Dear Media

Dear Media,

I think this is another letter that should begin with "are you f-ing kidding?!"

I can't avoid it, so I saw today all the articles online, some radio references, the newspaper articles - all about the mass killings at V-Tech, and I have to ask you, Media - are you serious?

Because - can you really have a doubt about why these things keep happening? Why "troubled youths" since the Columbine shooters keep doing f-ed up things like this? Part 1 is that they have issues - of course. Part 2 is the world is f-ed up. Part 3 - you want to know what Part 3 is? It's you, Media. It's you.

What does every angsty young person every fantasize about? Being "famous," being important and having a big impact, having people worry/think about them, and death. What does the media give to every school shooter? All of them but the last (which they give themselves to achieve the first three). Do you think these kids would do these things if they didn't think that, in doing so, they would "get their message out," or "be remembered"? Hell, no. Who fantasizes about being forgotten or never known?

On the other hand, let's imagine you give a teenager (or, in the current case, a young man) the following options:

A) Be lonely, insecure, and horribly frustrated about the injustices of the world without having the ability to say or do a thing about it. Make few friends, have people laugh at you or ignore you, and carry on in the world with little chance of becoming a lasting memory or a success. Piddle through life "trying to make it" while the better-looking, more-connected, more-whatever people seemingly do it all with ease.
OR
B) Kill a slew of those people who you projected your frustrations onto and die as a "martyr" and hero to all the other people like you out there. Get your name plastered all over the tv, news, and internet. Have your picture be recognized by almost everyone for months. Have your deluded, poorly-written "manifestos" printed word-for-word by every major media outlet and read by millions of people.

What the hell do you think they're going to choose? Considering all the glorification that this latest fucker has gotten, I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often. Media - do you have ANY knowledge of basic psychology or economics? You ever hear of rewards and consequences? Cost and benefit? Can you honestly tell yourself when you look at yourself in the mirror in the morning that you didn't know what you were doing when you made all of this asshole's dreams come true? You reinforced the common knowledge that the only sure-fire way to get your name known and your writings read in this world is to shoot a bunch of people in a school.

And then there's the fact that there are people out there who would object to my referring to this most recent guy as a "fucker" and "asshole." Because of your work, Media, there are people (and maybe a lot of them) who are thinking - what a poor guy. So lonely and misguided, it's just so sad that it came to this. How can we prevent other people like him from ending in this sad way? I know - shower them with f-ing attention!!! Talk about "cries for help."

Have you ever thought of not reinforcing the f-ing behavior?! What if - the media DID NOT print all this stuff. What if we just said some unknown shooter killed some people for unknown reasons? Do you think further angsty youths would think that that was the way to get known? Not too f-ing likely.

And yeah, yeah - the American people WANT TO KNOW. They may even DESERVE TO KNOW. But look into your cold little heart, Media, and ask yourself - do these shooters DESERVE TO BE FAMOUS? Do the victims DESERVE TO BE NUMBERS so that their killer can become a hero?

I read one article that referred to "the previous record for mass killings in a shooting was . . ." The RECORD!?? Like it's an f-ing VIDEO GAME!? Thanks, Media. Thanks a lot.

Let's make a prediction here in cold, hard print with a date and time stamp on it: in the next year, let's watch the rate of similar shootings go up. Probably in the next 6 months, even. Now that it's all fresh in our minds and huge and headline news again. Let's watch that happen. And then, Media, we'll watch you slowly push all these shootings to the back page because it's too common and people have reached their saturation point. And then they'll finally go down again.

Until something nice and big that you jump on and make "important."

Most people of my generation know all about Jeffrey Dahmer. How many people are familiar with Vernon Dahmer? That's what I thought. And what part did YOU play in that, Media?

That's what I thought.

I'm going to go throw up now, and then wither away in obscurity with my art, beliefs, and writings hidden away from the world because I'm not f-ed up enough to go kill dozens of innocent people.

Sadly,
CVT