Thanks to Dr. Frantz, Associate Professor of Coolness at Fayetteville State University, for the following link:
Stephen King weighs in on the idea that fiction ought to have been an indicator that Cho was planning a massacre.
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Well, I’ll stay Associate Professor of Coolness, but IRL, I’m a mere Assistant Professor! 😉
Thanks for sharing this. It needed to be said.
I live awfully near Fayetteville, Prof. . . Maybe I should come take a class from you. 😀
A thousand HELL YEAH, what he said!
Hey, come on over. Next semester I’m teaching 18th Century literature, if you can stomach it! 😉
But I think it’s a good idea for a teacher or whoever to pay attention to someone who’s work displays the kind of imagery in Cho’s work. It might be one indicator that a person could be off his trolley. Taken on it’s own isn’t very indicative of anything, but if it also goes with being a loner, behaving in strange anti social ways as he was, having a history of mental illness as he did, it could shout warning bells as it seemed to with some of his teachers.
I hope no one’s reading my fiction with a mind to divine my mental state. I’d be locked up for a nymphomaniacal pervert enemy-of-the-state.
Bow down 🙂
That was great, Mr King!
I knew a guy in high school that worshipped King and wrote some weird stuff. He wanted to be him. He was strange but there were dozens of guys waaaayyyy scary than he was.
I hate it when people blame someone’s asshat behavior on their reading the wrong book or hearing the wrong music. It’s not the author/artist/musician’s fault if some nut adopts their work as some sort of Homicidal Bible.
I read my first Stephen King book in third grade. (Firestarter). I have read his and many others just as twisted all my life, and I LOVE slasher flicks. I had a totally crappy school career and was picked on,etc. I’m a Red Sox fan, even. Did I go nuts and kill anyone? Of course not.
Why?
BECAUSE I WAS TAUGHT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG, AND THAT KILLING PEOPLE IS WRONG.
If kids are being raised by the media, then they’re not learning that concept at all. In fact, the total opposite.
‘it could shout warning bells as it seemed to with some of his teachers.’
I think that’s the issue—it could be a kid ready to shoot up the place, or just a stressed teen letting off steam by writing vivid imagery, so they tend to note it, then sit back and watch instead of stepping right up.
Mr. King appears to have hit the nail on the head. The kid wasn’t very creative, and that was all his writing reflected. Plenty of people write far more disturbing things and otherwise live perfectly normal lives. And hell, I’m medically psychotic, and I write light comedy.
Damn, I wish I could take a class from him . . .
On the whole, I don’t think you can pick these guys out based on their work, unless you look for violence unenlivened by any real talent.
Am I the only one a little disturbed by King’s last sentence? Because seriously, how many adolescent or post-adolescent “writers” have a boatload of talent to distinguish them from potential mass murderers? And what about the talented shooters?
From the King of Gore I was hoping for complete slaughter of the ‘you can predict violent behavior from someone’s creative work’ equation.
I wonder if Video Games and bad writing is why that NASA guy just went off?
As soon as people started batting this around as a topic I offered up Stephen King as the number one reason the theory was wacked. It was the easiest debate I’ve ever had, as my co-workers said variations on, “Oh, yeah!”
This is a topic that calls for common sense and even cursory thought on this should reveal how dangerous it is, no un-American it is, to entertain the concept that fictional stories can predict violent tendencies. Of course you can see things in retrospect, but only in retrospect—to think anything else is to open the door to the Thought Police.
My hubby and I have been debating this since everything went down. I agree with Mr. King’s analysis…sorry, we ALL knew weird kids/people who were #1 on being the sniper in the clocktower (and alas, now that’s been superseded by the crazies in Luby’s and at VT).
From a psychological standpoint…Cho was a seriously unpredictable shooter. Yes, he posed enough of a threat that two female students posted a formal (but not arrenst-based) complaint agianst him. Additionally, his teachers were concerned. Is it their bad for not pursing it further? I my mind, no. They did what made them feel personally and professionally safe, while letting the chain of command (ie law enforcement) know of their concerns.
Cho, Whitman (University of Texas, Austin, 1966) and Hennard (Luby’s restaurant, Killeen, Tx, 1991) were all individuals working toward their own, to us, unimaginable goal.
As much as the news and tabloids would like us to belive this is an “American” problem, any look at the archives shows that single “mass” killers have proliferated across the globe in the last forty years (from what I’ve found in basic research).
Unfortunatly, there is no “safe” answer. As I said above, unusual people are a staple in a free and unfettered society. What we do about them is a completely diffent discourse…
And another thing based on what Terri wrote: the reasons mass killers have proliferated in the past 40 years can’t be pinned down. So many people blame modern society, but they forget: most people before 1960 or so didn’t have physical access to the type of weapon needed to cause mass murder. Those who did, such as Sylvestre Matuschka, Andrew Kehoe, John Filip Nordlund, or Jack Gilbert Graham, killed just as easily as Cho did.
It seems to me that we always weigh more recent events (and events that happen in the United States) as being more important than historic events or those in other countries. Witness all the media calling the VA Tech killings the worst school massacre in US history (Kehoe’s Bath School Tragedy is) or the worst gun massacre in US history (the killed four times as many).
That was very interesting and painful read about the Mountain Meadows Massacre, which I had never heard about before.
When considering “evil,” I tend to think of certain situations, such as Cho, as more like hurricanes Katrina and Rita hitting one after the other—a force of nature—in which rare elements just pull together in such a way that it’s beyond human intervention. We go over and over what we could have and should have done, hoping to find the lever of control over Fate—what does this writing mean, what does that barometric pressure predict?—but there is no lever and no control, and this is terribly distressing in itself. But maybe not “evil.”
Whereas, given the wikipedia description of the MM massacre, I would call that “evil” because it is sane people making a decision to do something horrible based on a desire to protect a self-interest.
Hey Dr. Frantz (and Lorelie), I live near Fayetteville too. I already have a BA in Lit from UNC-P, but it is great to know there are other Smart Bitches nearby! And thanks for the link. Count on SK to boil it down in such a clear and concise way. I think he is one person people will listen to about this.
my spamfoiler: stand22
A couple of years ago, my husband’s 13-year-old nephew got into potentially-serious trouble for writing a bloody little horror story in his English class—the teacher got freaked out by it, took it to the principal, and before you could say Edward Lee the kid was hauled into the front office and there was all this talk of expulsion and counseling.
My husband got a frantic call from the kid’s mother, so he went to the school with some of his published horror novels to explain that he’d encouraged his nephew to write and that really there wasn’t anything to get worked up about.
The school admins cooled their jets fairly quickly after that, but it was only my husband’s being a published author that turned the tide. If the situation were the same but my husband not yet published, I don’t know how things would have gone for the kid. I’m pretty sure that, had le neph been an actual potential budding shooter, their subsequent actions to put him in his place likely would have made things worse because it was all oh-god-a-FREAK-in-our-midst rather than trying to address problems he might have had.
I have a hard time seeing this shooting as an expression of evil.
I’m just having a hard time with that phrase. There’s something about “Evil” which to me would be a pedophile or a harborer of a murderer or a neighbor who turned a Jew over to the Nazis so as to escape persecution himself.
Acting out on your own psychosis in a random, yet horrifying way, going down in the suicidal rain of gunfire yourself just somehow does not fit my own internal idea of “evil on earth.”
I think because this was so very random, and at a basic level, so very unpreventable, no matter how disturbing his plays may have been. He never did much of anything which was actionable before the shootings, and when he did, people seemed to act upon it and report his behavior.
Some terrible events are simply not preventable, although that can be a very scary proposition for many in our community to embrace.
and that is why i love the man… utterly pithy, cutting right to the heart of it. this is a slope we don’t want to go down; we would soon be arresting people for writing outside of topics consisting of fluffy bunnies and State worship, ala Hitler and Kim Jong-il.
Damn straight, Steve. Damn straight.
Excellent commentary from King. I would say that someone’s writings alone shouldn’t be used as a barometer for their mental state. As he pointed out, a totally sane mind can create some horrific scenarios. It’s other anti-social and inappropriate behavior that should raise the red flags.
I would disagree that the presence or absence of talent is one barometer of psychotic intent when considering horror writings, but otherwise, I completely agree with King.
Writing is putting your own fantasies, fears, or imaginings on paper. That’s all. And no one should be prosecuted for that. King said in an interview that he’s had horrible nightmares and fears all his life, so he writes them. I love reading and writing about sex so I write about love and sex, but I’m not a nympho. Other people love writing about crimes, but they’re not cat burglars/murderers/pick your favorite crime here. Some people like to have their significant other help them play out rape fantasies in bed, as we discussed in another comment thread, but they sure as hell don’t want to be *truly* raped. Still others, like me, play video games where enemies are hacked up with swords, and I have yet to get a sword and drive to my ex-husband’s house.
What one imagines does not reliably determine what one will actually do.
Suisan said it well, and it’s been said by every terrorism expert I’ve ever heard or read interviews from—if someone is truly determined to commit an act of mass murder, 9 times out of 10, THEY WILL SUCCEED. That fucking sucks and it’s scary as hell, but that’s the harsh fact of the matter. You pay attention to warning signs so there’s the chance of preventing that tenth one, but even then, there are bound to be false alarms much more often than there are true threats averted.
But with true sociopaths like this Cho guy? He gave no credible warning signs, at least from what I’ve read. He didn’t do warm-up type behaviors like self abuse or picking fights. He didn’t abuse animals or bully others. He didn’t write threatening letters about going on a shooting rampage. Yes, he wrote scary stories—well, lots of people write scary stories. He made a couple of girls uncomfortable enough that they reported him, but he never physically harmed them. This guy bottled it up and went quietly insane, made his plans in silence and then exploded.
I don’t think this happens because of violent television—I didn’t know about the Bath school tragedy, God that’s so damned sad—but in 1927, I don’t think there were too many violent television shows on. I think art imitates life rather than the other way around. Just like Cho, Kehoe went quietly nutso (although he DID show warning signs of animal abuse and abuse of others, namely his wife and stepmother) and then he lashed out. And much as we all hate to think about it, this will happen again.
It’s horrible. It’s scary. It’s not preventable. I wish to God it was. All anyone can do is try to minimize the risk and teach your children—and know yourself!—what to do if someone goes on a shooting rampage around you.
Run away if you can, hide if you can’t. If people are being killed around you, play dead. Learn self-defense. If you’re taken hostage, be as compliant as humanly possible until an escape opportunity presents itself—and then run like your ass is on fire. Make yourself “real” to the attacker—tell them your name, talk about your family, your hopes, your pets, your home. Anything that takes you out of the role of “victim #whatever” and makes the attacker see you as a real person can increase your chance of survival.
And by Geminy, I’ve written a book here!
I had expected better from King…but then, I got tired of his horror once I outgrew my angsty 20’s. And I have known too many fanfic writers who dwelt lovingly on torture in their stories and were in RL somewhat creepy and dysfunctional (not necessarily dangerous) to believe there’s no connection at all between the creation and the creator. (I’ve known fanfic writers who were literal geniuses, and nice folks at that—but their writing was a lot more balanced.) King’s assertion that ‘lack of talent’ is the tip-off is flatly ridiculous. Edgar Allen Poe was a genius, but these days he’d be regarded as a pedophile.
I would also take exception to the idea that the media and video games have no effect on behavior. Video games rehearse violent behavior. As anyone who’s taken martial arts or sports training knows, practicing a behavior eventually turns it into a reflex. Yes, certainly, if you’re a well-balanced adult this won’t have any effect. It won’t turn a sane and sensible person into an axe murderer.
But for an angry young person—usually male—who’s sexually frustrated and has poor social skills and poor impulse control, teaching mass murder strategy is the worst possible kind of entertainment. I’m thinking mainly of “christian” videos that teach young “soldiers of god” to murder Muslims, gays, Buddhists, Jews, etc, but there are plenty of ‘urban warfare’ games that essentially show the players how to commit mass murder. They are advertised incessantly on Spike and the Sci-Fi channel. They are not the cause of violence, but I think they do contribute to the escalation of it.
When I was a kid, the good guys shot to wound, not kill. Phasers on stun, Mr Sulu. I also had a mother who made it a point to watch with us and remind us that these were actors, shooting blanks, and they weren’t really hurting each other. Now the ‘good’ guys blow people up and joke about it, and few parents have the time to even look at what their kids are viewing, much less interact with them. This does have an effect.
And our society is at a point where kids are being raised by parents who were raised with TV as a babysitter. It only takes one generation to lose vital information, and while I doubt anyone on this list is psychotically dangerous, Smart Bitches are in a minority.
I also don’t buy the notion that nothing could have been done to stop Cho. If it takes installing metal detectors on the doors and even ground-floor windows in schools, hooked up to a particular alarm to warn teachers, it would be a damned cheap preventive. Passive security like heavy slide-bolts on the inside of classroom doors would serve the same purpose—they might not save everybody but it would have cut the fatalities.
There’s a big gap between treating anyone who writes ultra-violent stories as a menace and treating psychopaths as a ‘force of nature.’ It’s a pity the two young women Cho harrassed didn’t take stronger legal steps..but it’s a pity that harrassment of young women is not taken more seriously. But that’s another whole rant.
“I would also take exception to the idea that the media and video games have no effect on behavior.”
Why? Because it points out the informal fallacy of questionable cause, or makes the whole thing a matter of personal responsibility?
People being fed this idea that their murderous actions are not their fault and are simply a “rational outcome” to TV programs, music, movies and video games is far more dangerous to me.
Like saying gangsters kill or rape because of Rap Music.
Like teens commit suicide because they listen to Rock Music.
Like our anger at current politics is because of a liberal news media.
The Navy trained me to use a rifle and to shoot to kill. It was a requirement that I pass that course. They actually did train me to kill in real life while guarding a nuclear submarine while docked.
I guess by your reasoning I’m a walking time bomb.
Look, none of us knows the way to stop this kind of random madness. But if we clamp down on creative writing and throw kids out of schools or adults out of jobs or into jails because they write the “wrong” things, we aren’t going to save one life. And we’ll ruin theirs.
Writing talent or no writing talent, violent thoughts are not in themselves a predictor of violent acts.
Metal detectors? Oi. That would be a mess to implement and deal with on a daily basis.
I work at a large university. My building has four exterior doors. They’d have to lock off three doors and install a metal detector at the main entrance, and hire somebody to guard it. And they’d have to do this with each of the other 250 buildings on campus. According to an article on the Saginaw school district’s plan to increase security, metal detectors cost nearly $4,000 apiece. Assuming each building could be limited to one public door (and many probably couldn’t) that’d be a cost of over a million dollars in detectors and probably another 5 million per year in personnel costs. Where would the money come from, and what programs and facilities would be underfunded as a consequence?
And what would endlessly forcing adults to empty out their pockets and be herded through detectors do for morale and people’s sense of isolation and oppression?