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from:
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<A HREF="http://www.zolatimes.com/V3.17/pageone.html">Laissez Faire City
Times - Volume 3 Issue 17
</A>
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The Laissez Faire Times
April 26, 1999 - Volume 3, Issue 17
Editor & Chief: Emile Zola
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The Littleton Shootings
The Decision to Kill
by Wolf DeVoon
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, two white teenagers who lived in the
wealthy Denver suburb of Littleton decided to kill themselves. They also
killed a dozen other teenagers, attacking Columbine High School with
pump-action shotguns, a semi-automatic pistol, an assault rifle, and
thirty homemade bombs, including three 25-lb propane tanks wired to
detonators. In addition to students pronounced dead at the scene, dozens
more were wounded, many critically.
In Denver, citizens are angrily demanding to know why police waited more
than two hours after the shooting had stopped before they entered
Columbine High School. Others are asking whether the two perpetrators
had help in planning or conducting their lethal assault. Where did
Harris and Klebold get their weapons? How can schools be protected from
similar attacks? Should Columbine High School be reopened after repairs
or closed permanently? What can be done to "heal" the community and
counsel thousands of distraught students who were horrified by
unexpected bloodshed? Why didn't school authorities realize that Harris
and Klebold were capable of murder? Months before they attacked with
real guns and real ammunition, Harris and Klebold produced a school
video in which students were shot at random in the hall. Harris' website
named the day and the target he intended to strike. What kind of parents
did these boys have? Why didn't police listen to complaints from other
teens, that Harris and Klebold threatened them and often "played war" in
the school corridors between classes?
Those are all the wrong questions to ask, folks.
There is no mystery why it took the cops two hours to act after the
shooting had stopped. Cops have less courage and freedom than an
ordinary citizen. You or I might have rushed in and shot it out with the
bad guys—but cops have to wait for orders, and orders have to wait for
commanders. Commanders have to wait for SWAT teams, and SWAT teams have
to wait for the Bomb Squad . The Bomb Squad has to wait for the sniffer
dogs, and sniffer dogs always wait for Channel 9 to set up their
satellite truck, to transmit dramatic live publicity of the operation.
If you study the Channel 9 video, you'll see a SWAT team kicking and
shoving hundreds of terrified kids out of the high school, single-file,
hands clasped over their heads like prisoners of war, approximately
three hours after Harris and Klebold had killed themselves. The next
time you want to suffer needlessly in heart-pounding terror for three
hours, call the cops. They are good at guarding crime scenes and hanging
yellow tape barriers. They are not much good at anything else.
Nor is it interesting to speculate where Harris and Klebold got their
weapons. America has plenty of shotguns. We have plenty of
semi-automatic pistols. The components for a pipe bomb can be purchased
at any local hardware store. Harris and Klebold had money. They drove to
and from Ace Hardware in one of the Klebold family's six BMWs. Harris'
father is a retired Air Force officer who undoubtedly kept weapons at
home. It is scarcely surprising that two wealthy American teenagers
found a way to obtain guns.
Schools cannot be protected from assault by terrorists. Nor can our
airports or Federal buildings be "protected" in any real sense. When the
IRA attacked 10 Downing Street, they launched rockets from a van parked
two blocks away. To guarantee the safety of a suburban high school,
you'd have to close it and pour concrete over the front door. Whether
Columbine High should be reopened or demolished is a trivial question.
There are thousands of such schools in America, each of them equally
vulnerable to a terrorist attack. Nothing can be done to "heal" the
survivors in Denver or to reassure kids that our schools are safe. They
obviously aren't.
Public Employees Are Not Paid to Think
It is especially silly to question why Columbine High teachers and
administrators failed to perceive that the two killers posed a threat.
Unionized public employees are not paid to think. They are legally
required to "educate" every child, especially those like Harris and
Klebold, who were often asked to fix classroom computers because no one
employed at Columbine High knew how to do it. Clever students are hard
to come by, after three decades of New Math and Look-See dumbing down.
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold (and other members of Columbine's "Trench
Coat Mafia") kept their high school's academic score from sinking below
average. Their attire and behavior was far less disturbing than the
normal sort of macho adolescent bullying that public schools tolerate. I
n most districts, teachers are amazed and delighted to have students who
pay attention. The last thing on the administrative agenda at Columbine
was a couple of sissies who complained about Harris and Klebold. Nobody
had been physically assaulted (yet). Schools have counselors to deal
with behavioral problems. The teachers and principals at Columbine
followed official procedure and passed the buck to licensed social
workers who lectured Harris and Klebold about the importance of obeying
the rules and being nice boys.
Perhaps there is less excuse that one of their teachers, Mr. Garrett
Talocco, allowed Harris and Klebold to make a video last fall that
depicted a mass murder of their classmates, precisely "acting out" on
film what would happen in reality six months later. But Harris and
Klebold belonged to an established social group featured in the
Columbine yearbook (the "Trench Coat Mafia"), and they seemed no
different than thousands of other U.S. teens who mimick Gothic music
groups like No Pity and Marilyn Manson. Goth music is pretty tame
compared to overtly violent gangsta rap. Many students and parents
expressed abject disbelief the day after Harris and Klebold went on a
shooting spree at suburban Columbine. "We expect that sort of thing in
the inner city," said one, "but not here" [in squeaky-clean, upscale
Littleton]. Nor was there anything unusual about the killers' habit of
playing violent computer games. Millions of children across America are
sitting at Nintendo consoles right now, firing shotguns at three-dimens
ional, animated opponents who scream in stereophonic sound when they
die. Hollywood scripted the whole Columbine massacre, starring Keanu
Reeves in "Matrix," complete with black trenchcoats. Leonardo DiCaprio
shoots his teacher and classmates in "Basketball Diaries." High school
students kill each other in "Jawbreaker." It's hardly mysterious that
Harris and Klebold were permitted to film something similar for class
credit. Maybe they were offered some criticism about bad sound or
amateurish lighting, but certainly not about content. We live in an age
of murderous movies.
Nor should their parents be questioned. The Klebolds and Harrises are
respectable pillars of the Littleton community. Dylan Klebold's mom
worked with disabled students. "I can't imagine her not being a good
parent," a former co-worker told a newspaper reporter. Eric Harris'
older brother graduated from Columbine three years ago and was a popular
athlete. It is entirely possible that the killers' parents had no idea
that anything was wrong with their teenage sons. They were smart, they
got good grades, and they behaved more or less like other kids who drive
BMWs to school every day. Their parents gave them everything an American
teenager could possibly want: cars, computers, pocket money, clothes,
you name it. Their suburban community was peaceful and full of fun stuff
for teenagers to do. At the core of all the hysterical bullshit that has
appeared in the Denver press
and on national TV, it is indeed frightening that the only difference
between Eric Harris and most other suburban American teenagers was
intelligence. Eric was extremely intelligent.
And so, finally, we come to the question that no one is talking about
and that actually matters. Why did one of Littleton's brightest young
men decide to kill?
"It was a calculated act of evil," a radio host stuttered on KOA. "It
will never make sense. We'll never discover the ultimate reason why."
Lacking any cogent explanation, Colorado Gov. Owens declared a state of
disaster. Some called the bloodshed an act of God. Thousands of
strangers gathered in churches and public parks to pray. Millions of
Americans sent passionate email messages to TV stations and letters to
the editor, promising to pray for everyone in general, except Eric
Harris -- the young genius who decided to kill.
"The victims didn't deserve this!" a Denver man moaned in despair.
The Demonization of Eric Harris
Let's start with the obvious. Eric Harris did not kill his parents. He
did not attack a racial minority. The massacre in Colorado was an act of
revenge against a public school, its teachers, its social order, and the
1,900 Columbine High School students who were content to derive a sense
of purpose, achievement, and solidarity simply by attending an
institution. Eric decided to change things. He sacrificed his life (and
that of a wealthy and gullible stooge, Dylan Klebold) in a manner
calculated to destroy Columbine High School. As a plain matter of fact,
it is important to recognize that Eric Harris achieved his objective.
Whatever pretence of "school spirit" that may have existed at Columbine
High School, it has been destroyed forever and cannot be regenerated.
Public officials are talking about closing the Columbine complex and
paying $100 million to build an entirely new high school, because Eric
killed an institution named "Columbine."
It is absurd to characterize Eric Harris as a neo-Nazi, despite the fact
that he conducted his attack on Adolph Hitler's birthday and he affected
admiration for Teutonic discipline. Young people often ape heroic men of
steel. But documentary films made in Nazi Germany during the 1930s
establish clearly that the real Hitler Youth were athletic, clean-cut,
flag-waving "patriots," not unlike the brainless Columbine jocks that
Eric despised and wanted to defeat.
It is no surprise to me that Eric's father was a military officer. The
leader of the Kent State SDS (Students for a Democratic Society) in
1969, who orchestrated the firebombing of campus ROTC buildings and led
a series of violent clashes with the Ohio National Guard that resulted
in the death of four students -- which probably ended the Vietnam War --
was another Army "brat." The children of career soldiers have a natural
reason to resent authority.
Guns are not an issue. If a half dozen Columbine teachers had been
carrying concealed weapons (i.e., responsible for their own personal
safety), Eric might have been stopped. His attack on the high school
depended entirely on the fact that no one was equipped to fight back.
The Colorado state legislature was debating a "concealed carry" bill
when Eric opened fire in Littleton. The proposed law would have allowed
trained, adult citizens of Colorado to apply to their local county
sherrif for a permit to carry firearms. It is important to keep in mind
that no current or proposed U.S. state or federal law allows teenagers
to carry shotguns, semi-automatic pistols, or explosives of any
description. Eric broke the law, and the law was powerless to stop him.
The police arrived within minutes of the first shots being fired at
Columbine High School. The police were powerless to stop him. The
district attorney, the FBI, and a dozen other agencies are investigating
what Eric Harris did during the final weeks and days and minutes of his
life -- but they cannot undo what happened.
If every gun in America had been confiscated and destroyed, Eric was
clever enough to build and launch a rocket, or poison the school
cafeteria, or something equally deadly. The one and only way to stop a
determined genius like Eric Harris is to do the unthinkable and question
some fundamental fallacies of American society. I will talk about
several of these, but none is more clear-cut than the fallacy of gun
control. When you insist that private citizens should be legally
forbidden to defend themselves and that we must rely entirely on police
officers to protect us, anarchists like Eric Harris win.
I claim Eric as an anarchist because he attacked and destroyed an
institution of government. It is undoubtedly terrible that "innocent
victims" were killed and wounded in the assault. But how different is
their innocence, compared to the hundreds of civilians who were killed
and wounded this week by U.S. warplanes? Yes, certainly, there is a
difference. Wealthy suburban American children are supposed to be exempt
from armed assault. Eric Harris disproved that supposition. The terrible
suddenly became real.
We Want This, We Want That
It has been argued that evil pop culture (movies, music, etc) were
responsible for Eric's deed, and that icons of "hate" should be legally
prohibited. No doubt they will be, sooner or later, because America
expects public safety. Americans want peace and prosperity, even if it
means repealing the 1st, 2nd and 4th Amendments. Most people don't know
or care about their Constitution. It's just words on paper, like the
Bible. They want television. They want a new car. They want free,
compulsory, safe public schools -- despite the contradictions in terms
and a half century of "dumbing down." They want leadership and criminal
justice, prisons and freedom, fairness and sunshine. It is unimportant
whether anyone else in the world feels secure, so long as my child has e
verything. Disease and hunger are un-American. The stock market should
not be allowed to go down, and home loans should be tax-deductible.
It is this Disney fantasy of American surplusage that Eric Harris
attacked and successfully destroyed. Eric had everything that a kid
could possibly want. He threw it away.
Some say that Eric was insane, or evil, or possessed by the Devil. I
disagree. There is no supernatural Devil—only foolish people who believe
silly, hysterical myths. Nor was Eric insane. By all accounts, he was
cogent and friendly. He was sane enough to plan and execute a military
operation, requiring forethought and steely commitment, courage,
responsibility, training, and skill. He was charismatic and extremely
intelligent. His decision to kill was not a confused "cry for help,"
neurotically threatening suicide every Thursday. Eric Harris went to
war. He gave his life to attack Columbine High School and everything it
represented.
This does not mean that the killings are justifiable or that it was
desirable for Eric to end his life. One of the saddest things about
young people is that they make decisions without perceiving or
understanding the full context. Bobby Seale and Malcolm X lost their
lives that way. Thousands of teenagers were killed in Vietnam: they went
to war convinced it was their duty to die for Lyndon Johnson and
Lockheed. The disaster of Soviet Russia and China's Cultural Revolution
were wrought largely by idiot teenagers. This year, on American roads,
thousands of teens will die in automobile accidents. Thousands more will
die from drug use and ghetto turf wars. Not one of these kids is less
deserving of life than a handful of pampered "victims" in suburban
Denver.
On a KOA talk show last night, a caller tried to explain that there were
more important issues in the world than the death of a dozen teenagers
in Denver. He was cut off. To the people of Colorado, there is nothing
more disastrous than the sudden disruption of normalcy. Eric Harris
pushed the war in Serbia from the headlines. Give the kid some credit—he
showed us who we are as a nation, indifferent to the lives and fortunes
of an "enemy" in Serbia or Iraq, so long as no American troops are in
danger. Clinton's military policy is Littleton writ large: that
video-game, laser-guided bombardment is cool, but it's too risky to
actually confront the enemy in battle.
Eric Harris faced his enemy, exchanging gunfire with the cops and
driving them away. Whether you agree with him or not, he had the courage
to fight and die. The Denver Police didn't.
I very much regret Eric's decision to kill. Direct action is best left
to older and wiser anarchists. Suburban high schools are not strategic
targets, not even as symbolic statements of rage. Religious fanatics in
Ireland and "Right-To-Life" bible-thumpers attack unarmed women and
children, but real anarchists don't. We shoot tyrants.
Sadly, Eric Harris saw tyranny as a diffuse, pervasive social system. It
is not. The thousands of nicely-dressed teenagers at Columbine,
obediently marching to the beat of an institutional drum, posed no
threat to anyone. Eric's rage was misplaced. He couldn't see the big
picture—that Hillary Clinton is pulling the social strings from above
and that the guiltiest of men are the New York merchant bankers who pay
her do it.
Before you leap to the wrong conclusion, I am not in favor of killing
Hillary Clinton, not even as a symbolic statement. All that would do is
defeat natural justice and create another martyr for the American myth,
like JFK. It is important to let Hillary live, to let history reveal her
as a deranged villain, which it most assuredly will. If my fellow
anarchists are itching to attack something, they are better advised to
take out a few tabernacles: CBS, in particular. This does not require
loss of life.
Young and angry, Eric Harris sacrificed himself for no reason. There is
nothing good to be gained from killing oneself or others, when America
is held captive by an infrastructure of inanimate objects – the
instrumentalities of Hillary's media oligarchy.
-30-
from The Laissez Faire City Times, Vol 3, No 17, April 26, 1999
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Published by
Laissez Faire City Netcasting Group, Inc.
Copyright 1998 - Trademark Registered with LFC Public Registrar
All Rights Reserved
-----
Aloha, He'Ping,
Om, Shalom, Salaam.
Em Hotep, Peace Be,
Omnia Bona Bonis,
All My Relations.
Adieu, Adios, Aloha.
Amen.
Roads End
Kris
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