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February 25, 2016Sue Klebold, the mother of Dylan, one of the Columbine school shooters, agreed to an interview on ABC’s 20/20 news magazine, which aired Friday. The ABC news team looked at this horrible tragedy from a historical point of view. They gave us insights about what has been happening in our country in the past years. Here are some highlights.
Dylan and his partner, Eric Harris, killed 12 students and one teacher and wounded 24 others before taking their own lives on April 20, 1999. In America, there are two disturbing trends: from 1930-60, most mass shootings involved family members and felony related killings. From 1960 to the present, most mass shootings are in public places against unknown bystanders.
In the past 30 years, 65 out of the 67 shooters had mental health issues, 55 out of the 67 obtained weapons legally. 12 of the 67 shootings happened in school, 20 in the workplace, 3 in a religious settings; and 32 in other public places. It’s frightening that we allow people with mental issues to buy guns legally. Mass shootings are a matter of mental health and they are increasing in frequency. We need to adopt and support preventive measures before it’s too late.
Many school shootings involve young adults. In the interview, Sue Klebold said, “I think we like to believe that our love and our understanding are protective, and that if anything was wrong with my kids, I would know, but I didn’t know. And it’s very hard to live with that.
“I felt that I was a good mom that he would, he could talk to me about anything,” Klebold continued. “Part of the shock of this was learning that what I believed and how I lived and how I parented was an invention in my own mind. That it was a completely different world that he was living in.”
She made the point that parents should really know what is going on with their children and they should pry into their business. Dylan seemed to be a good kid but he was going through a lot of questioning about himself and his world around him. Parents need to be more involved in the life of their children.
Sue Klebold has also suffered personally because of the tragedy. She said, “The one thing that I want to say is I am so sorry for what my son did, yet I know that saying I’m sorry is an inadequate response to all this suffering. There is never a day that goes by that I don’t think of the people that Dylan harmed.”
She also went through a divorce with her husband because of the difficulty both of them had in dealing with this tragic incident. People face life in different ways. We can all get caught up in the blaming game but in the end, that does no good. We all have to go through the pain of the cross before we can experience new life. Eric Harris’ family refused to be interviewed so we do not know how they are dealing with their son’s behavior.
When Dylan met Eric Harris, he got involved in more violent games and movies. This caused them to want to get their hands on more guns and rifles. We have all seen an increase in the number of violent TV shows, video games, and movies in the past decades. When Dylan and Eric started watching and playing this type of media, they wanted to act out these fantasies. And they did. Violence does breed violence.
Both young men felt rejected and left journals and videos telling how they were bullied. They wanted to “get even.” They wanted to “make someone pay” for their feeling of loneliness. Innocent children did pay. However, forgiveness is the only way we can move forward in life. •
