4.23.2007

one week later


Hope you all had a good weekend. After last week, I need a little bit of time away from the computer (and a good, stiff drink). Here's another long list of links related to the Virginia Tech shooting:
  • Some more information on Seung-Hui Cho's childhood and background: An Isolated Boy in a World of Strangers
  • Another article on Virginia's Korean American community: Virginia Korean community still reeling
  • The state medical examiner reveals few details about Cho's grisly rampage: Tech gunman shot victims over 100 times. There was apparently nothing unusual about Cho's autopsy and nothing that would have hinted at any psychological problems that might have led to his actions.
  • Newsweek has a gallery of photos by Shaozhuo Cui, the student photographer who was shown being arrested by police at the site of the shootings: One Hour in Hell
  • President Bush has directed three cabinet secretaries, educators, mental health experts and government officials across the nation to recommend ways to avoid a repeat of last week's events: Bush Appoints Panel to Review Va. Tech Shootings
  • This is a really interesting, nicely stated editorial in the Philadelphia Inquirer, on South Korea's emphatic apologies when it was revealed the shooter was originally from South Korea: Letter to South Korea
  • And here's a good commentary by Professor Katherine H.S. Moon in the Chicago Tribune: Don't politicize massacre
  • And here's another well-written, personal editorial in the Tribune by Esther Yoon-Ji Kang: IN OUR DARK HEART
  • Last week, I couldn't help thinking about Shi-Zheng Chen's Dark Matter, a film loosely based on the 1991 University of Iowa incident in which a Chinese student reacted violently after being passed over for an academic prize, killing five people and paralyzing a sixth before killing himself. After the film's premiere at Sundance, distributors were unsure whether such a bleak film would be released theatrically or go straight to DVD. According to this article, now the film is getting interest again as a theatrical release: 'Dark Matter' message painfully sharpened by Virginia Tech tragedy
  • At the University of Maryland, an Asian American student claims a professor harassed her and likened her to the Virginia Tech gunman: Student: Professor Likened Me To Va. Tech Shooter
  • This blog has been created to document possible hate crimes that have resulted from the shootings at Virginia Tech: Don't Ignore Hate Crimes, Document It
  • Rapper Jin has posted a track, "Rain Rain Go Away," offering his take on the tragedy.
  • The Season, a band whose members are from Virginia Tech, wrote a song, "Forever Changed," in memory of the victims. It's kind of cheesy, but their hearts are in the right place, and you get the idea.
  • And finally, I was guest last week on NPR's Tell Me More with Michel Martin, along with Alvin Alvarez, Ph.D., president of the Asian American Psychological Association, and Jeanne Mariani-Belding, president of the Asian American Journalists Association, talking about the perceptions and implications of the shooter's ethnicity: The Perceptions of Tragedy. I should also add that the show also features a great segment with Oliver Wang, author of the fantastic Soul Sides blog, bringing some levity to the show and sharing some soul cuts.
This tragedy will be in the news and continue to affect the nation in different ways in the days, weeks and months to come. But I'm going to make a concerted effort now to move on. I know that the friends, family and loves ones of the victims do not easily have that luxury, and again, my heart goes out to them.

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