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FORCED INTO A CORNER Can we learn from Virginia Tech? Or: How social exclusion led to a killing spree in an American university    | Hugh Cleary (OXFORD). “You forced me into a corner and gave me only one option? ... Thanks to you I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people ... Your Mercedes wasn’t enough, you brats? Your golden necklaces weren’t enough, you snobs? Your trust fund wasn’t enough? Those weren’t enough to fulfil your hedonistic needs? You had everything.” The words of Cho Seung Hui, recorded on video, shortly before he went into university and killed 32 of his fellow students.    The self-glorification, the jealousy, the bitterness, the attempted moral justification of such a reprehensible act are not worth our time. The idea that we should read the murderer’s words and learn from them is repugnant and offensive. Yet to dismiss the individual simply as “evil” or mad (though he clearly was both) is an equally unjustifiable failure to get to grips with the reasons for his actions — which is the least his victims deserve. One question should be tackled above all others: why did this crime (and the similar Columbine massacre of 1999) take place in the USA, while no similar event has ever taken place in the UK or Italy, for example.    In Cho’s justification we see dissatisfaction with the priorities of a society where money and materialism come ahead of the individual, who is forced to conform. Currently doing the rounds on the internet are two short plays he wrote as an undergraduate. They are demonstrations of adolescent angst, focusing on a hatred of authority (in the forms of a stepfather and a teacher, respectively). This theme: rebellion against authority, wealth or capitalism is familiar to students all over the world. So why does it only come to such extreme violence in America?    One answer would be that the healthy outlets for dissatisfaction are less accessible in the US than in Europe, a situation which encourages a search for more drastic means of expression. In Europe, universities are, in general, havens of alternative viewpoints on society. In America, on the other hand, the private system makes universities just as much the preserve of the rich upper class as company boardrooms or the White House. From the perspective of a Cho Seung Hui, universities are part of the problem, cooperating with the system which denied him his point of view.    Cho’s actions make no constructive or justified criticism of America. But they are a reminder that societies must give a voice to their opponents, or the results can be tragic. Ultimately, a democracy is built on the foundation that everybody gets their say, and — at the price of innocent lives — Cho Seung Hui never had his. | Similar articles: — Amok & Psyche (2006) — Erfurt International (2002)