Columbine : Columbine High Columbine

Barbara Dority author of “The Columbine Tragedy: Countering the Hysteria”, illustrates how society becomes hysterical after a teen commits a mass school shooting. The Columbine shooting occurred April 20, 1999 in Littleton, Colorado. It was caused by two adolescents Eric Harris and Dylan Kledold, collectively killed 13 students and wounded 23 others. After the Columbine shooting, society looked in every direction for who is to blame for such a horrendous act of violence caused by teens. Dority expresses how society tends to panic, and take away the youths’ pleasures such as video games, music, and the very basic rights young people have. While society posit that media or Goth music is the catalyst for teen violence, it is not the media or Goth who are to blame for teen violence.

On April 20, 1999 every American life was changed forever as the news broke of what would come to be known as the Columbine High School Massacre. Immediately reporters and psychologists alike began to ask the question; why? What could cause Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, eighteen and seventeen respectively, to go off the deep end and commit one of the worst mass shootings in history? Both seniors had less than two months left in their high school career, why would they choose to commit this crime instead of graduating, moving on with their lives, and leaving their classmates to do the same? Although there were two clear killers at Columbine what many people don’t know is the theory that Eric Harris was the true mastermind behind the plan. “To understand Columbine, we have to understand Eric Harris, “(Langman, 2009). Many people who knew the boys say that Dylan Klebold was a follower of Eric Harris and that he would have never constructed a plan like this on his own (“Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold The killers of 13 students and a teacher at Columbine High School – Littleton, Colorado”). Regardless of whether Dylan followed Eric or if he had his own reasons for murder, it is clear that Eric was the one with deep rooted psychological issues. However this makes Dylan Klebold harder to understand, was he a follower or just good at hiding his emotional turmoil? Why did Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold commit one of the most well-known school shootings and what effect has it had

day two seniors Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris carried out a full blown assault on the school during school hours with hundreds of kids and teachers present” (Levy, 1999). These two had a plan to kill as many people as they possibly could. They had multiple guns and explosives as they patrolled the halls looking for their victims. By the time the situation was resolved they had murdered 12 students and 1 teacher before they killed themselves.

On Tuesday, April 20 1999, Columbine High School located in Columbine Colorado an unfortunate massacre happened and many teens lost their lives. The two students responsible for this incident were Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. These two senior students were responsible for killing twelve students and one teacher; they were also responsible for injuring an additional twenty one students on their rampage. A few other students were injured while trying to escape the school. Columbine is considered the fourth deadliest school massacre in history. It was said to be that there was not one target but everyone was a target on Eric and Dylan’s rampage through the high school

Over the past couple of decades, school shooting have seemed to occur often-- continuously shocking the nation and reminding everyone that no community is exempt from such horror. One main contributor of this hysteria is found within the media. At the catalyst of this hysteria, lies the horrific Columbine shooting in 1999. Since then, school shootings have received ample coverage-- some argue that this has romanticized school shootings, others argue that is has provided condemning coverage of the often insane perpetrators. In the first year after the Columbine shooting, over 10,000 articles were written about the event, likely setting the stage for the nationwide desire for constant coverage of such events (Elsass et al, p. 445-446).

Tuesday April 20th, 1999 began like any other day. Parents went to work, and the children went off to school. Neither worried about the other, or how their day would turn out. But, hours later everything changed (“Columbine Highschool Massacre.”). Little did the residents of Columbine, Colorado know their high school would be a statistic for one of the largest school massacres in US History. On this day, two teenage boys were responsible for killing 12 innocent students and a teacher, wounding 23 more students, and then killing themselves (Miller). While a horrific event, the Columbine tragedy improved the safety in schools by upgrading security systems, improving administration’s knowledge on school security, and increasing

“There have been 220 shootings on school campuses in the U.S. since 20 children and six adults were killed at Sandy Hook Elementary school in Newtown, Conn. on Dec. 14, according to Everytown For Gun Safety, an advocacy group.” (Krishnakumar, Priya , and Len Degroot) Many people do not feel safe attending or sending their child to a public school where they are possibly subject to a shooting. School shootings were first initially brought to the attention of the public in 1999, Columbine was one of the first school massacres that was recognized nationwide. Because of the magnitude of the shooting there is an abundance of information online bearing information of the event. First off, the shooters had identified specific targets, athletes, minorities and Christians. The two shooters had planned the firing for over a year and thought out their whole strategy. (“Columbine High School shootings.”) There was no plan in place to react to this shooting, because nothing like it had ever happened before. Although if there was, we may not hear about Columbine to the degree we do today. Columbine still is the most well known shooting and the horrific impact is still notable today across the United States. In the eighteen years since Columbine in 1999 there have been hundreds of school shootings, ranging from grade schools to college universities. Obviously, school shootings are a big problem in the United States and hopefully in time with the proper precautions taken they will eventually be eliminated forever.

On April 20th, 1999 at 11:19 AM two current students named Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold open-fired in Columbine High School murdering 12 students and one teacher. They wounded 24 other students and shortly after took their own lives. Strategically, they set up bombs a few miles away from the school to go off just before the massacre was to begin to deter the police, fire department and

During what started like any other day in a small Colorado town on April 20th, 1999 ended in tragedy and death. Seniors Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris wrote about how they would execute the massacre. In the journal found in Harris’s bedroom was written almost every part of their plan. They wrote how they would like to “leave a lasting impression on the world with this kind of violence” as well as how they wanted to “kill mankind” and have no one to survive. Initially they wrote how they were planning for a long time to bomb the school in an attack similar to the 1995 Oklahoma City bombings, but its failure led to this event. The investigators also found videotapes in which some contained both seniors planning and practicing with their guns for the attack and others

On April 20, 1999, tragedy struck a Colorado high school. It started out as an ordinary spring day in Jefferson County, but it soon turned horrific. “The tragedy began at approximately 11:10 a.m. on that sunny Tuesday,” (Gimpel 27), right around lunchtime. No one could have anticipated the events that would soon follow, devastating the otherwise average suburban town. The lives of the students of Columbine High School and their families would never be the same after that catastrophic day.

On this day in 1999of April 20, two teenage gunmen kill 13 people in a shooting spree at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, south of Denver. At approximately 11:19 a.m., Dylan Klebold, 18, and Eric Harris, 17, dressed in trench coats, began shooting students outside the school before moving inside to continue their rampage. By 11:35 a.m., Klebold and Harris had killed 12 fellow students and a teacher and wounded another 23 people. Shortly after noon, the two teens turned their guns on themselves and committed suicide. This event made me feel safe around schools with uniforms because it makes it more unlikely for students to bring weapons. It shows that teens may be all able to get weapons easily making me aware of the people surrounding me.

April 20th, 1999 is a day that will never be forgotten, on that day the first school shooting massacre accord. At around eleven fifteen a.m. Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris opened fire on students at Columbine High School in a suburb of Denver, Colorado. What drives two teenagers to the point of mass murder? These kids had come to a dark road in their lives and they succumbed to it completely and that is when they began to plan for the biggest school shooting. What drove these two teens to their breaking point and what was the result of their choices?

"I'm angry someone would do this to us. There are lives ruined, families ruined, and our whole school year is ruined" (Brackely 1). Casey Brackely, once a student that attended Columbine High School, remembers the tragedy of the horrific Columbine shooting that killed and injured many students. Mass shootings in the United States have been on the rise since the 1980’s, especially in the last decade. These shooters motives and profiles are almost all terrifyingly alike. Many of these shooters try to imitate and parallel the tragic shooting of the Columbine High School in 1999. These shootings have made peaceful organizations, such as an elementary school; become a place of violence and death. Currently, in the United States, an epidemic of

Craig Scott once said, regarding the two boys that took his sister’s life, “I think the biggest challenge for me after the shooting was the anger that I was dealing with toward the two shooters.” In Craig’s interview he talked about the foundation he started in honor of his sister, Rachel Scott. For a long time Craig felt hatred for the boys, but a revelation came to him and he created Rachel’s Challenge, an organization to promote a positive culture change and relationship growth across the nation’s school systems. Students who feel troubled and misunderstood are helped by the foundation to feel acceptance and equality amongst their peers. The number one way schools can find out about students carrying weapons is not from a piece of equipment but from the individual who comes forward and reports it to an adult that he or she trusts (Strutter). Schools turned their focus to students themselves and creating a healthy and educational environment. By doing so, the threat of a weapon being brought in school has

The first misconception is that the social cliques that occur in high schools across the nation has a role in this tragedy. Columbine is not simply a school shooting but is rather a shooting that the gunmen chose the school as their tool. School shooters tend to act impulsively and attack the targets of their rage mainly the students and faculty. Harris and Klebold planned for a year and dreamed much bigger. The school served as a means to a grander end, to terrorize the entire nation by attacking a symbol of American life. The shooters talk in numerous video tapes about their act being bigger than the Oklahoma city bombings. They boasted about making sure there bloody performance was bigger and more memorable. Klebold is particular was quoted as bragging about inflicting “the most deaths in U.S. history. Columbine was