Editing title as Morgan Freeman didn't say this. Regardless of who said it, I can agree with much of it.
These are * someone's * thoughts on the recent shootings. I've started a new thread because I feel the stories of those impacted should be heard and remembered, without having to sift through the debates and awful descriptions that are now entering the other thread.
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"TURN OFF THE NEWS......."
"You want to know why. This may sound cynical, but here's why.
It's because of the way the media reports it. Flip on the news and watch how we treat the Batman theater shooter and the Oregon mall shooter like celebrities. Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris are household names, but do you know the name of a single victim of Columbine? Disturbed people who would otherwise just off themselves in their basements see the news and want to top it by doing something worse, and going out in a memorable way. Why a grade school? Why children? Because he'll be remembered as a horrible monster, instead of a sad nobody.
CNN's article says that if the body count "holds up", this will rank as the second deadliest shooting behind Virginia Tech, as if statistics somehow make one shooting worse than another. Then they post a video interview of third-graders for all the details of what they saw and heard while the shootings were happening. Fox News has plastered the killer's face on all their reports for hours. Any articles or news stories yet that focus on the victims and ignore the killer's identity? None that I've seen yet. Because they don't sell. So congratulations, sensationalist media, you've just lit the fire for someone to top this and knock off a day care center or a maternity ward next.
You can help by forgetting you ever read this man's name, and remembering the name of at least one victim. You can help by donating to mental health research instead of pointing to gun control as the problem. You can help by turning off the news."
Emphasis mine.
You may not agree with everything he says, but I feel remembering the victims is important.
I honestly don't know why, but as much as hearing about kids dying in this way is really hard to take, there was something even harder for me about seeing the years in the birthdates in your post.
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Seeing the parent, not much older than, me was hard, and his response to the shooters family...
So emotional. I couldn't even fathom putting myself in there shoes. Nor would I, but in such a tragedy I too wish for peace and love.
Perhaps this is not the place to post this, but I think of the people that I literally "hate". They are few. However, this mans message brings a whole different perspective to forgiveness and peace. Can I forgive those people? He didn't say he forgives the shooter, but who can really blame him. It's a touching speech filled with much hurt and love. It's very moving and in such difficult times it is inspiringly written in his daughters memory.
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I will remember the heroes that arose and made this tragedy less than what it could have been. Victoria Soto and Rachel Divino were two teachers who died to protect their students. Tragic and touching.
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I don't know if it is conditioning by TV and movies that lead me to assume that heroes come in only so many forms, and that in the terrible chaos of events like this there is no room for heroes.
But I was really moved by the story of Victoria Soto. I didn't expect to read anything like that. It wasn't a situation of "right place, right time" or dumb luck. That woman in an instant saved children's lives while losing her own.
A teacher who died trying to protect her children in Sandy Hook school has been described as a dedicated educator who had her dream job.
Victoria Soto, 27, was one of six adults and 20 children killed in the elementary school shooting on Friday.
It is thought Soto died trying to shield her students. According to a cousin, Jim Wiltsie, a police officer, said the family had been told that Soto was attempting to get her class into a closet when the gunman entered the room. "In our eyes, she's a hero," Wiltsie told ABC News.
"She was trying to shield, getting her children into a closet and protect them from harm. And by doing that put herself between the gunman and the children and that is when she was tragically shot and killed."
Out of the chaos and horror emerged an incredible act of selflessness and bravery by one teacher who spent her final moments trying to protect her young students from harm.
Victoria Soto, 27, a first-grade teacher at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., ushered her students into a closet, and in so doing placed her body between them and the assailant.
"She was found huddled over her children, her students, doing instinctively what she knew was the right thing," her cousin Jim Wiltsie tells ABC News. "I'm just proud that Vicki had the instincts to protect her kids from harm," he continued. "It brings peace to know that Vicki was doing what she loved, protecting the children, and, in our eyes, she's a hero."
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I don't know if it is conditioning by TV and movies that lead me to assume that heroes come in only so many forms, and that in the terrible chaos of events like this there is no room for heroes.
But I was really moved by the story of Victoria Soto. I didn't expect to read anything like that. It wasn't a situation of "right place, right time" or dumb luck. That woman in an instant saved children's lives while losing her own.
That's what I will remember
It was sort of wrong place wrong time too.
All teachers/staff were protecting and shielding students. The shooter was only in the lobby and the first couple of classrooms. So if you (teacher or students) were in the back, you were safe.
Fortunately a lot of the kids were in the gym at the back of the school so they were safe.
good, another person sees the light. I've thought what he has for years, stop broadcasting their names all over the news. Instead of demonizing them, don't even announce their names, say the victims and then for the shooter just call them "generic gunman #47" that would really take a lot of motivation out of it if they knew their name was going to forgotten. Of course that would never happen because the news channels don't give a damn about their effect on social behavior, all they care about is ratings.
In Canada remember the recent shooting at the Parti Quebecois victory celebration? Canadian media reported the important information, yes they did broadcast the shooter's name but I can't remember it anymore, can you?
Dawn Hochsprung, the principal of Sandy Hook elementary school who was among the six adults killed in the Friday shooting, had led the almost 700-pupil school according to the values she had long espoused: inclusiveness, creativity, and academic ambition.
As confirmation that she was among the dead circulated in the small community of Newtown, where the school that she had led for the past two years is one of the central pillars, there was an outpouring of emotion from the parents of her charges and friends. "Dawn Hochsprung touched many of our hearts with her professionalism and love for her students," said the first selectman for nearby Bethlehem in Connecticut, Jeff Hamel.
Dawn Czaplicki, who had known the principal since their own high school days, remembered her as "a mature and very smart young lady full of life and always had a smile on her face that could only warm your heart."
In the two years that she led the Sandy Hook elementary, Hochsprung, 47, had emphasised its strong community role. When she sent memos to parents she would address them to the "Sandy Hook family".
In Canada remember the recent shooting at the Parti Quebecois victory celebration? Canadian media reported the important information, yes they did broadcast the shooter's name but I can't remember it anymore, can you?
And after about a day, it was off the news.
For every story like that we have another story where a guy murders a guy and mails his body parts all across the country and has his name on the news every day for about two months following.
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Woah, I've never got tears in my eyes from a news story before but scrolling down and just seeing that little girls face in the embedded youtube clip really got me.
I think Columbine was the worst in terms of treating the shooters like 'celebrities.' Or maybe I just remember it much better as I was in high school at the time too, and a lot of changes were made in terms of lockdowns and security protocols.
I think Columbine was the worst in terms of treating the shooters like 'celebrities.' Or maybe I just remember it much better as I was in high school at the time too, and a lot of changes were made in terms of lockdowns and security protocols.
It is beyond sad.
In my opinion that was certainly the worst example. "Trench Coat Mafia"... they might as well have been given a theme song.
For every story like that we have another story where a guy murders a guy and mails his body parts all across the country and has his name on the news every day for about two months following.
Apples and oranges. There are times when you want the perpetrator's name and face all over the news - when they are at large and the subject of a worldwide manhunt being one of them.
Apples and oranges. There are times when you want the perpetrator's name and face all over the news - when they are at large and the subject of a worldwide manhunt being one of them.
"Turn off the news......."
