Kansas City kids plan Columbine-style attack

[LadyErin]

Paws, indeed they shouldn't. With little expections, parents are not allowed to deny ciritical medical care, I don't feel mental health care should be any different.

Blue, very often kids won't. But some of us do. And sometimes things don't work out on their own. Mine only did when I grad'ed.

Spaz, I think you hit the nail on the head - it's only because it was forcibly bought to the attention of the 'adults' that they did anything. And I agree wholeheartly, the 'innocent bystanders' who stand by and do nothing while others are being ripped apart verbally are not innoncet. Most of the time, I hold them more guilty than the bullies. Bullies are corwards. If someone other than the victim stands up to them, they will back off. If the bystands say 'No, this is not allowed.' and then do not allow it (ignoring the bully's bad behavior - infront of the victim and when he/she is not around, not voting for the bully (student government or courts), etc) a great deal of it will stop.

[kurt_the_quick]

Originally posted by LadyErin

Originally posted by kurt_the_quick

man, I know high school is tough, but seriously WTF. what inspires people to think about carrying out such an act? I can almost wrap my mind around suicide bombers, they believe they are doing a religious act and/or they have no other option, but I'm pretty sure these kids aren't thinking anything along those lines.

I wish I could say I didn't understand it.
I wish I could say I had never gotten to the point where I wanted to hurt others who hurt me.
I wish I could say I worried about innocence bystanders getting hurt.

But I can't. I simply can't.

High school is hell for some people. Literally.
More than once, some boys grabbed at my bits. More than once I was checked into lockers. More times than I can count in fact. Ditto for the number of times I ran from classes crying. I got cussed at, spit on (both spit and food), shooter-mable sized balls of tacky putty hurled at me, tumbtacks shot at me, pencils shot me - all in front of the techer!

At first...I just wanted to go away. Change schools.
Then...just go to sleep and never wake up.
Then die.
About then...I got *furious*.
How dare they hurt me like that.
How dare they touch me. How dare they speak to me like that. Bruise me. Make me cry.
And I wanted to hurt them for it.
And the teachers who knew, and saw, and did nothing to stop it. Who told me to toughen up. That it was normal. That is was a rite of passage. That everyone went though it.
And most of all?
I wanted to hurt the people who claimed to like me, claimed to be my friends - and stood by and did nothing. Didn't help me. Didn't tell them to stop. Didn't ask them to stop. Or stood by and laughed.

I wanteed them to hurt like I was hurtting. To make they sorry for what they did. I didn't want to be the only one in pain. The only one who prayed to stop existing. Who felt so alone.

I never did anything. But I can understand those who do. Honestly, I can. I don't think it's a moral thing to do. But I can understand it.

What's worse, I've since found out none of them ever ment to feel that way. They didn't know they were doing that to me. They thought it was just kid stuff. They had no idea.

And actually...I think that hurts more.

I'm sorry to hear that Lady Erin. you should never have been treated like that, and worse a someone should have stood up and said "you should be treated better". :

[fourpawsonthefloor]

Ah - but life is seldom that simple, and few are the teens who truly understand what impact it is having on the other person's life. Even fewer are the teens that are secure enough in themselves to put their ass on the line to defend someone that they don't really know. As you get older, it gets better - but most the idiotic bulling behaviour that I have seen is strongest from about grade 6-10. And that is the "Its all about ME" age for teens.

I don't think for one blinking minute that the kids who planned those attacks did it out of any sense of duty to others like themselves...like say a terrorist would. They did it because THEY wanted the satisfaction of revenge. That's my opinion...because there are a lot more effective and better ways to educate people than to escelate violence to such a scale. I acknowledge that they probabally had some real valid reasons to feel the way that they did...but still - it was pure selfishness to do what they did. It was revenge. And revenge doesn't taste as sweet as some may think. I doubt it would ease their pain in the long run.

I personally think that anger hurts the person that is feeling it way more than it hurts the person that you are angry with. Partly for me, the road to letting a lot of my anger go, was that I got "permission" from a councellor to feel that anger. Once I wasn't being denied it, for example with the statement "oh they were just being kids", I felt validated - and then could let it go. And it feels sooo good to let it go.

Nothing is ever black and white, but I doubt that these "cries" for help are improving things...violence is just escalating and escalating. If they did help, we'd be seeing a decrease in this behaviour, not an increase.

Just my 2 cents . Paws

[LadyErin]

Originally posted by kurt_the_quick
I'm sorry to hear that Lady Erin. you should never have been treated like that, and worse a someone should have stood up and said "you should be treated better". :

Thanks Kurt. I had a tacher my senior year do that...but a teacher...eh...didn't count with the students as much.