Re:Beyond words... (Score 1)

I do not agree with your viewpoint at all. Essentially, you are blaming the victims for this shooting. This is no one's fault except for the man who pulled the trigger. This is not an extreme viewpoint, this is not a narrow-minded "ignoring the root of the problem" view point as you argue that it is. This man was mentally ill, and has a history of disturbing behaviour. He was accused of stalking a few women back in 2005 - is that the women's fault because he found them to be good-looking? According to your mentality, the answer is yes. It is not the victims' fault that he was the way he was. It is not their fault that he felt compelled to kill people. Whether he could control his own actions or not, it most certainly was NOT the fault of the victims so don't you dare try and blame us. And we are all victims. The deceased, their families, the students & staff at Virginia Tech, Virginia residents, American residents, North American residents. This is our society, and we all have an expectation to take part in it without having to worry about a random psycho killing people. And when this does happen, that behaviour must be condemned. On a separate issue that involves the same mentality, Norway in the recent past experienced massive increases in rape on Norwegian women by new immigrants. It makes no difference whether these statistics are correct - for the sake of the argument I'm happy to assume that they are not correct just to avoid any sidetracking (and there always are serious questions with the validity of statistics of such complicated issues anyway). But a certain member of the Norwegian government believed them to be true, and his response was that it was the fault of the Norwegian women themselves for dressing in provocative clothing (normal clothing for Western women) that immigrant men were not used to. The women were asked by this member of government to dress more conservatively to reflect this. Yes, different issue altogether, but the EXACT same mentality and I hope this example of a different scenario was successful in illustrating the problem with this issue. The victims are being blamed, and the offender's behaviour is sympathized with. This is a common trend in Western extreme leftist camps today. I applaud your intentions for trying to get to the "root" of the problem and attempting to look beyond the mere surface. But I believe that you have erred in your endeavor. We have all been victimized by this tragedy, and you are victimizing us a second time by blaming us for being victims. How dare you do this to promote your personal ideology?