Friday, October 01, 2004
"He Drew a Circle..."
He drew a circle that shut me out--
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
-- "Outwitted" by Edwin Markham
Lessons of Columbine are still not heeded by schools, parents, kids, communities. The result is Andrew Osantowski, 17 yrs old, currently held on charges that include threatening to kill witnesses (a police officer), concealing stolen firearms, making a terrorism threat, using a computer to commit a crime. Osantowski was planning to attack teachers and fellow students at Chippewa Valley High School, just down the street from me. He wanted to commit a massacre. And he detailed his weaponry, hiding places, and planned killing spree online in a music chat room with a girl three time zones away. Thank God. The young woman was alert enough to tell her university policeman father of the plans that Osantowski bragged about.
One sick psychopath off the streets. One down –- how many more to go?
The local residents can’t show enough gratitude. They want parades and honors bestowed upon the young woman and her father. I think if they were smart they would take an oath to stop the hatred that breeds terrorists.
A police search of Osantowski’s home resulted in the confiscation of numerous stolen weapons including high power hunting rifles, an AK47 assault rifle, long knives, hundreds of pounds of ammunition, pipe bombs already made, misc. bomb making instructions and paraphernalia, aluminum nitrate and other chemicals. Most telling were boxes of white supremacy and Nazi literature, and a Nazi flag. (His mother says he was brainwashed from all those Nazi TV shows on the History Channel–kind of reminds me of an old neighbor who was furious with the f–ing teacher who kept putting her f-ing kids in detention for cussing when they f-ing learned that language in the f-ing schools in the first f-ing place ‘cause she never f-ing talked like that in the f-ing house she said.) Evidently, Osantowski even tried to join a white supremacy group but was denied membership because he wasn’t 18 yet.
Columbine, all over again. Here we have a young man, disenfranchised, a loner, bright enough but different. He couldn’t make it in the area Catholic High Schools (believe me–they are vicious to non-jocks but so are many public high schools). By the time he was enrolled at Chippewa Valley HS just a few weeks ago, he had already been molded into a hate-filled young man. Bigot, racist, antisemitic. He was cognizant to the world he knew–a world that relishes conformity and holds uniqueness as repugnant. He was outcast among his peers . Ridiculed by teachers who function best in a room of clones.
He is the result of the world we created -- a world of judgmental buffoons who sincerely believe humiliating others elevates themselves.
Take a bright young man, ostracize him, and end up alienating him. When you alienate him, you give him only two choices. To be forever doomed to the status of oddity, bitter, unable to live or function normally -- another soul lost. Or to take on the superiority complex of one who is above the rest, a demigod who feels no more empathy for fellow humans then we might feel for the ants we sweep off the walk–a monster -- a Hitler, a Hussein, a bin Ladin.
We live in a world where there are no duplications. Not even two snowflakes can ever be the same. No two people can be in the same place, can have the same DNA, fingerprints, ear shapes, nor life experiences. In a world where we are all different, why are some people isolated? Why can’t we relish all their differences? Include everyone. Appreciate every one. Each person is a neighbor, a member of our team, a value.
In a world with complex problems, wouldn’t it be nice to have a diverse pool of ideas and perspectives to work on solutions? We need every type of person created. We need the meek and the strong, the demure and the confident, we need people who function on intelligence, on heart, on spirit, on sensation. It is no accident that we are each different. Why do we fight so hard against the very attributes that will save our world?
My dad is a retired coach so let me put it in his way. What would happen if everyone on the squad was a quarterback? What kind of team would you have then?
He drew a circle that shut me out--
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.
But Love and I had the wit to win:
We drew a circle that took him in!
-- "Outwitted" by Edwin Markham
Lessons of Columbine are still not heeded by schools, parents, kids, communities. The result is Andrew Osantowski, 17 yrs old, currently held on charges that include threatening to kill witnesses (a police officer), concealing stolen firearms, making a terrorism threat, using a computer to commit a crime. Osantowski was planning to attack teachers and fellow students at Chippewa Valley High School, just down the street from me. He wanted to commit a massacre. And he detailed his weaponry, hiding places, and planned killing spree online in a music chat room with a girl three time zones away. Thank God. The young woman was alert enough to tell her university policeman father of the plans that Osantowski bragged about.
One sick psychopath off the streets. One down –- how many more to go?
The local residents can’t show enough gratitude. They want parades and honors bestowed upon the young woman and her father. I think if they were smart they would take an oath to stop the hatred that breeds terrorists.
A police search of Osantowski’s home resulted in the confiscation of numerous stolen weapons including high power hunting rifles, an AK47 assault rifle, long knives, hundreds of pounds of ammunition, pipe bombs already made, misc. bomb making instructions and paraphernalia, aluminum nitrate and other chemicals. Most telling were boxes of white supremacy and Nazi literature, and a Nazi flag. (His mother says he was brainwashed from all those Nazi TV shows on the History Channel–kind of reminds me of an old neighbor who was furious with the f–ing teacher who kept putting her f-ing kids in detention for cussing when they f-ing learned that language in the f-ing schools in the first f-ing place ‘cause she never f-ing talked like that in the f-ing house she said.) Evidently, Osantowski even tried to join a white supremacy group but was denied membership because he wasn’t 18 yet.
Columbine, all over again. Here we have a young man, disenfranchised, a loner, bright enough but different. He couldn’t make it in the area Catholic High Schools (believe me–they are vicious to non-jocks but so are many public high schools). By the time he was enrolled at Chippewa Valley HS just a few weeks ago, he had already been molded into a hate-filled young man. Bigot, racist, antisemitic. He was cognizant to the world he knew–a world that relishes conformity and holds uniqueness as repugnant. He was outcast among his peers . Ridiculed by teachers who function best in a room of clones.
He is the result of the world we created -- a world of judgmental buffoons who sincerely believe humiliating others elevates themselves.
Take a bright young man, ostracize him, and end up alienating him. When you alienate him, you give him only two choices. To be forever doomed to the status of oddity, bitter, unable to live or function normally -- another soul lost. Or to take on the superiority complex of one who is above the rest, a demigod who feels no more empathy for fellow humans then we might feel for the ants we sweep off the walk–a monster -- a Hitler, a Hussein, a bin Ladin.
We live in a world where there are no duplications. Not even two snowflakes can ever be the same. No two people can be in the same place, can have the same DNA, fingerprints, ear shapes, nor life experiences. In a world where we are all different, why are some people isolated? Why can’t we relish all their differences? Include everyone. Appreciate every one. Each person is a neighbor, a member of our team, a value.
In a world with complex problems, wouldn’t it be nice to have a diverse pool of ideas and perspectives to work on solutions? We need every type of person created. We need the meek and the strong, the demure and the confident, we need people who function on intelligence, on heart, on spirit, on sensation. It is no accident that we are each different. Why do we fight so hard against the very attributes that will save our world?
My dad is a retired coach so let me put it in his way. What would happen if everyone on the squad was a quarterback? What kind of team would you have then?
