I just heard the news about the sentencing of this young man for killing three students in a lunch room at his high school. Sadly, in our violent culture, that did not catch my ear in the way it should as I'm desensitized in a way I wish I was not to gun violence.
What did was the incredible anger expressed in the sentencing by the convicted man--wearing a t-shirt with "KILLER" written on it, sticking his middle finger in the faces of those in the courtroom and other disturbing acts and statements I won't glorify here.
From my perspective he is just as much a victim as anyone else--this young man--barely a legal adult and certainly not one by any other standard is so mad. What happened to him? Why was in not caught earlier? How sad that the only thing we did with him was ignore him until he destroyed others, too late for all of them.
 |
| this photo is property of the Associated Press |
We have to get serious--very serious--about mental health in this country. What caused this man to take this lives? I don't know but I would have loved to have helped him when he was fifteen or sixteen.
Depression and anxiety are spreading across the region because he was ignored. Witnesses, survivors, the family of those who died, his relatives, the entire community as well are all at risk to opportunistic mental illnesses such as depression and anxiety, if not more serious conditions. I was even effected by this and I am two-thousand miles away.
Now I can't help him and neither can anyone else.
Beautiful.
ReplyDelete