4/20/99
I was sitting at my desk at video game company Ion Storm in Austin when I saw the Yahoo headline about a gun massacre by two disturbed students at Columbine High School in Colorado. Twelve students and teacher were quickly, brutally mowed down by Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, whose planted explosives devices failed to fully charge. The young killers had their sick fun and then committed suicide as is the wont with shooters on sprees. It was strange to watch this tragedy unfold, ironic in asmuch as I was writing for the company founded by my friend John Romero, whose game DOOM among other cultural items (Marilyn Manson; NATURAL BORN KILLERS) were singled out by media for “inspiring” the killers since Harris and Klebold were fans. That the main political focus was on blaming media and not the instant access of a small army to two psychotic teens revealed much about America’s hysterical myopic allegiance to the Second Amendment. 10 years later, nothing has changed.
April 20, 2009 at 6:40 pm
If only the teachers had been armed, right? Sigh.
November 24, 2009 at 1:50 am
i think that is horrible i heard it today at school i wish we can help them
December 1, 2009 at 6:42 pm
i WOULD LIKE TO START OFF WITH SAYING THE PARENTS ARE NOT RESPONSIBLE FOR THEIR CHILDS ACTION. WHAT THE HELL ARE THE SUPPOSE TO DO WHEN THEY ARE UNAWARE I MEAN THESE BOYS HAD EVERYTHING FIGURED OUT GOOD AND WAS ABLE TO HIDE IT FROM EVERYONE LET ME ASK YOU THIS WHERE WERE THE POLICE WHERE WAS THE PRINCIPAL AND EVERYONE ELSE AT THAT MATTER YOU ALL ACT LIKE THE PARENTS RAISED THEIR SONS TO BE KILLERS WELL NEWS FLASH THEY DIDNT WHEATHER YOU ADMIT IT OR NOT THE REAL FAULT IT IS IS THE KIDS AND TEACHERS AND THE STUDENTS I DIDNT KNOW THESE BOYS BUT THEY MUST OF DONE SOMETHING HORRIBLE TO MAKE TWO POOR BOYS TURN TO MURDER FOR REVENGE WHY CANT YOU PEOPLE SEE THAT THEY ARE NOT THE PROBLEM THIER JUST TWO PEOPLE WITH GUNS IN THEIR HANDS BECAUSE YOU DROVE THEM THAT WAY YOUR THE MURDERERS NOT THEM
April 20, 2009 at 6:49 pm
And the students. Especially them.
April 20, 2009 at 8:02 pm
Perhaps this is less about the 2nd amendment and more about keeping parents aware of what their kids are doing, and even more about finding better solutions for school safety. Educators need to be plugged into what is going on in their students lives through programs that support empowerment and student involvement.
April 20, 2009 at 11:22 pm
re: parental reponsiblility, i second that, but belicoseblog, i think you are kididng yourself if you don’t think what happened at columbine is ALL about the second ammendment. TEENAGE BOYS SHOULD NEVER, EVER BE ABLE TO PURCHASE SEMI-AUTOMATC WEAPONS OVER THE INTERNET/.
i recently watched an excellent episode of ‘zero hour’ on the columbine massacre, and as a parent what REALLY disturbed me was how completely absent these parents were in harris and klebold’s lives, how disconnected they were from their children who were virtual strangers to them, so much so that semi-automatic weapons were hidden in bedrooms for goodness sake. eric and dylan are responsible for their actions, but the neglect of those parents is INEXCUSABLE to my way of thinking and i’m sure those mums and dads have the rest of their lives to contemplate the consequences of their deplorable parenting.
November 24, 2009 at 1:52 am
i think that the parents should have been contacted that day by the police
April 20, 2009 at 11:27 pm
oh, sincerest apologies, i didn’t mean to post that yet, i have no idea how i managed to do that! i was typing REALLY fast and that version above is full of typos i hadn’t fixed yet. please to read proofread version below:
re:parental responsibility, i second that, but belicoseblog, i think you are kidding yourself if you don’t think what happened at columbine is ALL about the second amendment. TEENAGE BOYS SHOULD NEVER, EVER BE ABLE TO PURCHASE SEMI-AUTOMATC WEAPONS OVER THE INTERNET.
i recently watched an excellent episode of ‘zero hour’ on the columbine massacre, and as a parent what REALLY disturbed me was how completely absent these parents were in harris and klebold’s lives, how disconnected they were from their children who were virtual strangers to them, so much so that semi-automatic weapons were hidden in bedrooms for goodness sake. eric and dylan are responsible for their actions, but the neglect of those parents is INEXCUSABLE to my way of thinking and i’m sure those mums and dads have the rest of their lives to contemplate the consequences of their deplorable parenting.
.
April 21, 2009 at 6:32 pm
The parents were part and parcel of a gun culture in Arkansas that deifies the rights of gunowners, so I doubt anything would have changed had they noted the guns in the closet. I don’t think parents have as much control as they or society would like, so I don’t what the cure. But I do know that giving two mentally unstable teens access to weapons is BAD.
I’m reminded of THE PRESIDENT’S ANALYST: “Bing, that’s my car gun.”
April 22, 2009 at 1:20 am
that’s interesting, christian, about the parents and the attitude towards guns/gun culture, but going by the ‘zero hour’ documentary i saw (those ‘zero hour’ documentaries, produced by the BBC or ITV or one of those, are absolutely terrific), i can’t remember if it was dylan or eric who had guns/ammo and all sorts of really sick literature – and the diary and videotape they had been keeping all during their planning of the massacre – stashed in cubby holes and secret compartments under the bed etc. all over his bedroom. he knew his parents wouldn’t find them because they weren’t involved in his life; he knew they would never check his room so it was safe to keep a stunning amount of weapons and ammo there.
also, the fact that a complaint about the boys laid with the police not long before the massacre didn’t even get the parents involved in their obviously troubled son’s lives is just so hard to comprehend, as a parent myself. teenage boys need to be constantly encouraged to communicate and infused with a sense of family and belonging so they don’t go off the rails; parents who just switch off to their teen boy’s state of mind are negligent, imho, and in the case of harris and klebold, where the neglect was so complete – the boys often left to fend for themselves for days on end with the parents too busy or actually away for stretches at a time – complicit.
the fact those boys were in so much pain and had gone so far off the rails without the parents even noticing or taking any action is just mind-boggling. again, the massacre was just the end manifestation of a long disease left grossly untreated. gun control is crucial, but as far as people like dylan and eric just slipping through the cracks goes, it’s like an ambulance at the bottom of a cliff, imho
April 22, 2009 at 2:28 am
As far as all that goes, you are totally correct. Especially since the boys had already been busted. I’m not taking the folks off the hook, but I wonder if even with supervision the pair couldn’t still get the guns, which they would have. Or the denial of the parents who couldn’t conceive of their children killing…
April 22, 2009 at 3:20 am
yeah, i hear ya. it’s an age-old debate, and i come down really hard on the parents when it come to situations like this, but maybe i’ll whistle a different tune when my little guy is a teen and he’s bigger than me and what ever i say goes in one ear and out the other and he answers my questions with one syllable grunts!
April 22, 2009 at 3:43 pm
I’m sure your boy will be fine. He’s got a geek mom! The worst that could happen is he becomes a Republican;]
April 22, 2009 at 9:58 pm
lol, that WILL NEVER HAPPEN! (he’s in film school right now and absolutely loving it, it’s sort of hilarious how we mold our kids into little miniature versions of ourselves! poor kids, they never stand a chance)
May 27, 2009 at 1:23 pm
it was in colorado, not arkansas.
May 27, 2009 at 3:01 pm
Thank you! Correct.
August 25, 2009 at 5:43 am
You fucking hypocrite. It’s wrong to blame your shitty FPS, but it’s ok to blame a gun? The gun didn’t make them go and kill all those people. They got their weapons ILLEGALLY, no law would have stopped them anyway. You sicken me using this tragedy to push your agenda. Please do shove your viewpoints straight up your liberal, ignorant, pacifist asshole. No one gave them access to weapons. The only people at fault here are people like YOU, that think banning an object can solve the underlying problem of the moral decay of America.
August 25, 2009 at 5:48 am
Look at the words you’ve written and the tone and inner-rage. How about all the folks who get their guns LEGALLY and take out policemen? The moral decay comes from those who think the solution to gun violence is to bring them into churches — and a gun nut with LEGAL firepower shot up a church because of all that liberal moral decay. Ironic, huh? But thanks for taking time to vent. Makes me feel secure someone as balanced as you has access to firepower.
December 14, 2009 at 4:58 pm
FUCK HEAD
December 14, 2009 at 10:24 pm
Thank you for the chicken soup.
December 14, 2009 at 4:57 pm
Shut up christian sack of shit
December 14, 2009 at 10:24 pm
No, really. Thank you.
December 18, 2009 at 3:45 am
well you all have very good points here. but there is really nothin in the end that we can to do stop this. if someone is gonna snap they will. the kind of survaliance required to stop this would highly infringe upon legal rights because people are so unpredictable. and we have to be realastic here weither the guns were legal or not the boys would have found a way to do what they did. and personally some people react to much sometimes. i am a highschool student myself, and i have been “accused”of being just like these boys by my school officals and i was almost expelled because i made an ofhand joke to a personal friend that they had somehow got their hands on it. it was good that they had found out. cause imainge if i was like those boys, they could have stoped it there, and it was all a misundertaning that we can only hope will happen if the time comes where someone else attemts a similar foul deed