10 Comments

• 1. JF  |  September 20th, 2010 at 6:40 am

  To me the columbine shooters are heros. Why well they are like alot of students. Pushed to suicide wouldve done it and no one would have noticed. By going on the offensive they gave a voice for the victims of bullyng. They made it clear our schools failed them. They also finally made a stand against the bullies and harrasers.

• 2. Matthew  |  October 21st, 2010 at 8:11 pm

  While I understand what you’re saying, I just don’t believe the taking of any innocent lives can be “heroic”. Yes, the Columbine shooters may have killed those who bullied them. But they also killed a bunch of innocent bystanders.

  Additionally, when you think back to wars vs. peaceful movements, what are the examples that we all remember as inspiring progression? Peaceful movements, it seems. Martin Luther King JR., Gandhi, etc. were all much more effective for their cause than mass killings or war ever are. For instance: don’t you think Osama Bin Laden just made his “cause” much worse by masterminding 9/11? Now he has the US after him, and many people in our country sadly discriminate against Muslims, albeit on a subconscious level in many ways. What if Osama had tried a more peaceful movement? Do you think his cause would have been so negatively affected?

  Same goes for the Columbine shooters. I feel like they have given a bad name to those that have been bullied. Instead of sympathizing with them, many see them as ticking time bombs and are afraid of them. I’m not saying I have all the right answers, just saying that violence never seems to be the most effective one.

• 3. lionel  |  July 12th, 2011 at 11:17 pm

  @2-how is a fifteen year old supposed to stage “peaceful protests?” If Ghandi and MLK barely succeeded in changing their conditions how are teenagers going to?

  I was bullied too. All kids look for is some way to humiliate and belittle you. If people want proof of mankind’s relation to the apes of Africa South Hadley is it.

• 4. Anon  |  January 4th, 2012 at 5:53 pm

  @2, I have a few points to make in response:

  1. You claim that innocent lives were taken at Columbine, but as far as I’m aware there is no evidence to support the notion that any of the victims were innocent of bullying Harris and Klebold. This is not to say that everyone who was killed deserved it, but we have no evidence to say for sure either way.

  2. Peaceful movements in the middle east have, sadly, seldom worked, and using Bin Laden to justify your claim is taking the situation out-of-context. Firstly, Bin Laden’s cause was not to defend his country from the USA, but to destroy a culture that he, as a fundamentalist Muslim, found disgusting. He believed in enforcing people to become Muslims. There was no peaceful alternative for Bin Laden because oppression of freedom of speech was fundamental to his beliefs, and hence it cannot be compared to the feats of Gandhi and King, who were fighting for the opposite: equality and liberty.

  3. Thirdly, you mention Harris and Klebold have given a bad name to those who are bullied. How? They are already considered to be lesser human beings by their peers, hence why they’re bullied, but anyone could be put in that situation, and everyone has their limits…it’s not a reason to fear them, it’s a reason why the prejudiced should try and understand human nature and understand that their victims have the same limits that they do.

• 5. joe 3  |  August 26th, 2012 at 9:14 pm

  Ijust wish i was able to shoot them.

• 6. joe 3  |  August 26th, 2012 at 9:16 pm

  Killing is wrong;builing is rong. but whst those filthy pieces of garbadge did was unexcussable

• 7. kindle  |  April 1st, 2016 at 7:28 pm

  I also agree that their actions have helped the victims of bullying and harassment. The lives of the innocent that were taken, were for a greater cause. Whats a few deaths if the bullying rates decrease due to fear of what the reaction of said victim will be? I do take interest in their lives and views so i may have some bias, shoot me if i’m wrong.
  (hah did you catch the pun xD)

• 8. James  |  May 20th, 2016 at 10:34 am

  All I know is that I was in 8th grade when columbine happened. For whatever reason people started being nice to me and kids like myself after. Killing is wrong but I’m alive today because of the events at columbine. somehow when those 15 kids died at columbine the world became a better place to me and for me. For the first time in my life my peers didn’t just yell insults at me. They were scared of me and walked on eggshells around me. If kids talked to me it was nice. Precolumbine they only time kids talked to me was to be mean to me. Before columbine all kids did was pick on my weight and my music taste when all i wanted was to be left alone. How many thousands of suicides were prevented due to the actions by the shooters? Maybe even millions. There’s no stastic on that. But if we had to sacrifice 15 kids to save 15 thousand kids, wouldn’t we do it without thinking twice? I’d sacrifice my own life if I knew it would save thousands of lives. After 911 we hunted osama because we thought killing one man would save thousands of lives. Our leaders kill a few to save a greater amount of lives. I’m not sure the columbine kids had that in mind. I don’t know them or know what was going on in their heads. No one does. Their journals could have been lies or fabrication. All I know is my life got better and I stopped wanting to kill myself on a daily basis after 4201999. All I know is kids everywhere changed for the better. Unless you were in middle school or high school at that time I dont expect you to begin to understand and unless you were bullied constantly you could never understand. Teenage suicide rates declined. Suicides still happened but the percentage went down. Suicide percentages have always steadily been on the rise but the 4 to 6 years after columbine was the only time in modern history that percentage went down instead of up. 15 died so a whole generation could be saved. From the shooters to the victims they are all heroes in a weird way for the roles they played.

• 9. Andrew Skinner  |  November 18th, 2016 at 6:52 pm

  Matthew, There is no such thing as innocent bystanders they don’t exist. Americas laws are over 600 years old and still very little has changed.America are not seeing the forest from the trees, America holds the title of the most massacres and the highest suicide rate in the world.

• 10. Andrew Skinner  |  November 18th, 2016 at 7:00 pm

  For this to change, laws will need to be changed. Because unless that happens, it will only be a matter of time before another person will commit the next atrocity.1st amendment states you can say what you want without any fear of being sued, that is one of the main reason these terrible things happen.

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