Mourning sincerity: Why Americans don't care about the victims of mass murderers

Dressed in dark clothing, Steven Kazmierczak walked into a lecture hall at North Illinois University on Thursday and opened fire on a crowd of innocent people. In the moments before he committed suicide, he left five dead and 16 wounded in his wake.

It was an alarming event, a tragic occurrence that has left many wondering what the role of firearms should be on a college campus. More importantly, it is symptomatic of a startling trend: Increasingly, young people have gone on shooting binges at the schools they attend. Even in Spokane, a nearby-Lake City High School boy drove to his former school in the morning hours and sat in his car for an extended period of time. When police finally checked him out, they discovered a weapons cache in the trunk. 

This problem is for real.

And you can think what you will about it. Maybe students should carry guns. Maybe we should raze the conventional schooling system to the ground and implement an an intricate home-schooling system. Maybe the sky really is falling.

It's not my job to pick the best solution. Hell, I don't even have a job where I can pick solutions. But I will tell you this: The way Americans deal with tragedy is disgusting.

It is both natural and appropriate to respond to a tragic situation with emotion. It's OK to cry, to call your mom, to talk to a friend. It's OK to donate money to a victim, or to show your support by giving your time and energy. It's OK to write a legislator about laws that would prevent future destructive behavior. That's fine.

But it's pathetic to act like you care if you are unwilling to act, and care. 

You remember the horrific events of 9/11, and you remember the thousands who died and you remembered (past tense) them by sticking an American flag on your windshield. Some of you remembered (again, past tense) the slain by flying suspiciously obnoxious USA paraphernalia from your moving automobile. 

You only remembered the victims because the flag-fad fizzled and you were only left with a reminder of how shallow you really are.

You're shallow because someone who really cared would have given their money, given their time, they would have given something tangible of themselves. And they would have made a concerted effort to ensure those who were affected by 9/11 knew that someone in Squim, Wash. gave a damn. 

Someone who really cared would not have appended a dorky flag to their Dodge Dakota. Why? Because a message attached to a moving object only says this: I am too afraid to stand up and make a statement. I would prefer that others casually gaze at my half-hearted statements when they drive by.

You remember the heart-wrenching details of Virginia Tech.  A troubled student studying English directed the angst and depression  of his pathetic private life to the unknowing public. He found a gun and he went on a killing spree.

So what did you do? You put a cute "Remember the Hokies" decal on your profile pictures. You did it because you thought you were showing support. But you weren't showing support, instead you were only evidencing your own callowness. "People will see this and think I care, right? I do, care — don't I?" 

You put the decal on your profile, and when the trend died like the innocent VT students, the picture can tumbling off. "I'd rather people know I was at the kegger last week," you thought. 

At Gonzaga, I would estimate that 100s and 100s of students put the aforementioned message on their Facebook accounts. But do you know how many donated to a GU-led fundraising campaign for V-Tech?

You would be appalled.

Less than $500.

This behavior is sad, and it's almost as sickening as what these gunmen have done. It's sad because it's selfish, and it perpetuates empty and insincere behavior. If you truly care about the victims at NIU you wouldn't randomly plunk a "Remember Northern Illinois" picture on your Facebook profile because its meaningless. It's sloppy. And in the end? It's not genuine. It's just a self-centered attempt to manipulate others into believing you care.

If you really care, then care. Do something. You don't need a public stage to fulfill a private goal. That's what these murderers did. 

Do you want to assassinate your own sincerity and credibility?

That's a hot caucus: America and its ongoing bout with political incompetency

I realize I'm re-entering dangerous territory by talking politics again, but I guess I have some things to get off my chest. Some caucus things.

I visited the Washington state precinct caucuses on Saturday. For those ambitious folks out there, I wrote an article for the school paper that is allegedly on-point. So if you don't know what a caucus is, well, please refrain from reproducing offspring in the next decade and then read my piece. 

Anyway, the particular caucus I visited was an accurate reflection of how the rest of the Great Apple State voted Saturday: Obama mashed. It was also a pretty accurate reflection of how American voters operate: very poorly. By and large, everyone at the caucus was really, really confused. 

I know this is old news, but I want to (again) propose that the current political process is designed — whether intentionally or not — to disorientate and, ultimately, exclude. For my last blog I wrote that. For this blog, I lived it.

Before I begin, I have to give credit to the voters my age. We are young and dumb, and we come to these sorts of events overly caffeinated. If selecting a presidential candidate was not at stake — or something — we would mainly just be looking for a member of the opposite to get on. That's what we do. That's what bars are for. 

I'm just sayin'.

 Anyway, a big, old, disabled woman named "Janice" was really excited so many young-dumbies were at the caucus Saturday and remarked that she had not seen a turn-out this high since, like, the Ulysses S. Grant caucus or something.

The point is some of us were there, and that's good. But it's what we did when we were there that wasn't good. And I'm here to say we looked stupid because the process is thoroughly and, perhaps eternally, demented.

Young people, who primarily comprise the "Gonzaga" precinct, began streaming in the Jepson doors at about 12:45 p.m. Chaos immediately ensued. 

Do I have to sign in? OK, I do — but I don't need ID to prove who I am? Do I have to select a candidate on this piece of paper here? OK, turns out I do. Where is my precinct? What is a precinct? Is that like the early stages of being "succinct?" Man, I wish Thomas Hammer Coffee was open right now...

Some poor young girl thought the caucus was "an informational session about the presidential candidates or whatever," which is like saying going to strip club is educational. You learn about it, though it's not really the expressed purpose.

By the time everyone pulled their act together, Janice strolled in aboard her wheelchair and reported several voters were representing the wrong precinct and several more had neglected to endorse a candidate on their voting sheet. And it wasn't even like these people appeared to be imbred knuckledraggers. There was just a bunch of really, really confused Americans. And when Americans get confused, they get bored. And then it's over.

The rest of the proceedings played out predictably enough. Obnoxious political-zealotry abounded. Obama/Hillary rhetoric was spewed. Tin-faced acne-mongers promoted themselves as delegates. And most people my age looked on, as they texted their friends about the bar tab that night for the Gonzaga basketball game.

You know, the stuff that matters.

Primary school

On the eve of Super Tuesday last night, I sat in the family room of my college pad with a housemate. We were talking about the magnitude and excitement of this day, and we pined for the impending political climate. Will Ron Paul finally drop out? Will Barry Obama finally get caught smoking a stress-cig? Will Hillary finally reveal herself as a Fem-bot?

It was Monday, only a day after the Super Bowl, but Tuesday — to us — was full of more intrigue and drama. 

 

And then another, less politically aware roommate, entered the fray. 

"What are you guys talking about?" He asked, innocently enough. We explained we were discussing Super Tuesday, and we said we were excited for the event and we assumed he understood.

"Super Tuesday..." He said with a pause. "Is that like Big Monday? Is it basketball?"

The point here is not to degrade my fellow Americans, or even my fellow housemates. In fact, I want to hold this housemate up as an accurate portrayal of many citizens in the United States: We don't know anything about politics.

Nothing.

And you know what? It might not be our fault.

Do you know what a caucus is? How do Obama and Hillary differ on the "issues"? What are the "issues"? What are delegates? How are candidates elected? What is an "endorsement?" What is the electoral college?

Believe it or not, your humble narrator (me) does know the answers to these questions (Well, mostly enough — that is). I got here via an obsession (and near fetish) for information. I have attacked Slate.com, CNN.com, Salon.com, the New York Times, and the Washington Post (you get the picture) with the paranoid energy of a suspicious ex-boyfriend.

But do you know the answers to these key questions? And if you don't, would you know where to find them? Are the answers readily available?

My point is that, more often than not, politics seems like an exclusive club available only to information-elites. It is a competitive and morally depraved legion, one where information-oneupsmanship runs rampant. You must endure a grueling initiation process, but once you're here, you're family. You're part of the mob. And if you're not one of us, you're one of them.

And what about them? Aren't they cast-off, and forced to politically-starve? Don't these people account for at least three-quarters of our society? Some may be informed, but couldn't they be even more educated? Isn't it our responsibility to offer the basic information? Won't this affect the future of our country? Or our children's country?

The media has a tendency to gloss over the foundation of politics, the nuts-and-bolts, the "yeah, no shit!" information. Why? Because information elites are unwilling to put their political capital on the line by offering remedial information. We see brief, watered-down explanations to some of our questions, but they're still ambiguous, or buried in the paper. 

Bottom line? The important information is shrouded in a cloud of mystery. When it's too difficult to access, we give up. And when we give up, everyone suffers.

So instead of focusing on voting records and "the issues," we start to focus on the personality traits of the candidates. Don't get me wrong, turn on Fox News and chances are great a genuine political report will be airing. Turn over to MSNBC, and perhaps Obama is defending his honor by pointing out he voted against the Iraq War. But are the people who matter most, and know the least, are they watching these shows?

No, no, no. All of a sudden, we are talking about John Edwards' haircut, or Obama's marijuana use. Or Hillary's tears. Or Romney's baby-thirsty Mormonism. How about Huckabee's Chuck Norris? We live in a gossip-culture. The sordid, seemingly unimportant details overshadow what really and truly matters.

And, slowly enough, the poison creeps into the fabric of our society. We all want to get the dirt. 

We get the dirt, and we sleep with the dogs and we get fleas. The fleas fester and we really get nowhere. So the problem remains: There's a big fat elephant at the party, and God knows it isn't campaigning. It's waiting.