First, my thoughts go out to those Newtown residents and the sadness they will be facing in the coming weeks. I can't even imagine. My baby is the same age as those children.
As much as I want to stop reading about the incident, like many others, I keep wondering why and keep reading. I don't think we'll ever know why. People do things to reasons unknown and some we'll never understand.
In following the news in the past few days, I ran across this article about an Oklahoma teen that was arrested in the early hours of Friday morning. He was recruiting students to assist him in luring fellow classmates to the auditorium so he could shoot them. He had been researching the 1999 Columbine High School massacre.
This lead me to thinking "sensationalism". Is that what is pushing all of these school killing sprees? I do believe in gun control to an extent. No, I don't want your guns taken from you. But, think about everything we go through to drive a car everyday- license, registration, insurance, inspection- and it isn't just a one time thing, these are ongoing requirements to owning and driving a car. I think these processes should be rolled over to owning and using a gun.
But, back to sensationalism. We go on and on about these incidents. When the word Columbine is said, what do you think about? We analyze, we talk about, we give attention to the sad events. Kids crave attention and if they aren't getting the positive attention, they'll go for the negative. Are these kids looking for attention in the wrong way? I don't know, but it is something that I've been thinking about.
I'm just as guilty as everyone else, I'm reading the articles too. But, another thing I'm doing is paying attention to my children. I'm trying to make sure they aren't feeling ignored and looked over. It's amazing what a little positive attention will do!