Rant

[pat]

:steps on soapbox: :deep breath:

I really hate when people check their critical thinking skills at the door.

Remember that story about the boy that was arrested for writing zombie stories? The way it played out in the press and on the Internet, this poor kid was being persecuted for being imaginative by people paranoid of anything that smacked of being different. The fact that it happened in Kentucky only made people jump on it more.

Turns out that the story is not what it seemed. A media savvy kid was able to rally people to his defense based on nothing more than his own description of what was in the writings, and people's willingness to assume that people in law enforcement (particularly in a Southern state like Kentucky) are overzealous idiots.

Are there a lot of overreactions out there from police and school officials nervous of another Columbine? Probably. But should we automatically assume that every kid like this is somehow just misunderstood by people too hidebound to recognize creativity?

Klebold and Harris wrote about their plans for Columbine a great deal before they ever killed anyone. (BTW, anyone who still holds on to the mythology that the Columbine killers were simply misunderstood loners who snapped should consider the fact that they started planning it a year in advance.) There are reasons authorities now take it seriously when a kid writes about shooting up a school. And in the case in Kentucky, there is at least some evidence that it went beyond mere writing.

So what's the answer? Is the kid a misunderstood genius or a budding psychopath? I don't know, but I do recognize the issue to be far more complex and difficult to answer than many people seem to think. Not many things in this world are black and white -- this is no exception.

And I know something else.

A while back, there was a big stink about a teacher in my area allegedly being reprimanded for teaching his elementary school kids about the Declaration of Independence. No, what the guy did was distribute a packet of teachings that included writings from religious figures of the era making the case that the US was a Christian country. Yes, the writings had historical value, and teaching them in context to a *high school* history class would have been appropriate, but that wasn't what happened. Yet the right wing trumpeted this as an example of political correctness gone amok. Many people on the left (and I include myself in this case) derided what they saw as a lack of rational thought on the part of conservatives.

Could someone explain to me how the Kentucky case is any different, save that it's guys on the left who are screaming?

::steps down from soapbox::

Thank you for your indulgence.

Comments

[calebbullen.livejournal.com]

I dunno. Based on the story alone, it still seems like too little to bust a kid for. At least in America it does. Seems like what one ought to do if one is unsure as to whether young billy is likely to go horrifically violent or not, is check with the school to see if he's been odd or given other indications, if he has then maybe have a mental health professional have a crack at the kid.

To me, involving the cops based off a short story, even if the person does intend to kill his whole class, is overkill. I'm sorry to have to take it there but who else's fiction are we going to use as an excuse to squirrel them away?

Besides, as you pointed out about the columbine kids, it's not like these things exist in a vacuum. If a person is liable to start killing people, there are usually more signs than their creative writing projects.

I think it's perfectly normal and sane to give a kid a second look based on a seemingly threatening bit of writing or whatnot but you don't call the authorities based on it. Either there's something else there you can get them nabbed for or they've just got a wacky imagination.

I once co-wrote a story where the whole federal govt gets wiped out by our own mutant super-warriors, did that mean I'm likely to violently overthrow the govt? No. Should older and wiser people maybe have had a looksee to make sure? Probably.

[patgreene.livejournal.com]

The kid's been corresponding with someone who claims to have acquired guns and other weapons.

[calebbullen.livejournal.com]

I know, I read that. Maybe I read the article wrong but didn't they find that after they busted him?

And is that even a criminal offense? I knew lots of kids when I was in high school who had weapons. Not a one ever used them in school that I know of.

The kid may be perfectly suitable for some counseling and whatnot, I'm guessing his parents or whoever is raising him should be looked at a bit too, (I still think the columbine parents ought to have been arrested) and if he's committed a crime, bust him.

[patgreene.livejournal.com]

If he is planning a crime, and there is evidence that he is planning in concert with others, he *has* commited a crime: criminal conspiracy. Conspiracy to commit murder is a crime whether or not the murder actually takes place.

[calebbullen.livejournal.com]

Exactly.

[klwalton.livejournal.com]

(I still think the columbine parents ought to have been arrested)

On what charge?

[calebbullen.livejournal.com]

For whatever it is that they did to those kids to make them that way. It would take a little snooping around and I'm not suggesting we start arresting parents on the mere suggestion of abuse but people don't just get born evil, or good for that matter. You have to raise them that way.

You show me most any serial or mass murderer and I'll show you a childhood chock full of abuse. I'm just playing the odds that if you look at how those kids were brought up, you'll find a closet with more skeletons than those kids had guns. A person who does that to a kid, ought to be punished.

[patgreene.livejournal.com]

Not, apparently, the Columbine killers. (http://columbine.free2host.net/eric.html) Ted Kaczynski claimed he was verbally abused, but there is no evidence to show that he suffered other abuse. (http://www.crimelibrary.com/terrorists_spies/terrorists/kaczynski/12.html?sect=22) (And remember, Kaczynski had siblings who turned out perfectly normally, with a normal sense of right and wrong: Ted's brother was the one who turned him into police.) And Jefferey Dahmer had a perfectly normal childhood. (http://www.crimelibrary.com/serial_killers/notorious/dahmer/why_4.html)

Not all serial killers had abusive childhoods. Not all people who were abused as children turn into serial killers. Are you more likely to end up a serial killer if you were abused? Maybe. But that's not enough to charge anyone of anything, absent other evidence.

How a person turns out depends upon a complicated interplay of factors, of which the parents are an important but not a sole determinative. There are also inherited emotional and psychological traits, for example.

[patgreene.livejournal.com]

(I still think the columbine parents ought to have been arrested)

The people who I know who think that way are generally not parents. Raising teenagers is trickier than it looks. I hope to God when my kid is that age I am enough in his confidence to know what's going on with him, but that might not be the case.

Besides, you want to hold the parents accountable but don't want the kids hauled in before they can do harm, where there is reason to believe that they might?

[calebbullen.livejournal.com]

I think you misunderstand me, I don't think they should be held accountable for their kids shooting people. I don't think parents should be held accountable for their kids misbehavior be it mild or extreme, as you said raising teenagers is tricky and most any teenager is going to get into some kind of trouble.

But I don't believe a kid gets so disturbed that he kills a bunch of people and himself without having gone through wholesale abuse, the parents should be punished for that. And I do think that when you get hints that that might be going on, like when a kid has a story where everyone in their school gets killed or they have a website that outlines how they want to kill everyone, the parents ought to be looked at first. And I'm not saying that you use the kids acting out as proof, I'm just saying it's probably cause to look deeper. If you can't find anything, then the parents are off scott free.

Maybe I'm just old fashioned but I think arresting kids should be the last resort after you've tried to treat them and or rehabilitate them. Sure, you can't always do that but don't you have to try?

[anotheranon.livejournal.com]

FWIW, there's some psychological analysis to suggest that Harris was indeed a psychopath (http://slate.msn.com/id/2099203/) - whether he was born or made, it seems certain that if he was, he was going to turn to murder at some point in his life.

I'm not sold that the parents should be held completely accountable for what their sons became, but I still find it staggering that the boys built a small arsenal in their family homes and the parents didn't know about it(!) I'm not sure there is a penalty for sheer ignorance :(

[patgreene.livejournal.com]

I still find it staggering that the boys built a small arsenal in their family homes and the parents didn't know about it(!) I'm not sure there is a penalty for sheer ignorance :(


I thought that way too, until I had a teenager. The only reason that kid can't keep secrets is that we have five people crammed into a 1000 square foot house, and there's simply no room.