Virginia Tech’s denial and deception campaign
appears to have moved into a new phase in mid-2010. Censorship and manipulation had not worked; a
full-scale media propaganda campaign had been only partially successful. Now,
the school appeared intent on wiping out as many of the reminders of the
tragedy as possible. Tech’s new tactic became clear to me in the spring of 2010
when I received an invitation from Professor Jerzy Nowak at Virginia Tech to
participate in “Cultivating Peace: A Student Research Symposium on Violence
Prevention” to be held from November 12-14, 2010. I checked with Michael Pohle
and he was not going to attend, but because I was asked to moderate a session
of the symposium, I accepted.
Professor Nowak’s wife, Jocelyne
Coulture-Nowak, was the French professor murdered by Cho. As a tribute to her
and to all those who were killed and injured, Nowak set up the “Virginia Tech
Center for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention” (CPSVP) in the rooms of
Norris Hall where 30 people had been butchered. In conjunction with the CPSVP
and its affiliated “Students for Non-Violence” club, a student symposium on
violence prevention was organized.
In June of 2010, I received an invitation
from Mark G. McNamee, Senior Vice President and Provost, inviting me to take
part in an “International Summit in Transdisciplinary Approaches to Violence
Prevention” to take place on 12-13 November, 2010. My first impression was that
the student symposium had been expanded, and I immediately accepted. The
opening paragraph from McNamee reinforced my impression that the summit was
intended to honor those who were killed or wounded at Tech:
“On April 16, 2007, a terrible
tragedy happened at Virginia Tech. The violent actions of one individual took
the lives of 32 members of our community. In the subsequent three years,
members of our community, as well as other communities around the world
continue to struggle with the pain and loss caused by individuals determined to
unleash violence upon innocent people. It is within this context that Virginia
Tech is convening leading researchers and noted practitioners in the field of
violence prevention to share research, engage in dialogue, and advance best and
promising practices that take holistic and systems approach to the critical
issued related to violence. …”
The more I
thought about it, however, the more I was bothered by the two gatherings being
held simultaneously. When I looked closely at the dates for the summit and for
the student symposium, I noted they did not exactly coincide. In August, I
queried the student symposium and found out that my suspicions were correct—the
international conference had been organized after
the student symposium. It appeared that the school was trying to sideline the
students. This fact became even more apparent when I got to Blacksburg and
found out that members of the press covering the international gathering
weren’t even aware of the student symposium. There were also widespread and
disturbing rumors that the university had pulled funds from the CPSVP, making
the organizers scramble to find financial backing.
The international summit and student
symposium began on the evening of November 12th with a joint
welcoming session. School President Charles Steger gave the opening address.
This was my first exposure to Steger and I am not sure what I expected, but by
any standard, I was taken aback by the undistinguished man who stood before us.
I didn’t find him particularly imposing, and his speech was bland. I was also
bothered by the lack of eye contact with audience. There was no emotion in his
voice and he never mentioned the tragedy at Tech.
I suddenly felt as if I had stepped back in
time to when I was a political analyst at the CIA covering the communist world.
I was once again watching an uninspiring leader drone on and on to a tightly
controlled and manipulated conclave, and to an audience that responded with
perfunctory applause.
I had hoped I would see and hear a university
president who would dedicate the conclave to the victims of Cho’s rage—those
murdered and those wounded, both physically and emotionally. But April 16, 2007
was never mentioned. Indeed, no one speaking that evening ever mentioned the
shootings. It was as if several hundred people had gathered in Blacksburg to
discuss violence prevention in the abstract. It was as if the school had lured
us to Blacksburg by invoking the memory of the tragedy, and then tried to
ignore that it ever happened. The words “bait and switch” came to my mind.
Something else was curious. Participants in
the student symposium were invited to attend the opening ceremony, but the
reception following that ceremony was limited to “badge holding participants
only.” That meant the students and those attending only the student symposium
were not invited to the reception. I thought that rather odd, considering the
fact that the student symposium had been the catalyst for both gatherings. To
this day I am not sure whether the students were excluded because of academic
arrogance, or because the school was intent on keeping participants as far away
from the international conference as possible.
I also found it odd that the International
Conference on Violence Prevention was held on the main floor of the Skelton
Conference Center and the student symposium was in the basement. There were no
signs directing people to the student symposium; those wanting to hear the
students were left on their own to work through the maze of the conference
center and find their way down to where the students had gathered.
I also
thought it strange that there was no mention of the Center for Peace Studies
and Violence Prevention Professor Nowak had established using the remodeled
rooms in Norris Hall where Cho’s rampage took place. When I accepted the
invitations to both the International Conference and the Student Symposium, I
assumed that the university would offer all participants the chance to see the
CPSVP. Once again my expectations were not met. There was no mention of it
during the opening ceremony, nor were participants encouraged to see Professor
Nowak’s center first hand.
More
recently, my suspicions that the university wanted to downplay the shootings
(or pretend they never happened), were confirmed when I found out that the
Center had been downgraded from a “University Center,” to an adjunct of the
Sociology Department.
On Saturday, November 13, 2010, I moderated
the first segment after lunch. It was entitled “Violence Prevention and
Conflict Resolution.” Again, throughout the morning sessions no one mentioned
the April 16, 2007 shootings. The silence was deafening.
I was not the only one to find the absence of
any reference to Cho’s shootings disquieting. At lunch, I met a group of
students and their professor from an East Coast university. When I noted the
rather eerie lack of reference to the worst school shooting in this nation’s
history (and the reason why most of us came to Virginia Tech for the conference
and symposium), they immediately agreed saying they too were puzzled. It was as
if that terrible day had never happened, as if the school wanted to deny that a
gunman had slaughtered 32 people and wounded at least 17 others.
After talking to the professor and students,
I decided this silence would end.
That afternoon I opened my segment of the student
symposium with the following:
“Thank you professor Nowak for sponsoring
this symposium. I must begin by saying I am somewhat concerned that we are
sitting on the campus where the most horrific mass murder took place in the
history of this country—we are attending an international conference and a
symposium on violence prevention, and there has been no mention of that
tragedy. I find this fact troubling. So, as a tribute to the memory of those 32
innocent victims of April 16, 2007 slaughter, I would like to dedicate this
session to their memory. Indeed, Professor Nowak’s establishment of the Center
for Peace Studies and Violence Prevention is an outstanding and fitting way to
honor the memory of those 32 innocent individuals.”
“It is an honor for me to sit on this panel—I
believe that it is absolutely critical to bring in the minds and ideas of young
people such as those seated next to me, if we are ever to make progress in
preventing the all too frequent slaughter that occurs on our nation’s campuses.”
“When Professor Nowak asked me to
participate, I asked, “What do you want me to say?” He said, “Perhaps something
about yourself and your background. This symposium is not about me; it is not
about anyone in attendance or the people on the panel, it is about finding
solutions to prevent violence. … “
“What I want you know is that my journey in
this quest to find answers to campus violence began on January 16, 2002, when
the mother of my oldest grandchild was gunned down on the campus of the
Appalachian School of Law at Grundy, Virginia—less than 200 miles from where we
sit.”
“The parallels between that shooting and the
shootings here at Virginia Tech are frightening. Parallels in the profiles of
the killers, parallels in the failure of people in positions of authority to
heed the warning signs, parallels in the poor responses at the time of the
shooting (in both cases costing lives), and parallels in the lack of candor in
raising questions as to what went wrong, failure to identify individuals who
failed in their responsibilities (and to hold them accountable), failure of law
enforcement officials, and the willingness of politicians on both sides of the
aisle to gloss over harsh realities and in so doing, to create a cover up.”
My remarks
drew thunderous applause. Clearly, I was not the only one puzzled by the
silence. (To be continued)
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