Turning on the TV expecting a quietly routine, extremely mundane news bulleting peppered with dollops of scoops abt the Abhiash wedding... I was shattered. Some bizzare pyscho had gone on a rampage killing scores of students and injuring a multitude of others at V Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia. The very news flash sent a chill down my spine. This couldnt be real is the only thing my brain was registering and evrything else was numbed.
Suddenly, every other proceeding seemed unnecessary. The first thought swerved to my friends studying there and praying tht they be alright. The very next moment I was gripped by this huge catastrophic feeling.. At a slightly different time (circa 2002) and maybe a lil different place (Gainesville) and that bullet could have been for me.
Is my life that cheap... anyone can walk in and shoot me cold? Is anyone's life that meaningless? What are we achieving with advances in science and technology if we give equal access to thugs and criminals? Is this progress good then? Was this a one-off, randomised case of pyschotic behavior prevading society or have we turned the clock on humanity?
The more I thought of it.. the more shattering the answers were. I felt this was just one of the terrible manifestations of convulted value streams we are drawing upon. The reflections are there everywhere... Only when they leave an impression do we consider that the sanctimony to be shattered.
I see road rage daily... everyday the drivers veer off showing their strength and supremacy while alluding to knock anyone and evryone in their way; But it gets highlighted only when a super rich brat tramples innocent roadside dwellers. Violence is encouraged heartily through video games and wrestling entertainment; but it makes dreadful reading only when students procure guns and go on a rampage. Rock and hard rock is celebrated till a Kurt Kobain dies only to be enshrined for all he meant; drugs and death.
We abuse evry freaking right we have been mandated to exercise only to shoot the gun over someone else shoulders saying " Him and not me is breaking the limits".. not realising we are pushing ourseleves to a collective pitfall.. Every one is gonna fall; if not today then some day for sure...
Sad is the fact that by the end of the shooting 33 innocents were dead, sadder is the part that we would just move on with lives taking this to be a blip on the Human advancement radar but saddest is the part that not many of us would introspect to find the deadly creature growing in each of us in this jingo-heavy value-less world...
Rejoice we would that thankfully, it wasnt us.... Repent we should that this wasnt the last.....
And some day.. It could be you or me......
