Tag Archives: school shootings

Boycott of Violence?

The drama club at Marysville-Pilchuck High School performed a play, as do many high school drama teams. But this high school is the place where a student recently shot five of his friends during a lunch hour, then killed himself.

The drama group had finished the last rehearsal for the play just before the tragedy occurred. The play contained violence. After the shooting, the group decided the portrayal of violence would remind too many students of the event which tore apart their world.

So they rewrote the script to take out all references to violence. It was voluntary, of course, a recognition that even simulated violence can overwhelm.

Admittedly, the events at the high school are not common. Yet they are becoming more common. And those of us not directly affected by an incident see it in the news and experience it vicariously.

Who knows how far voluntary boycotts of violent entertainment might curtail the current rise in violence itself?

 

Violence as Addiction

This time it happened closer to home, a small town we pass through from time to time. A young man shot four of his fellow students in a high school cafeteria, then himself. The shooter had been, to all appearances, a popular and well-adjusted young man.

I cannot imagine the anguish and soul searching that is occurring among families and friends. The tragedy touches anyone who was close to the shooter or the two friends who have already died or the two still in hospital, one remaining in critical condition. It will haunt the living for the rest of their lives.

No use to speculate on the motives of this particular young man. Let the families have their privacy.

Looking through my newspaper’s weekly movie guide a day or so later, however, I noticed how many of our movies are rated “R” due to violence. Is the violence we choose to call entertainment related to the increasing number of people, whether mentally ill or not, who use a gun to work out whatever is bothering them? We seem to be as addicted to violence as we are to drugs.

 

How Hope Overwhelms the Shootings at Seattle Pacific University

Which of us hasn’t sorrowed at the school shootings which seem to happen regularly these days? The one at Seattle Pacific University two days ago, however, especially affected me.

Seattle is the closest major city to my home. More than that, I’ve attended a writers’ conference there. I receive SPU’s Response magazine each quarter in the mail. I’ve quoted from it in this blog. I know at least one writer on the staff there. Each week, a guided Bible reading from the school arrives in my inbox that I use in my daily devotions.

SPU is affiliated with the Free Methodist denomination. The college lays great stress on the connection between faith and service in the wider world.

According to news reports, a lone gunman entered a building on campus and killed one person and seriously wounded two others. Another student is credited with saving more individuals from harm by attacking the gunman with pepper spray and disarming him.

What stands out for me in this tragic episode is not only the heroism of the student who dared confront the gunman. Even more significant for me are the images of hundreds of students from the university sitting afterwards in circles on the SPU campus holding hands and praying. They comforted each other in huddles. They gathered together for prayer in a nearby church.

I’m sure every student at SPU at this time will live forever influenced by this event. However, those students reacting to tragedy by coming together in spiritual community send a stronger message. They convince me that a force stronger than evil is loose in this world and will ultimately prevail.