School Shootings

Dylan and Eric were both planning what they called, "Judgment Day". Several days before, the two boys created a bunch of tapes of themselves telling the camera what they were about to do. Their final video, which was made the morning of the massacre, had the two boys saying their final goodbyes to their families. At about 11:00 AM, Dylan and Eric were both walking into school wearing large trench coats and holding duffel bags. A few of the students from Columbine were outside at the time eating their lunch, when the two boys came up to them and shot them point blank in the back of the head, killing them instantly. It was then that "Judgment Day" began.

Before the massacre began, Eric and Dylan had created propane tank bombs that were rigged to a timer that would explode at 11:30 AM. This was lunchtime for the students at Columbine High School. Luckily, the home made bombs that were planted in the cafeteria were faulty. The bombs never exploded, but if they did, the bombs would have taken the lives of over 200 students. When the two boys found out that their bombs did not work, they decided to fall back to plan B. They both pulled out the two Sub-Machine Guns or SMGs that they had concealed in their duffel bags and began their rampage. They went around the whole school with guns blazing, hoping to kill everyone. The two boys injured many people and managed to kill 15 people, including themselves and a teacher. Together the two boys fired over 200 bullets from their shotguns, SMGs, and pistols.

What you have just heard was not made up. This description of the massacre at Columbine High School is not in any way fictional. I strongly believe that the act of shooting in schools is absolutely horrifying and deplorable. I believe that everyone should work together to prevent these violent acts from ever happening in our schools. There should never be a weapon of any kind in a school so that the students can focus on academics and not have to worry about their own safety.

Can you just imagine how much damage and destruction an incident like this affect to people? Why would someone ever want to do something like this? Well, there have been many thoughts on why a student would want to pick up a gun, bring it to school, and use it to hurt people.

In the past ten years, there have been over thirteen fatal school massacres:

• On February 19, 1997, a sixteen year old boy took a pump-action shotgun and hundreds of shells to school in Bethel, Alaska. There, he killed the principal and a student.
• On October 1, 1997 a sixteen year old student, Luke Woodham, of Pear, Mississippi fatally shot two students and injured another seven after stabbing his own mother.
• On March 24, 1998, two boys, one eleven and the other thirteen, fired at the local middle school in Jonesburo, Arkansas, killing four girls and a teacher.
• On April 24, 1998, Andrew Wurst, fifteen, open fired at an eighth grade dance in Edinboro, Pennsylvania, killing a teacher and wounding two students.
• On May 19, 1998, Jacob Davis, an eighteen year old honor student open fired at his high school in Fayetteville, Tennessee, killing one of his classmates who was dating his ex girlfriend.
• On May 21, 1998, two teens were killed and over twenty were injured when a teen open fired at his high school in Springfield, Oregon.
• On April 20, 1999, the horrible massacre at Columbine High School occurred.
• On November 19, 1999, a twelve year old boy shoots a thirteen year old girl in the head at school in Deming, New Mexico.
• On February 29, 2000, a six year old shoots and kills a classmate in Morris Township, Michigan. On May 26, 2000, a thirteen year old student, Nathaniel Brazil killed his English teacher in Lake Worth, Florida.
• On March 5, 2001, a fifteen year old boy named Charles Williams, killed two of his fellow classmates and wounded thirteen others at a high school in Santee, California.
• On September 24, 2003, two students were fatally shot in a school in Cold Spring, Minnesota by a fellow student John Jason McLaughlin.

That would be a total of 5 adults killed, 67 students wounded, and 30 students killed.

Do you find these statistics of these school shootings absolutely devastating? Many people are debating as why these kids did what they did in their schools. Most people are blaming the violent acts on the Gothic culture, heavy metal music, the usage of anti-depressants by teens, violent films, movies, and video games. I think the reason for school shootings is not because they like to play gruesome video games or watch violent movies. I believe their rage is caused because they were either bullied at school by students or teachers, or they were abused at home by their parents or guardians.