My Thoughts After [Insert Campus Name Here]

Before I created Patronomics 101, I used to have a blog while I was in graduate school. I used that blog as a way to keep my writing flowing. I hadn’t really gone back to my old posts until this week, after the recent shooting at Michigan State University. After reading this story in The Atlantic about the incident, I went back to a blog post I wrote on the eve of the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007, when I was still in Champaign-Urbana, IL. I read it again and the fact that it’s 2023 and a 16-year-old post doesn’t seem that outdated is concerning. I’m reposting as a way to continue healing in the wake of so much senseless violence everywhere.

April 18, 2007

Thoughts After the Virginia Tech Tragedy

Greetings to all my fellow bloggers and friends around the world. As you can tell, I’ve chosen Maroon and Orange for this blog. This entire blog is dedicated to the 32 victims of the Virginia Tech shootings this past Monday. However, a special dedication to the memories of two of the victims: Professor Liviu Librescu, who showed us the ultimate sacrifice a teacher can (and when need may be, must) make, and Professor James Bishop, a “brother” of mine, if you will, since he (just as I am now) was a Fulbright Alum in Germany. Peace to all of them in their resting places and my prayers to all of them, friends, and families.

On my with blog:

Thoughts in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech Tragedy: Some of my reflections and cathartic thoughts

Before I start, a caveat: I assume sole responsibility of these thoughts. They are my catharsis. I’ve been choking tears for the last three days and I need this to clear my mind. They represent my uncertainty, my sadness, and even my anger. However, I’m trying to be fair and honest.

We’re all Hokies… because we all could’ve been Illini.

It has been a sad week for anyone who attends a university anywhere in the world. In the morning of April 16, 2007, 32 students and faculty died in the hands of another student, who was disenchanted with life and decided to make them (and us at large) the recipients of his unjustified nemesis (more on that later). It is an unfortunate day because this could really have happened anywhere else. For all we know, it could’ve been in Champaign, Illinois, and now I’d have to be calling everybody else to tell them I am alive and safe. I prayed to God on Tuesday morning when all I had to talk to my mom was about my sister’s broken ankle. When that’s the topic of conversation compared to what could’ve been about, as Friar Lawrence would say, “Therefore thou art happy.”

Why did this happen, we all wonder? Part of it is the very nature of these universities. In terms of safety, these are monolithic constructions in the middle of small towns. I mean, how would you feel if someone tried to place the Eiffel Tower in your backyard? Overwhelmed? Mad as hell? Some folks here might if you think about the social imbalances on both sides of the invisible fence that college campuses have created. True, this time it was a student himself who perpetrated such atrocities, but what might preclude someone unaffiliated with the university to try to teach us a lesson in inequality and injustice? Then, there’s the very nature of the academic life at these universities. Virginia Tech, just as Illinois, is a Research University. The demands are high and the pressure sometimes even higher. It is not hard to crack under pressure, believe me. We all feel the weight under our shoulders, and anyone who says otherwise is full of it, I promise. The thing is, some of us have other outlets to relieve the pressure, some of us have close and good friends who rescue us day in and day out. That Korean kid had none of them. I’m neither defending nor justifying his actions. Let me get this straight: No matter how much pressure you live under, there’s no excuse to punish others for it, especially if the punishment is death. You can always seek other outlets, seek counseling, talk to someone.

However, this is a cautionary tale for all of us. How many people do we know that never talk to anyone? We have seen them at lecture halls, we have seen them at coffee shops, we have seen them at the libraries, yet we hide under the shield of our papers, research, and dissertations to avoid them. We classify them as “weird” or “creepy” when maybe there’s someone worth talking to. There are 45,000 students at the U of I. How many loners are there roaming our campus? I think we need to be more careful and try to find ways to help them if we know a case. They might not go ballistic on anyone, but they might hurt themselves. That we cannot allow it either.

I am trying to make sense of these events using the University as a field, devoid of the “It’s in the USA” discussion. Contextualizing this in the “those gringos brought it to themselves” cloud is not my point (and I know for a fact that some folks around the world — as I noticed in a forum I read in a Colombian newspaper — are actually celebrating this… probably not in South Korea, though). I still think something like this, or along these lines, could happen elsewhere. We have universities all over the world, and they are a microcosm of our societies. Am I advocating for lessening the demands so that our students don’t go bananas someday? No. It’s not my style to call for mediocrity. I wasn’t raised to be mediocre, and I thank my parents for that. I am advocating for present and future faculty to be less of a Professor and more of a Teacher. I mentioned in a past blog how I saw myself as a teacher. That’s what we need: More professors and teaching assistants who care more for their students or at least as much as they do for their research. We need faculty who can give students what Wikipedia will never be able to: a comforting hand in the times of need, a voice of support when we’re down, to show that we care for the scholars they can be but even more so for the person they are. And for that, we don’t need a goddamn Ph.D. We just need a heart.

The Ultimate Sacrifice

Here I want to stop and pay tribute to Professor Liviu Librescu, one of the true HEROES of A-16. For those who haven’t heard yet. Prof. Librescu, a former Holocaust survivor, gave his life away to save his students. He blocked his classroom door with HIS OWN BODY to allow his students to escape. In the process, the bullets hit him and his life was over. Sometimes people question teachers too lightly and claim they’re not doing their job right. I get teary-eyed when I think of this. The reason: I know I would’ve done EXACTLY THE SAME under those circumstances. NO BULLSHIT THERE. It is not our job to put our lives in the line of fire, as police or firefighters do every day, but we know there are risks. Sometimes I think about that scene and what if I had been there. I teach a class, and I care for my students’ safety. So, to those of you who dare criticize teachers, let me look at you straight in the eye, and let me ask you: Would you be willing to care for and protect a group of kids to the point of giving your life to save theirs? Ok… so pretty please, with sugar on top, GET OFF MY TEACHERS’ BACKS!!!!! Thank you.

Here I’d also take a moment to thank a teacher who showed me 18 years ago what teaching is about. The year: 1989. The place: My high school, French class. The scenario: A group of thieves broke into our campus to avoid the police. The police entered the campus in pursuit of the criminals. Gunshots galore followed. It was about 11 am. Our French teacher, after hearing the gunfire, yelled at us all, “everybody down, hide under the seats!” and immediately asked us to barricade the door with desks. True, he was a little agitated at the time and we all took it as a joke of an overreacting teacher back them. But, in hindsight, it was the right thing to do: Make sure the thieves wouldn’t have a chance to enter the room. After reading what some students at VT did to prevent the killer to break into their rooms, throw desks against the door, I cannot help but say: THANKS, LEON, wherever you are. Be as it may, you cared so much for our lives and you weren’t overreacting after all. You were just being a concerned teacher.

I’m not playing the blame game

Right now, it’s very easy to start blaming everybody for what happened at Blacksburg. Some will go on and blame video games. Others will blame hip-hop or rap or heavy metal, etc. For all we know, someone will blame Barack Obama and others will blame Hillary Rodham Clinton. And many will blame Hollywood. Finally, some will just blame the United States at large. I’m still trying to make sense of this tragedy; as I said, it could’ve been Champaign-Urbana just the same. Blaming video games is pointless. True, some of them depict violence, but for all I know a U of Illinois alumnus created Mortal Kombat and you don’t see people here trying to rip each other’s hearts off in the Quad. Blame it on TV? Too easy. Blame it on the permissive gun culture in the U.S.? It’s plausible but others are debating now as we speak. True, getting access to guns here is easier than it is in Colombia for instance (9mm pistols, for example, are restricted by law for exclusive use by members of the armed forces) but instances of violence can outburst anywhere. And, unfortunately, where there is an evil will there is an evil way. Whose fault is it then? Everybody’s and nobody’s. It’s nobody’s fault because sometimes we cannot control what goes on in other people’s minds. But it’s out fault because sometimes we ourselves, as I mentioned above, are fostering the existence of social outcasts due to the very circles we create.

I also said that I wasn’t going to go down the easy road and blame tne U. S. of A. for all of this. That’s too simplistic and misses the point. True, there are some things that the government has done which have begotten more violence elsewhere. That’s just one side of this country, which a lot of folks here don’t agree with either and are just as disgusted by. I have lived and felt another side of this society. That of people who are willing to lend you a hand when nobody else would. I’ve had people offer me help, emotional, economic, and otherwise, in times of need. I have people here offer me their undivided friendship and care. I have cared for and loved people in this country, so I can’t just go and say, “They deserve it”. Trust me:

Nobody deserves to see their friends or compatriots die, NOBODY!!!!

I’ve seen people from all over the country show their support for those who died on Monday, and I can assure you that if some of these people weren’t blindfolded by their own goverment as many are would care for other people’s deaths also. Saying that everybody in the U.S. are inconsiderate and don’t care about the world is as pointless as now thinking that all Koreans are one massacre waiting to happen (Which is utterly false. I have GREAT, AMAZING friends from Korea, and I can assure you they’re terrified by all this) or calling us all Colombians Mules or Cokeheads just because you think we are all ready to pull a “Maria Full of Grace” at the next U.S. Airport. Just as I don’t think all Arabs are walking suicide bomb either (I cried for my Lebanese friends last year when I heard about the bombings in the summer). This is a sad day for all of us. As is every day that soldiers and civilians alike die in Iraq, or as people die in Darfur for ethnic purposes, and I could go on and on. It’s a sad day because someone else decided that his life was so worthless that it was worth taking 32 others along with his. That’s what makes it sad. It is sad to think that life means so little for others when there are couples out there crying night in and night out trying to bring a life here. It is sad to think that life means so little for someone when there are thousands breathing through machines who would’ve traded places with that Korean kid and have the new lease on life they don’t have right now.

My Tears Tonight, My Challenge Tomorrow…

That’s why I cry. Because deep inside me, I know although I have made something to make other people’s lives worthwhile, I still haven’t made enough and need to do more. I cry for those 32, along with all the thousands that died today and no one talked about on Facebook or wrote a tribute to on a blog, because they all missed the chance to make a difference. I cry because there are children who died in Iraq and elsewhere today whom I won’t be able to call brothers and sisters when they would’ve been bestowed the honor to be Fulbright students or come to the University of Illinois. I cry for them because they don’t have anymore the chance that I still have: The chance to still make a difference for someone. Why me and not them? I’ll leave it up to God himslef to explain that to me one day, not that he needs to justify his choosing me over all of them. It is up to me to honor that decision. And I’ll cry for them because I mean it, not to make a spectacle of it all. And I know some of these tears are for my grandmother, whom I kindly ask to take care of those who died at Blacksburg and other parts of the world, as she did for me and my cousins at some point in time. I’m not afraid to admit that I’ve cried while writing this blog. Because I’m human and I care for other people’s suffering, even if I don’t know them. It’s because I never will that I care and even cry in the end.

Tonight, I’ll pray for all of them. What will I do tomorrow? Very simple: I’ll get up early and go to work. And I’ll continue fulfilling the mission that I set for myself when I left home 5 years ago. And I will give my friendship and love to those near me and, if possible, those far away from me. In the end, the best tribute we can pay to those Hokies and others is not just to keep living, but to keep living with intensity. It’s about making every day worthwhile. As cliche as it seems, we never know when it’ll be the last. And, as my mom always keeps telling my sister and me, “EN VIDA, HERMANO, EN VIDA.” That is, while living, my brother, while living. Why wait to tell someone how awesome they are during an eulogy. Tell them in every which way you can. Heck, even Facebook poking may do that! You can read a poke as “here he goes again annoying me” or “damn, someone took two seconds of their busy time to look for me and annoy me with a poke… that’s kinda cool!”

In the end, we can’t replace anyone who’s died, but we may as well try to make up for their absence by giving it all every day of the rest of our lives. That is the challenge for us all. Let’s remember them all by living life at its fullest and taking advantage of those little luxuries they no longer have, such as breathing the air and feeling the sun in our heads. It’s about giving other people the luxury that Korean kid didn’t have: To have someone call him “Friend” or “Brother”. We sometimes underestimate the power they have. But what difference can they make in one person’s life. They can be the difference between spending $570 on a gun or $570 on a home theater to invite their friends over for movies and popcorn. Ridiculous? Try asking those 32+ 1 who died on Monday.

That’s it for now. I’ll be back soon with, I hope, a more uplifting blog. Take care of yourselves, my friends and brothers/sisters out there. I’d hate to hear I won’t be able to know you’re alive tomorrow… and by the way, all of you…

ARE AWESOME!!!!!!!!!!!!

The Blogger, The Thinker, The Provocateur
Raul A. (El Patron)