Response to a Tragedy

There are a number of ways to respond to the shock of a national calamity. The shootings at Virginia Tech have awakened us in many ways to the lack of morality and Godlessness we see in our everyday lives. Some on the Left have chosen to use this as the calling card for gun control, or the outright repeal of the 2nd Amendment. Some on the Right have taken the opportunity to decry the foolishness in supposed "gun-free zones" and the lack of personal responsibility required of young adults in America.

Some, such as David Skorton, the president of Cornell and former president of the University of Iowa, and Betty Trachtenberg, the dean of students at Yale, have use the tragedy to advance their idiotic notions of morality and justice. Skorton has made calls for the country to honor the "33rd victim," the murderer of innocents as "a member of our family." The dean of students at Yale has used the shootings at Virginia tech to ban all weapons from campus - including fake ones used in dramatic productions. She then amended the ban so that students could use "obviously fake" weapons such as wooden swords in productions.

What really needs to be done? We need a culture of intellectual discourse and defense. Physical defense will follow intellectual defense, but in so many ways our institutions of higher learning do nothing to teach responsibility and logical discourse in the name of "diversity," "multiculturalism," or "sensitivity." We need college students to understand that the institutions will not and can not protect them - not from physical harm or unwanted intellectual stimulus. Students are adults and claiming colleges can protect them is both untrue and unwise. Finally, we must be "realistic about reality" and acknowledge that "gun-free zones" and attacks on our rights as Americans to bear arms does nothing to secure ourselves or our students safety. CNN anchors that accuse the gun store proprietor of murder never questioned the fertilizer store owner who sold ammonium nitrate in Oklahoma City or blamed the presidential administration for Columbine. Crime will not be stopped by preventing citizens from arming themselves, because the law-breakers won't stop buying guns when it becomes illegal.

What response is necessary? Remember that you are responsible for yourself, and that you have only one comfort in life and in death.