What's the Difference?

Almost a year ago 32 people died at Virginia Tech. It was a horrible act and a horrible time for all of us on the east coast, especially here in Virginia. Many of my friends knew people who died, myself included. Funerals and wakes are odd places to reconnect with lost high school friends, and though we all miss Max and wish she was there, it felt to me more like a mini reunion. Of course the funeral itself was heart wrenching, but otherwise we all went to Glory Days and had drinks and a few laughs.

I knew about the VT shootings as they were happening. I was getting ready for the day and my roommate looked up from her computer as I was fixing my hair. She looked odd and said “There was a shooting at Tech, a couple people were killed”. I didn’t really react right away, instead saying, “That’s awful, lets go to lunch”. When we got to the dining hall the televisions were on, and as we passed them, the numbers started to spike. From 9 to 30 dead? What is going on? CNN must have it wrong. 30 dead? Really? That can’t be right, they probably mean 3. typo, yeah, that’s it. Except that wasn’t it. And no one could look away from the televisions. It wasn’t the tense eerily silent atmosphere of 9-11, people were still talking and eating and being in college, but glances kept moving to the tvs. Those tvs were always on the price is right or espn the entire time I was in college, but that day they were all on news outlets. Every single one.

I mention this not to relive those moments, or the moments returning to my room when the sheer enormity of the violence hit me. I bring this up because 6 people are dead at Northern Illinois University. And I didn’t know. I mean, there was some buzz, but no one I know was affected directly, so there was no need for me to pay any special attention. So I didn’t. But then I read my aunt’s blog today and I started to think about the fact that I didn’t pay attention. Was it because no one I knew was involved? Or was it because the campus itself is so far removed from me? Even if Maxine had survived, the tech shootings were a very real part of my world. So why was the Illinois shooting not worth my time?

People will claim that the Tech shootings got more publicity because more people were killed, but though that may be true, it is not justified. The people killed in Illinois had just as many people who loved them as those in Virginia. Is it a Midwest thing? My mother would rail that the Midwest is maligned by the coasts, and that could be why. There are too many possibilities as to why Illinois has been “less” newsworthy, at least in my circles. Its just sad.

“The shooting was the fourth at a U.S. school within a week. On Feb. 8, a woman shot two fellow students to death before committing suicide at Louisiana Technical College in Baton Rouge. In Memphis, a 17-year-old is accused of shooting and critically wounding a fellow student Monday during a high school gym class. The 15-year-old victim of a shooting at an Oxnard, Calif., junior high school has been declared brain dead.”