We’ve learned here in America that there’s just nothing quite like empowering a sociopathic gunman after his own death. After all, why leave him with the nasty label of deranged killer? Let’s have the decency to raise him to the status of martyr.
When I read the breaking news about the Virginia Tech gunman’s so-called “manifesto” I was intrigued by the quotes from the document. I worked in the counseling field for several years, and it was insight as to what was broken in his mind.
But when I saw the images being played (and played and played and played) all over mainstream news media, I was taken aback. Then disturbed. Then appalled. An image that particularly forced me to look away from the screen after the first time was the image of Cho pointing his weapon toward the camera. For a moment, I had a glimpse of what the victims may have experienced in their last seconds of life. I’m not sure I should ever have had that.
I have two issues here: first of all, why is the media slapping the victims and their families in the face with this? I’ve also worked in the journalism field for a while. The quotes were enough to carry a news-worthy story. The video should carry the same decision as graphic terrorist execution videos that the news media refuses to show: tell us it exists, quote the deranged ranting, and that’s enough. These victims don’t need more nightmares.
Secondly, by airing Cho’s videos we’ve given him exactly what he wanted. We’ve empowered him in death beyond what he was able to accomplish in life, even in his last horrific actions. There are other disturbed individuals out there, and now they have a twisted role model. Remember in Star Wars when Obi Wan Kenobi proved more powerful in death than he was in life? We’ve just created an evil version of that.
Not everything that’s newsworthy needs to be aired. Not everything that’s ethically acceptable is morally acceptable. To quote an Apostle, “Just because something is technically legal doesn’t mean that it’s spiritually appropriate” (I Corinthians 6:12a, The Message). While the public certainly has a right to know, the extent to which that information was disseminated in this case is a poor professional judgement call. It’s, ultimately, a poor spiritual decision, because the effect it has on the spirit of our nation and on the spirit of the victims, their families, as well as survivors at Tech, is absolutely poisonous. It’s a cancerous link to the past they are trying to leave behind.
And that’s the last thing they need right now.