April 20, 2007 By Jack Salisbury The last two weeks have been rough on the world of sports. Meat-headed Don Imus, thinking he was being clever and funny, showed us that race and racism is still a paramount issue in today's America with his description of the Rutgers women's basketball team as "nappy-headed hos." Then, NBA superstar and supposed role model Tim Duncan was challenged to a fight by veteran referee Joey Crawford. The scene had its comic elements to it, but it was still fairly disgusting with the raw angst and hate between the old Crawford and the robust Duncan. In a time when nuclear weapons programs abound, people are killed over the outcomes of Little League games and enormously wealthy NBA players' demand salary hikes citing the "need to feed their family," you sometimes have to wonder where our neurotic society is going. And then Virginia Tech happened. Virginia Tech. The Hokies have been a mainstay of college athletics for years. Head football coach Frank Beamer built his program based on hard work and excellent special teams play. By the time a kid named Michael Vick stepped onto the Blacksburg campus in the fall of 1998, Beamer's program had reached the status of national power. Since then, Virginia Tech has always been a mainstay of college football, competing in the national championship and appearing at numerous New Year's Day bowl games. Under Seth Greenberg, Tech's basketball program has also risen, beating both Duke and North Carolina this year in ACC play and making the NCAA Tournament as a five seed. It has never been hard to root for the Hokies; they have up-and-coming programs. And after all, who can resist rooting for a Hokie? Part of the allure in rooting for the Hokies was that you often didn't know what a Hokie was. For the record, Hokie is a fictional mascot masquerading itself as a maroon bird. But there's even more reason to root for the Hokies now. We all know about the tragedy that took place this Monday. I can't imagine what it's like to be a student at Virginia Tech right now, to know someone who was shot or injured, to be around the university or to even be an alumnus. The inexplicable tragedy has moved our nation, brought people together, but most of all, it's left us asking: Why? There isn't an answer, though. That's the hardest part. It's times like these when sports are therapeutic, taking people away from the harsh reality of the world we live in. A touchdown, last-second shot or an interception can make people forget, for just a moment, what has happened. What I'm saying is: Sports can be trivial, but for the most part, they're not. A 45-yard touchdown run or a 50-yard field goal? Sure, they're pretty meaningless in the long run, but when you realize who they're affecting and how they're affecting them, they suddenly take on a whole new meaning. After the city of New Orleans experienced the devastating disaster of Hurricane Katrina, it rallied around the hometown Saints. The Saints received coverage around the country for their heart-warming story; and unlike a lot of things dramatized in sports, the Saints' story was truly heartwarming. Drew Brees, Reggie Bush and Marques Colston rejuvenated a city, a region and a country by bringing the Saints to the doorstep of the Super Bowl. They understood the responsibility on their shoulders and acted accordingly, being active in their communities and setting new standards for what it meant to be role models. And in the process, they showed that sports aren't just sports. Sports bring people together. They may not seem to have that same effect in a place like California, but trust me: If you go to Tuscaloosa, Chapel Hill, or even Blacksburg, sports are a huge thing. They're more than just a game. I'll be rooting for the Hokies every chance I get next year. I can only hope that the city of Blacksburg, the state of Virginia and the whole country will rally around Virginia Tech and its athletic program in moving on from this senseless tragedy. It was hard to not root for the Hokies before. Now? It's impossible. Jack Salisbury is a freshman. Contact him at jack24@stanford.edu. -- Original Source: Stanford Daily - April 20, 2007
Permissions granted by James Hohmann Editor-in-Chief The Stanford Daily <jhohmann@stanford.edu>
Recorded Thursday, April 19 (24 MB MP3) We've decided to scrap tonight's planned show (about language post-Imus) in favor of a show about the visual reverberations of the Virginia Tech shooting. Our central prod came from the trusty barthjg, who wrote: I'll pitch a show about Instant Symbols and Icons, based on the Virgina Tech killings. The image of Cho Seung-Hui brazenly holding two handguns, arms outstretched will soon reach iconic status, to be mashed up and shared in all sorts of ways-just like the Abu gharib photos and Che' and everything else that has appeared on t-shirts and ads. How many You Tube videos created in the wake of the shootings? music tributes. every incident enters the mosh pit of creative repurposing. Who is going to write the music, the movie...track every 6 months how pieces of this tragedy filter thru global culture. Watch someone stage the two crazy plays this guy wrote for the drama class he is in. (you can find them on aol.com...i read them last night) barthjg, in a show suggestion to Open Source, April 19, 2007 We're following his lead, and asking: Is there anything to learn about the way we use new technologies in this first mass-murder made, as it were, for YouTube? Are mashups and tributes a form of digital catharsis, a sort of artistic safety valve? Is there a cross-over point where they become pure exploitation, or worse? And what, exactly, is new here? Besides the zeros and the ones, and the ease of dissemination and reconfiguration, is there a difference between a 19th-century suicide note and a 21st-century QuickTime movie? Siva Vaidhyanathan Assistant Professor of Culture and Communication, NYU Blogger, SABEROCRACY.NET Keith Jenkins Picture Editor, The Washington Post Flickr blogger, Burnt Pixel Blogger, Good Reputation Sleeping Founder of the Post's Blog City feature James Der Derian Director of the Global Security and Global Media Project at The Watson Institute for International Studies at Brown University Author of Virtuous War: Mapping the Military-Industrial-Media-Entertainment Network Extra Credit Reading Excerpts from the original footage sent by Cho Seung-Hui to NBC on the day of the shootings (via YouTube): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FbDl5_qAj04 anditgoeslike, 2007-4-19, anditgoeslike's LiveJournal: "These pictures of Cho failed to evoke the kind of emotional reaction that a real villain should. I'm sure it would be different if he were actually holding that gun to my head and not to a digital camera with the self-timer innocuously ticking away. I don't know, though. I just imagined him going in front of the mirror and experimenting with various outfits and poses." ntcoolfool, Update, Bryce's Journal, April 16, 2007: "I cannot decide if I should join and get the most up to date information or not. I think when I do, it will then hit me. I must avoid it at all costs. The list still awaits- and several friends have remained silent on facebook updates. Could it be them?" Scottish Right, Old Media Tries To Tarnish New Media With Virginia Tech Massacre, Scottish Right, April 19, 2007: "A madman campus killer making a video and shipping it to a media outlet has absolutely nothing to do with "citizen journalism" or "new media." A sicko video made with a camcorder and sent to NBC is hardly any different than an elaborate suicide note being written and mailed to a media outlet." Momus, The problem lays a floral wreath at the grave of the problem, Click Opera, April 17, 2007: "There, visually represented, is the same horror we heard on the cell phone video footage students recorded. The grim exterior of the building, and that seemingly endless banging. Horror beyond all the platitudes. Horror intimately tied to the braying donkey of the Absurd, the pragmatic, the routine, the logistical — what Hannah Arendt called the banality of evil." nikolrb, in a comment on Open Source, April 19, 2007: "It seems part of this discussion is not about if the images are more prevalent, I don't think they are especially, but how quickly we are digesting and regurgitating and socially processing them. Think of all the movies, plays, songs, etc. made referring to Jeffrey Dahmer, the Zodiac Killer, Son of Sam killings, Jack the Ripper, etc. The entertainment/news cycle seems to be converging (in more arenas than just this.)" Dan Gilmor, Virginia Tech: How Media Are Evolving, Center for Citizen Media Blog, April 17, 2007: "Once again, horror has given us a glimpse of our media future: simultaneously conversational and distributed, mass and personal." Sky News, Copycat: Killer Re-Enacted Violent Film, Sky News, April 19, 2007: "Officers believe he repeatedly watched Oldboy as part of his preparation for the killing spree." -- Archived with permission of the producers. Original Source: http://www.radioopensource.org/re-imaging-violence/
David Miller Senior Producer, Open Source www.radioopensource.org 617.497.8096 david@radioopensource.org
Sick Sad World: A lesson from Virginia Tech
April 20, 2007 Opinion article By Jackie Bernstein It's time for a game of Funny/Not Funny. First: A joke overheard in the CoHo on Monday referencing the Virginia Tech massacre. Not Funny. No one laughed, and someone said, "Too soon, too soon." Next: An off-hand comment made at the gym on Wednesday, poking fun at the ethnicity of the Korean shooter responsible for the assault, Cho Seung-Hui. Funny? At least, I heard people laugh in response. "Oh, man... that's so wrong. Hahahahaha." How soon is too soon to use a tragedy as fodder for comedy? "Homer loves Flanders," a Simpsons episode in season five, parodies Charles Whitman, the University of Texas tower-sniper: Ned Flanders guns down multiple Homers from atop a bell tower. About 25 years after the massacre, FOX executives found the scene funny enough to air. How long will it take for South Park to run an episode satirizing the events at Virginia Tech? I think that the amount of time it takes for someone to find humor in tragedy is directly related to his connection to the incident. It is unlikely that the man who sold Sueng-Hui his gun will ever find anything humorous about the shooting. The student in the CoHo who made his joke last Monday probably doesn't know anyone at Virginia Tech. I doubt that he feels any kind of personal connection to the event. However, we as Stanford students are actually deeply connected to the Virginia Tech massacre. Seung-Hui exploded at Virginia Tech. Maurice "Mo" Morsette imploded at Stanford. Both students' lives ended in tragedy. Maurice Moisette's suicide is one of at least three reported at Stanford this academic year. Ranked in 2005 by The Princeton Review as the university with the "Happiest Students Overall" in the country, Stanford doesn't seem to be living up to its reputation any longer. The Virginia Tech tragedy will undoubtedly lead the Stanford administration and various support groups on campus to reexamine how issues of mental health are handled on campus. This response seems to deal with only part of a greater problem. No matter how many aggressive programs a school funds, no matter how many 24-hour hotlines they provide or psychologists they hire, nothing can change without a change in the student culture itself. Unfortunately, the type of student elite universities admit is not going to change anytime soon. We are a nation obsessed with getting into college. And the most obsessed end up here. As a result, we are a campus full of top-heavy people. We are world-class debaters, writers and chemists, fully actualizing our intellectual potential. But these skills have come at the loss of developing more basic skills. By the end of winter quarter of my freshman year, 40 percent of my all-frosh dorm had never been kissed. Throwing these types of kids into the collegiate world is bound to result in extreme feelings of alienation, confusion and anger. College is a place where many get their first taste of freedom, but learning how to handle independence isn't part of any AP Physics textbook. I know that this article goes to print during Admit Weekend, and, as such, I was reluctant to write this week about our collective failings as members of the academic world. As a tour guide who couldn't imagine having gone anywhere else (and who enthusiastically tells this to hoards of high school juniors on a regular basis), I want to make sure that I am very clear: I have had a remarkable experience at Stanford, and I know that I made the right choice in coming here. Quite a few of my friends feel the same way. The problems of socially handicapped hyper-achievers are not unique to a few schools. Rather, this situation is endemic across the country. I decided to write this article after I watched a mother and her ProFro daughter walk through the activities fair yesterday. The daughter was texting on her cell phone, and her mom kept on taking papers from the student tables, asking the students working the booths a slew of questions: "How many hours a week do you volunteer? How many other activities do you do? Do you put your activities on your resume? How many activities should my daughter do?" The mother was so involved in her daughter's life that I wondered if she had opened her daughter's acceptance letter for her. My hope is that the mother I overheard reads this week's column. I hope that she realizes that her daughter is probably exhausted from pushing herself through four incredibly difficult years and almost certainly will need guidance on how to be a well-adjusted citizen, not how to build a resume, as she enters adulthood. My hope is that ProFros read this column and realize that coming to college is not going to be easy, wherever they choose to go. Part of growing up is facing failure and difficulty, and there is no shame in asking for help, even if it seems as though everyone else is doing fine. They aren't. Our complete inability to cope with the pressures of today may eventually be funny. But for now, it's definitely too soon to turn the tragedy of our extreme emphasis on academic intelligence and achievement into a quick one-liner glibly delivered at the Manzanita brunch table. Jackie Bernstein can be reached at jaber@stanford.edu. -- Stanford Daily - April 20, 2007
Display of support painted on front window of Imaginations Toy and Furniture Company, South Main Street, Blacksburg. The poem reads: If we had hinges in our heads There wouldn't be no sin. 'Cause we could take the bad stuff out, And leave the good stuff in. - Shel Silverstein Photo taken by Brent Jesiek on June 9, 2007. -- Licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0.
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0
Un gînd pentru studenţii şi profesorii din Virginia
32 de colegi ai noştri, studenţi şi profesori, au fost ucişi într-o tragedie fără sens care a zguduit America şi lumea întreagă. Noi, cei 37.000 de studenţi şi profesori ai Universităţii „Alexandru Ioan Cuza" din Iaşi, împărtăşim durerea şi revolta în faţa unui act de neînţeles. Este dificil să reacţionezi în faţa provocărilor absurde ale violenţei, mai ales atunci cînd universitatea ştie să lupte doar pentru cunoaştere şi o viaţă mai bună în comunitate. Îi plângem şi noi pe cei care acum şi-au pierdut viaţa în campusul Universităţii Virginia Tech, printre care şi pe profesorul de origine română, Liviu Librescu. Cu gândul la ei şi la tinerii de pretutindeni, nu putem decât să ne continuăm misiunea de a lumina minţile omeneşti prin ştiinţă, pentru că sîntem convişi că acesta este singurul mod în care putem inventa împreună un viitor mai bun. 32 of our colleagues, students and teachers, were killed in a senseless tragedy that horrified America and the entire world. Here, at Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iaşi, the 37.000 students and teachers share the grief and anger in front of such irrational and unfair act. It is difficult to find the right reaction to the absurd challenges of violence, especially since the university's only fight is for knowledge ad a better life for the community. We too mourn the lives lost in the campus of Viriginia Tech University, among which that of the Romanian professor Liviu Librescu. Thinking of them and the students everywhere, we can only carry on our mission of sheding light upon human minds through science, for we are convinced that this is the only way to invent a better future. -- Sursa Originala/Original Source: http://www.uaic.ro/uaic/bin/view/Main/N0704191142
Published: Wednesday, April 25, 2007 Tyler Hill Staff Reporter After a weekend of national media coverage and student outcry, administrators decided Monday to rescind the ban on stage weapons that was enacted in the wake of the Virginia Tech massacre. Last week, Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg told several students that realistic-looking stage weapons would no longer be permitted in Yale theatrical productions. Amid concerns that the restriction was inhibiting free speech, a group of administrators decided Monday to overturn the policy, Yale spokeswoman Helaine Klasky said. In the future, Yale will require that audiences be warned before performances that include scenes with fake weapons, she said. Trachtenberg had originally intended to ban all stage weapons, but was persuaded that obviously fake weapons should be permitted, Sarah Holdren '08 told the News last Thursday. Holdren directed this weekend's production of "Red Noses," which was forced to use wooden swords instead of more realistic props. The restriction also affected the opera "Orpheus in the Underworld," which used balloon swords in place of its real-looking stage weapons. News of the University's reversal was only released when a reporter from the Associated Press called Klasky on Monday evening to ask about the original restriction. Students have not yet been officially informed of the change in policy, Klasky said. Administrators, including Yale President Richard Levin, weighed in on the decision to overturn the ban after it became apparent that it concerned issues of free speech, Levin said. Although the administration will not censor future shows, he said, the Dean of Student Affairs still has the authority to regulate student productions. "The fundamental consideration was trading off artistic freedom of expression against concern about the potential emotional precariousness of audiences during the week of a mass murder," he said. "There was a different approach which hadn't been considered at the time, and the approach would be not to censor the show but warn the audience." But Holdren said she asked Trachtenberg on Thursday to consider allowing the use of realistic-looking weapons if the staff included a warning before each show. At the time, Trachtenberg found that alternative unacceptable, Holdren said. She said that although the change comes too late to affect her show, which ended its run on Saturday, she is glad the administration has considered the issue more carefully. "Obviously professional theater companies do shows with weapons all of the time and it's up to the audience's discretion whether or not to watch," she said. Trachtenberg declined to comment Tuesday night about the reversal of her decision, but over the weekend she told the News that student criticism of the stage weapons ban had been exaggerated. "I think people should start thinking about other people rather than trying to feel sorry for themselves and thinking that the administration is trying to thwart their creativity," Trachtenberg said. "They're not using their own intelligence. ... We have to think of the people who might be affected by seeing real-life weapons." Dustin Cho '08, chair of the Yale chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said "knee jerk" reactions are common after national tragedies, but that such limitations on free speech inhibit any meaningful dialogue. Generally Yale is very good at protecting free speech, he said. "It's quite a stretch to say that substituting realistic-looking prop swords with wooden ones showed more sensitivity to the shooting victims," he said. "This was a grave mistake, but I'm glad they took care of it immediately." Trachtenberg, who has served as Dean of Student Affairs for 20 years, announced in November that she is stepping down at the end of the academic year. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - April 25, 2007
Editor-in-Chief, Yale Daily News - Sarah Mishkin <sarah.mishkin@gmail.com>
Published: Monday, April 23, 2007 Cullen Macbeth Staff Reporter Members of Yale's undergraduate theater community reacted with anger over the weekend to Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg's decision to bar performance groups — at least temporarily — from using life-like weapons in their productions. The new rule is meant to protect audience members who may have connections to last week's deadly gun massacre at Virginia Tech University or who may react adversely to violence on stage because of personal experiences, Trachtenberg said. But many students said the new restrictions represent inappropriate censorship of student artwork and that Trachtenberg should not have implemented them without soliciting student input beforehand. The new restrictions were put in place to protect people in the Yale and New Haven communities who live or have friends who live in Virginia, or who have seen people die by gun violence, Trachtenberg said. She said the outcry from students upset with her decision has been exaggerated. "I think people should start thinking about other people rather than trying to feel sorry for themselves and thinking that the administration is trying to thwart their creativity," Trachtenberg said. "They're not using their own intelligence. ... We have to think of the people who might be affected by seeing real-life weapons." The new restrictions do not ban all types of stage weapons, Trachtenberg said. She said she did not prevent an instructor in theater studies who talked to her on Friday from using a dulled knife to cut a cabbage head in a production, for example. This weekend's productions of "Red Noses" and "Orpheus in the Underworld" were affected by the rule change. "Red Noses" had to substitute wooden swords for more realistic-looking ones after learning of the rule from Trachtenberg on Thursday. The University overstepped its bounds by prohibiting the ways in which students can express themselves on stage, said Dara Lind '09, who has managed and produced several campus performances. "Personally, I am very strongly anti-censorship as far as the arts are concerned," she said. "I don't understand what gives the college the right to try to circumscribe artistic expression like that." Lind is a staff columnist for the News. Students should be left to decide for themselves what is appropriate to include in their productions and should be able to use theater to realistically portray a range of topics, including those relating to gun violence, Yale Drama Coalition Vice President Mike Leibenluft '10 said. While he was in high school, Leibenluft said, he worked on a show about the Columbine High School shootings that documented witnesses' reactions to the violence. "I think the fact that it assumes that we first of all can't deal with these issues in a dramatic setting and also we can't take responsibility for the theater that is produced and the reaction it has from Yale students is pretty shocking," he said. "I was incredibly surprised by it. I think it's totally inappropriate." Leibenluft said Trachtenberg should have consulted with students before implementing the new regulation. But Yale Dramatic Association President Emmett Zackheim '08 said he is not concerned by the ban because he thinks the normal rules governing the use of weapons in theatrical productions will be reinstated before long. "I don't think it's a disaster for everyone involved in theater," he said. "It essentially doesn't concern me. I probably wouldn't have done the same thing necessarily, but I'm not really concerned by it." Trachtenberg has not yet decided whether the new restrictions will be in place permanently and will review the decision as "things settle down," she said. She said she consulted with representatives from the Theater Studies Program and did not make a "unilateral decision" about the rule. Lind and several other students formed a "FEAR NO ART" Facebook group over the weekend to protest Trachtenberg's decision and discussed ways to try to get the rule reversed. The groups have not yet decided on a definite plan, she said, but they may stage a rally on Beinecke Plaza or attempt to set up a meeting with Trachtenberg to discuss the rule. "As far as collaboration is concerned, it will probably just be easiest to take public action," Lind said. "The best way to prove that art gives much more to the student body than it takes away is to have public art and demonstrate to people what the benefit is of having unrestricted artistic expression." The continuation of the new restrictions could hamper the theater community's willingness and ability to put on a wide variety of shows, YDC founder Eyad Houssami '07 said. He said he would have "strong reservations" about agreeing to produce a show that requires stage weapons — such as the one he put on for his senior project, which required a shotgun — if the ban on realistic props remains in place. "When you're using realistic props, it doesn't make sense to substitute them with children's toys, because you are making a mockery of the play and of the character," Houssami said. "I feel like by banning weapons from the stage at Yale, we are kind of silencing a potentially fruitful debate on violence and the nature of violence in America today." The University had rules in place before last week that limited the kinds of weapons students could use in productions, Trachtenberg said, but she does not know the exact provisions. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - April 23, 2007
Published: Friday, April 20, 2007 Courtney Long Staff Reporter and Copy Editor In the wake of Monday's massacre at Virginia Tech in which a student killed 32 people, Dean of Student Affairs Betty Trachtenberg has limited the use of stage weapons in theatrical productions. Students involved in this weekend's production of "Red Noses" said they first learned of the new rules on Thursday morning, the same day the show was slated to open. They were subsequently forced to alter many of the scenes by swapping more realistic-looking stage swords for wooden ones, a change that many students said was neither a necessary nor a useful response to the tragedy at Virginia Tech. According to students involved in the production, Trachtenberg has banned the use of some stage weapons in all of the University's theatrical productions. While shows will be permitted to use obviously fake plastic weapons, students said, those that hoped to stage more realistic scenes of stage violence have had to make changes to their props. Trachtenberg could not be reached for comment Thursday night. "Red Noses" director Sarah Holdren '08 said she first heard about the changes in a phone call from a friend as she arrived at the Off-Broadway Theater on Thursday morning. At the theater, technical director Jim Brewczynski told her about the new regulations. The pair then met with Trachtenberg, who initially wanted no stage weapons to be used in the show, Holdren said, though she later agreed to permit the use of obviously fake weapons. In a speech made before last night's opening show of "Red Noses," Holdren said that Trachtenberg's decision to force the production to use wooden swords instead of metal swords will do little to stem violence in the world. "Calling for an end to violence onstage does not solve the world's suffering: It merely sweeps it under the rug, turning theater — in the words of this very play — into 'creamy bon-bons' instead of 'solid fare' for a thinking, feeling audience," she said. "Here at Yale, sensitivity and political correctness have become censorship in this time of vital need for serious artistic expression." Holdren said she is primarily worried about the University's decision to place limitations on art, rather than the specific inconvenience to her production. "I completely understand that the University needs to respond to the tragedy, but I think it is wrong to conflate sensitivity and censorship," she said in an interview. "It is wrong to assume that any theater that deals with tragic matter is sort of on the side of those things or out to get people; they're not — they're out to help people through things like this. I want my show and all shows to be uplifting to people. That's why I'm upset about this — it's not because my props were taken — it's about imposing petty restrictions on art as the right way to solve the problems in the world." Brandon Berger '10, who plays a swordsman in the show, said the switch to an obviously fake wooden sword has changed the nature of his part from an "evil, errant knight to a petulant child." "They're trying to make an appropriate gesture, but they did it in an inappropriate way — they've neutered the play," he said. "The violence is important to what it actually means. What these types of actions do is very central — it is not gratuitous." Susie Kemple '08, an actress in the show, said Trachtenberg's way of dealing with the Virginia Tech massacre was not beneficial to the students' own mourning process. "It is problematic because all of us were incredibly shocked by the events at Virginia Tech," Kemple said. "We turn to extracurriculars in our grief [and] the Yale administration makes the healing more difficult. None of the shows are about massive gun violence — this show is about showing and explaining the human experience." Berger also said he finds the ruling inconsistent because forms of stage violence that do not involve weapons — such as hangings — are still permitted. "Red Noses" will end its run Saturday night. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - April 20, 2007
Memorials are a positive force after tragedy
Published: Thursday, May 3, 2007 Opinion articles Danielle Tumminio Guest Column 4/17/07. When students from Virginia Tech struggled to make sense of the horror that struck their campus last week, they erected a banner on their student center with the date of the massacre. It provided a reminder of a time and a place, a way to express a trauma through white lettering on black canvas. It was an attempt to remember. Theirs is not the first — nor, unfortunately, will it be the last — commemoration of a tragedy. This desire to remember seems built into us. We sing, sculpt, hold one another, dance, write poems and pray in order to find solace in our most tumultuous moments. Using these forms, we try to incorporate trauma into our lives so that we can give meaning to events that feel meaningless. If we're going to move forward from the horrors we experience, this process seems essential. Otherwise, evil becomes something like a dangling participle not properly integrated into a sentence. It hangs there, and it has, quite literally, the last word. There's no hope in a worldview like that. So through our memorials, we try to find meaning. Perhaps that's why our nation's capital is peppered with commemorations of wars and those who represented our country in them. Through carved stone, we remember our history. Likewise, after the Columbine shootings, students draped flowers over Rachel Scott's car and sat on its hood, sobbing in grief. Leaning against red Acuras, we remember our loves. Or following Hurricane Katrina, memorial services were held in worship spaces across the country. In our religious homes, we remember the possibility of hope. But if there are right ways to remember, there are certainly wrong ways to remember as well. "Just move on" and "It's time to get over it" are common phrases in our culture, and they imply that the only way to recover from a traumatic event is to forget it. The trouble with these cliches is that they conflate remembering with reliving. Reliving traps us in the past, keeps us from existing in the present and building hope for the future. But remembering is different: It is the means by which, again and again, we try to defeat pointless horrors by giving them some perspective. That's the transformation that must occur if we are to prevent the dangling-participle problem. This power of memorializing is something I've experienced in my own life. I was a junior at Yale on Sept. 11, 2001. I remember that the phone lines were down, and I couldn't call my family. When the trains were running again, I returned to the New York suburb in which I grew up. I felt isolated and frightened. When the Amtrak drew near Manhattan, the train slowed and passengers huddled near the windows, gazing upon a skyline that had changed forever. It looked tilted — just like my reality — even though rising grey smoke held the place where the towers once stood. Then the conductor asked us to keep a moment of silence, and it became our memorial, our remembrance of a horror that shaped our lives. They were strangers on that train, but they shared something with me — they were mourning, too — and they became my community at a time when I felt profoundly protected. In that memorial, I was offered a sign of hope that I was not alone. I will never forget that, nor should I. In the aftermath of Sept. 11, I, and so many others, observed endless memorials. Some were noble, some bittersweet and some gut-wrenching: signs for missing people in Grand Central Terminal, military planes that kept watch over Manhattan with their deafening drones, chaplains for the cleanup crews and the putrid stench from the pyre of the Twin Towers. Those memorials challenged and changed our understanding of a horror. The same goes for the students at Virginia Tech. As they wear their school colors and attend candlelight vigils and invite a nation to mourn with them, they bear witness to nightmare. That experience will transform them, in their grieving and their remembering, in their hope and their search to make sense of the insensible. To forget the tragedy would be to forget who they were, who they are and whom they will become. But how they remember is their choice. 9/11/2001. 4/20/1999. 8/23/2005. 4/16/2007. These are the dates that form us. These are the dates that are seared into our memories. These are the dates we cannot — and should not — forget. Danielle Elizabeth Tumminio is a 2003 graduate of Yale College and a fourth-year student at the Yale Divinity School. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - May 3, 2007
Yale Daily News, Editor-in-chief - Sarah Mishkin <sarah.mishkin@gmail.com>
Pychoanalysis won't fully explain VT killer
Published: Friday, April 27, 2007 Opinion articles By: Carol Duh My parents immigrated into this country in 1982. My parents told me a Taiwanese parable while I attended the same schools as Mike Pohle, one of the 32 victims of last week's massacre. In the story, a teacher took his class on a field trip to the mountains of Taiwan. On the way home, they encountered a swarm of killer bees. The teacher removed his clothing to attract the bees away from the children to his flesh. I heard the echoes of this parable while reading about Liviu Librescu, the professor who blocked the classroom door with his body while the gunman demanded entry. While he did this, students escaped through the windows. No doubt that being stung by bullets was agonizing. There was little dignity in these painful deaths, only in their sacrifice. And what of the bee? The bee who stings out of cowardice dies soon after, so we cannot ask. Panicked, we call in the world-class bee experts to explain the situation. This response, though gratifying, is in vain. Like Wall Street analysts who offer their best predictions after the fact, the analysis will not provide us with the protection we need. The bee and Seung Cho perceived threats that were not real; their behavior escapes appreciation. Let's try anyway. His parents were South Korean immigrants who sent a daughter to Princeton and a son to Virginia Tech — a feat worthy to boast of across many oceans. College is the frame upon which immigrants hang their hopes, but sometimes it comes at a price. The drive that steers us toward hard work is often frustrated by the apparent frivolity that pervades American campus culture. Fraternity keggers, society taps — these seem to be the cornerstones of the American college student's anxiety. To the ethic of a different culture, they are laughable. Seung Cho's complaints, through lunacy, tap the drumbeat of this disappointment. Seung Cho's two defining characteristics continue to be his mental health and his immigration status. Experts dissect the belongings strewn about his dorm room, scrambling for a diagnosis. Depression. Paranoia. Obviously. It is insulting to the millions of positive mental illness survivors to dwell on this. On the other hand, we could further probe the reality of cultural disparity and the specific causes he cited for his intense dissatisfaction with his experience in the United States. Yet to draw conclusions about immigration from his story is an enormous disservice to the core of the nation's foundation and strength. Both of the gunman's prominent characteristics lead to a dead end. I know a man who spent 17 years in prison. He told me that the scariest inmates are the ones who are there for life. The lifers languish in hopelessness, and claim this as license to be brutal and sadistic toward everyone else. Another man I know was born deaf and contracted AIDS in his late teens. A few years ago, Michigan tried to prosecute him for sexual predation when he, with a willful heart, transmitted the virus to 13 different people within the span of six weeks. He remains unrepentant. Why do people sink into despair? The painful simplicity of the answer escapes psychoanalysis: laziness. Seung Cho chose bitterness as his permanent sanctuary, allowing himself to drown. Yes, he was unwanted and weak, and he elicits a kind of sympathy. Perhaps the shore seemed distant and we all know that without constant encouragement, the race is long. But we do it. We brush ourselves off after devastating exams, awkward dates, even outright evidence of human unkindness. As every first-generation student will tell you, we are too lucky to be given so much. As Seung Cho embraced his victimhood, we should embrace this explanation and free ourselves from this futile search into his psyche. How should we, the children in the parable, react to this event? When confronted with people who churn bitterness into poison, the natural reaction is fear. We buy bigger guns, go to college closer to home and dead-bolt our doors. Such malevolence seems intolerable to tempt with risk. Fear is the pulse of Seung Cho's madness, and this is the lesson he expected to teach. Yet Seung forgot his role in the parable — the bee was never a teacher. We see the families of Virginia Tech. Grief is agony, but it will not kill us. Seung Cho underestimated the goodness his psychosis would beget. Enduring traits of the human spirit enable the sacrifice of the Taiwanese schoolteacher and the Virginia Tech professor to transcend cultural borders to show that no matter where you are, the broken heart continues to beat. This country may not always safeguard us, but retreat will not protect us. The teacher's pain was apparent, his message clearer still. Seek comfort not in bitterness, but in courage and hope. We are always safe in their arms. Carol Duh is a senior in Trumbull College. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - April 27th, 2007
Published: Friday, April 27, 2007 Maggie Reid Staff Reporter In her sophomore year at Yale, Naasiha Siddiqui '07 found herself facing more problems than just the sophomore slump. Siddiqui was severely depressed, and when she checked into the Mental Hygiene Department at University Health Services, she was forced to leave school on medical withdrawal. Ever since, she has struggled to balance manic depression with a college career — taking three forced withdrawals and one voluntary leave of absence, and applying for readmission five times. "I was really frustrated," she said, referring to her first forced withdrawal in the fall of 2001. "Their attitude was, 'She's unstable, we don't want her at school right now.' In one respect, it seemed like discrimination because I was doing all I could to try to stay in school. But on the other hand, the administration should have some say over when students aren't fit to go to school." Mental illness has long been a hot-button issue on college campuses, but in the wake of this month's shootings at Virginia Tech, even greater scrutiny has been placed on university support systems for students with psychological illnesses. At Yale, the Mental Hygiene Department specializes in counseling and crisis intervention for suicide and depression cases. But in seeking to protect the psychological health of its students, Yale's mental health services must walk the fine line between enabling students to receive treatment while remaining in school and protecting the student's health and safety — or the health and safety of others — by sending seriously depressed students off campus. For the most part, universities across the country find themselves in a sticky situation with regard to mentally ill students. Universities may be found liable if they fail to detect and respond to cases that result in suicide or murder. But privacy and anti-discrimination laws limit the amount of information about students' mental health to which administrators have access, and the laws may prevent administrators from forcing students to take involuntary medical leaves. In general, the laws forbid universities from disclosing information about a student's health records to parents or administrators, including residential college deans and masters, without the student's consent. The exception comes when health officials believe that the health and safety of the student or of others are at risk. But Yale administrators said the definition of such an emergency is often blurry. Because of the subjectivity of such cases, the decision whether or not to force a student to withdraw is made on a case-by-case basis, YUHS Chief Psychiatrist Lorraine Siggins said. "Most students who take a medical withdrawal ask for it themselves," Siggins said. "However, occasionally a student who had attempted suicide and is considered to be a danger to self and others is asked to take time away from school for treatment and to get their mental health issues stabilized." According to University policy, if a student is forced to withdraw for mental health reasons, he or she may not reapply until two semesters have passed, including the one during which he or she left. With such serious consequences, administrators said, withdrawal cannot be forced simply based on strange behavior or a possible diagnosis of mental illness, Siggins said. Yale officials said the forced withdrawal policy serves the best interests of vulnerable and potentially reckless students. When students are severely mentally unstable, Siggins said, they can lack the presence of mind to voluntarily seek the medical help and time away from campus that they need to resolve health issues. But Siggins said students are expected, as dictated by University regulations, to return to school as soon as doctors confirm that they have recovered. The YUHS Mental Hygiene Department seeks to address mental health problems before they reach the point of necessitating a forced withdrawal. It offers mental health and counseling services to all enrolled students throughout the year, Siggins said, and because mental health issues can be dangerous and pressing, the department makes a concerted effort to be easily accessible, providing an on-duty psychiatrist 24 hours a day. "In the course of an academic year, we see between 16 percent and 20 percent of the student body," Siggins said. "For students who have continuing mental health problems, we can provide treatment throughout the year." But although officials say Yale's mental health counseling program focuses on reaching students before they reach a crisis point, Yalies who have gone through counseling at the Mental Hygiene Department said that Yale could do a better job of removing barriers to getting help. Susan* voluntarily entered the counseling program at YUHS during the first semester of her sophomore year. Although she told them she needed immediate attention for urgent anxiety and depression, she had to wait over a week before she was allowed to see a therapist, instead meeting first with a clinical social worker. "Unless you are suicidal, they make it very difficult to see someone," Susan said. "This is particularly scary when it comes to mental hygiene problems." Susan said the narrow-minded focus on suicide detection to the exclusion of other problems deterred her from using campus psychiatrists and led her to consult a therapist in a different state whom she can only visit once a month. But she added that though it can be difficult to get an initial appointment, once a student has made an first visit to the YUHS clinic, it becomes easy to get further appointments with a therapist. Siddiqui said the prospect of being forced to withdraw can also prevent students from going to seek help. "Mental hygiene can be very alienating," Siddiqui said. "Since I had my experience, a lot of my friends have been afraid to go to mental hygiene because they don't want to get kicked out of school. It's not a very welcoming place." Some students said the mental health department is too quick to act in cases of suspected depression. One student who had been referred to a YUHS psychiatrist said that fear of liability in the event of a suicide or murder makes Yale administrators move too swiftly to hospitalize or force the withdrawal of a student. During a psychiatry session, Ryan,* a junior at Yale who has withdrawn because of his bipolar disorder, said the therapist kept asking him if he ever had suicidal thoughts, and specifically if he was drawn to sharp objects or tempted to hurt himself. Ryan said that though he ultimately was given a choice whether to withdraw, officials pressured him to do so. While the attention to suicide might be helpful in preventing crisis situations, Ryan said, the manner in which it was addressed was unhelpful. "I might have been suicidal, but I wasn't looking to withdraw," Ryan said. Ryan said that he has seen private psychiatrists who never mentioned hospitalization, but that college doctors are more ready to hospitalize their patients because of the fear of liability in the case of a suicide. Outside the examining rooms of health services departments, universities often find it difficult to determine when psychiatric help is warranted, since it is difficult to know when a student's erratic behavior stems from mental illness rather than the vagaries of ordinary college life. Though Yale prides itself on providing many levels of supervision, from peers and professors to the residential college system, some students worry that this method of observation and personal counseling is not necessarily effective. "I talked to my master and dean about my problems, but they didn't even notice anything was wrong before I brought it up," Susan said. In the wake of the Virginia Tech massacre, deans and freshman counselors have discussed the protocols already in place to deal with students who may seem to have psychological problems. Freshman counselors in Branford and Silliman said they discussed mental health risks at their weekly meetings with their deans last Monday. But their rules about watchfulness or guidance did not change in the aftermath of the shootings, counselors said. "We talked about the incident, but we did not get any official instructions," freshman counselor Amy Broadbent '07 said. Although there is no specific protocol for the freshmen counselors to follow if they become aware of a possible mental health issue, they said they are trained to talk to students who come to them with problems and to take them to see professionals at YUHS. Counselors said they deal with mental health issues on a case-by-case basis, and have confronted problems ranging from severe depression to slight anxiety over classes or relationships. "We have liaisons in the mental health department if we have any questions or to help us navigate the bureaucracy," said Howard Locker '07, a freshman counselor in Silliman. "The dean did not specifically tell us to be more on the lookout [after Virginia Tech], it's something I think most counselors are innately attuned to do in the wake of such a tragedy." Siggins said that although 90 percent of the students who come in for therapy do so on their own, the rest usually come to the clinic at the suggestion of their deans, coaches or friends. But she said there is no difference in the amount of attention paid to students based on how they were referred. "We always take student peer concerns very seriously," Siggins said. "We treat each student on an individual basis." *The names of some students have been changed to protect their medical information. -- Original Source: Yale Daily News - April 27, 2007
Editor-in-chief, Yale Daily News - Sarah Mishkin <sarah.mishkin@gmail.com>
Focsanenii au fost la mormintarea eroului din America
De, Silvia Vrinceanu Nichita | 21.04.2007 Focsaneanul Zvi Ben Dov, emigrat in Israel in urma cu jumatate de secol, ne-a transmis ieri amanunte despre funeraliile profesorului Liviu Librescu Liviu Librescu, profesorul care si-a salvat studentii din fata unei ploi de gloante sacrificindu-si propria viata in amfiteatrul Universitatii Tehnice din Virginia, a fost condus ieri pe ultimul drum, in Israel, tara in care locuiesc si cei doi fii ai sai. La funeralii au fost prezenti si citiva focsaneni israelieni, care au copilarit cu profesorul Liviu Librescu in perioada celui de-al doilea razboi mondial, cind au fost nevoiti sa indure ostilitatea dusa pina la extrem fata de populatia de origine evreiasca. "Am participat impreuna cu prietenul meu focsanean Jack Gheber la mormintarea lui Liviu. Au fost sute si sute de oameni, rude, prieteni, profesori de la universitate, plus o delegatie special venita din Romania, in frunte cu ambasadorul Romaniei in Israel, pentru a inmina familiei ordinul national «Steaua Romaniei» in grad de mare cruce, oferit post-mortem de presedintele Traian Basescu pentru eroismul de care a dat dovada. Impreuna cu Jack, ne-am dus la Marilena, sotia lui Liviu, si ea tot din Focsani, si am consolat-o. Eu i-am inminat «Ziarul de Vrancea», care a sosit in Israel in urma cu doua zile, adus de prietenul nostru Nicu Stoinescu. I-am transmis condoleante de la grupul vostru din Focsani", ne-a transmis ieri, prin e-mail, Zvi Ben Dov, liderul focsanenilor din Israel, directorul general al organizatiei A.M.I.R. Acesta si-a ebraizat numele dupa ce a emigrat, in Focsani fiind cunoscut sub numele de Puiu Zilberman. De precizat ca Zvi Ben Dov si Jack Gheber au fost colegi cu Liviu Librescu la Focsani, inainte de a emigra in Israel. "Mama lui Jack a fost directoarea scolii evreiesti de fete din Focsani, unde a studiat si Marilena, sotia lui Liviu. L-a recunoscut si pe Jack si pe mine imediat. La funeralii am intilnit si alti prieteni focsaneni, pe dr. Fritz Scwartz, pe ing. Armand Rotenstraih cu sora lui Emilia si altii", ne-a mai relatat Zvi Ben Dov. Focsanenii care locuiesc in Israel ne-au spus ca la inmormintarea profesorului Liviu Librescu au participat zeci de jurnalisti din toata lumea, care au fost interesati de viata pe care "eroul din America" a dus-o in Romania, ca victima a regimurilor Mihai Antonescu si Nicolae Ceausescu. Reamintim ca "Ziarul de Vrancea" a relatat in exclusivitate povestea de viata a "eroului din America", care a trait din plin opresiunile antisemite la Focsani, in timpul celui de-al doilea razboi mondial, unde locuiau bunicii din partea mamei. Tot in orasul de pe Milcov, tatal profesorului Liviu Librescu, un avocat eliminat din barou pe criterii etnice, a avut domiciliu fortat inainte sa fie trimis in lagarele din Transnistria. Liviu Librescu fusese invitat sa viziteze Focsaniul in luna mai, invitatie pe care a declinat-o cu parere de rau din cauza proiectelor stiintifice in care era implicat. Sotia profesorului a anuntat ca nu se va mai intoarce in America si a multumit tuturor celor care au fost alaturi de familie in aceste momente grele. (Silvia VRINCEANU) -- Sursa Originala: http://www.ziaruldevrancea.ro/index.php?articol=11809
Silvia Vrinceanu Nichita (silvia@ziaruldevrancea.ro)
Un roman admirat in toata lumea Liviu Librescu, profesorul de eroism A supravietuit Holocaustului si comunismului, dar l-a ucis un student. Presa internationala scrie pe larg despre profesorul israelian de origine romana Liviu Librescu, care a murit salvandu-si studentii in timpul masacrului din campusul Universitatii Tehnice din Virginia. Profesor de peste 20 de ani in SUA, Librescu a murit in timp ce bloca usa de acces in sala de curs, pentru ca studentii sa poata fugi de atacator. Universitatea Politehnica Bucuresti (UPB) a declarat marti - zi de doliu in memoria profesorului Liviu Librescu, fost absolvent al Facultatii de Inginerie Aerospatiala. · Universitatile din SUA - in stare de alerta. Ieri s-a inregistrat inca o amenintare · Studentii de la Virginia - reporteri care au filmat cu telefoanele · Atacatorul de la Virginia Tech - un student de origine sud-coreeana · America sub soc: masacru intr-un campus universitar Moartea lui Librescu si a colegului sau, Profesorul Kevin Granata, a fost anuntata prima data pe site-ul oficial al institutiei. Articolul postat in versiunea engleza a HotNews.ro, despre moartea lui Liviu Librescu, a fost preluat pe blogurile Claremont Institute for the Study of Statemanship and Political Philosphy. Un material dedicat de Associated Press lui Liviu Librescu a fost preluat de sute de publicatii din intreaga lume. Articolul povesteste cum familia lui Librescu a primit e-mailuri de consolare de la studentii acestuia, care au povestit despre modul cum s-a jertfit pentru studenti. CNN, The Times, The New York Times si Haaretz se numara printre multele publicatii si televiziuni care au relatat pe larg despre cum i-a aparat Librescu pe studenti cu pretul propriei sale vieti. Pe site-ul oficial al Universitatii Tehnice din Virginia, a fost anuntat decesul a doi dintre dascalii universitatii: Profesor Liviu Librescu si Profesor Kevin Granata, morti pe data de 16 aprilie 2007, in timp ce isi tineau cursurile in cladirea Norris Hall de la Universitatea Virginia Tech. Potrivit "The Jerusalem Post" online, profesorul, in varsta de 77 de ani, a murit impuscat, iar site-ul ynetnews.com scrie ca profesorul a fost ucis in timp ce bloca accesul atacatorului in sala de curs, pentru a-si apara studentii. Alec Calhoun, o studenta aflata in sala de curs in momentul atacului, a povestit pentru Associated Press ca l-a vazut pe profesorul Librescu blocand usa in timp ce unii dintre colegii ei se ascundeau, iar altii sareau pe geam. Profesorul fusese condus la scoala de sotia sa, cu mai putin de o ora inainte de a fi impuscat. Potrivit sursei citate, sotia sa Marlina si copii, Arieh si Joe, au inceput deja sa faca pregatirile pentru inmormantarea lui Liviu Librescu in Israel. Nora sa, Ayala, povesteste ca profesorul era foarte pasionat de meseria sa si un om dedicat familiei. Colegii de la Universitatea Tehnica din Virginia il descriu drept "un adevarat gentleman". In incident, cel putin 33 de persoane au fost ucise si 28 au fost ranite dupa ce un student a deschis focul in interiorul campusului din Blacksburg. Cine este profesorul Librescu Profesor israelian de origine romana, Liviu Librescu a absolvit Facultatea Politehnica din Bucuresti in anul 1952, specializarea inginerie aeronautica si apoi s-a inscris la masterat. In 1972, primeste premiul "Traian Vuia" al Academiei de Stiinte din Romania. Intre anii 1979-1986 a fost profesor de inginerie mecanica la Universitatea din Tel Aviv. Potrivit ynetnews.com, profesorul Librescu si sotia sa sunt supravietuitori ai Holocaustului care au emigrat in Israel din Romania in 1978. Regimul comunist nu i-a dat voie sa plece din tara, dar a reusit acest lucru numai dupa ce premierul israelian de atunci, Menachem Begin a intervenit pe langa Nicolae Ceausescu. Cativa ani mai tarziu a plecat in SUA. Din iunie 1986 preda ingineria mecanica la Universitatea Tehnica din Virginia, unde era titularul a patru cursuri. In anul 2000 primeste titlu de Doctor Honoris Causa al Universitatii Politehnice din Bucuresti. A publicat numeroase articole si studii de inginerie mecanica in presa americana, a obtinut zeci de premii si titluri onorifice si a prezidat mai multe congrese internationale pe acesta tema. Zi de doliu la Universitatea Politehnica din Bucuresti Universitatea Politehnica Bucuresti (UPB) a declarat, marti, zi de doliu in memoria profesorului Liviu Librescu, absolvent al Facultatii de Inginerie Aerospatiala. Rectorul UPB, Ecaterina Andronescu, s-a declarat consternata de incidentul petrecut in campusul universirat din Virginia, Statele Unite, si a declarat ca va pastra poza lui Liviu Librescu in holul rectoratulului pentru a-i aduce un ultim omagiu acestuia. "Ne-am hotarat sa transmitem un mesaj de solidaritate, incurajare si de sustinere la Universitatea Virginia Tech si am declarat zi de doliu in universitate. Liviu Librescu este membru al comunitatii noastre academice, cu atat mai mult ca in anul 2000, domnul profesor a primit titul de Doctor Honoris Causa al UPB", a declarat Ecaterina Andronescu pentru HotNews.ro. „Prin curajul de care a dat dovada, Liviu Librescu a adus o mare onoare atat Universitatii Politehnice, cat si intregii scoli romanesti" a precizat Andronescu. HotNews.ro, C.N.A., C. Marin, 17 apr 2007 -- Sursa Originala: http://www.hotnews.ro/articol_70002-Un-profesor-de-origine-romana-a-fost-ucis-in-masacrul-din-Virginia-in-timp-ce-si-apara-studentii.htm
Data publicarii: 21/04/2007 Profesorul israelian de origine romana Liviu Libreanu, ucis in masacrul de luni de la Virginia Tech, a fost inmormintat vineri in Israel. Zeci de persoane au asistat la funeralii in cimitirul din orasul Raanana, din centrul Israelului, pentru un ultim omagiu adus profesorului Librescu, supravietuitor al Holocaustului care a emigrat in Israel in 1978, pentru a se instala ulterior in Statele Unite. Librescu a tinut blocata usa incaperii pentru a le permite studentilor sa sara pe geam, in timpul conflictului singeros de la Universitatea Tehnica din Virginia din data de 16 aprilie. Ulterior, atacatorul a incercat sa intre in clasa si pentru ca nu a reusit a tras o rafala de gloante in usa. "Imi voi consacra viata mostenirii tale. Adio, tata", a spus fiul sau Joe. Trupul neinsufletit al profesorului Librescu a fost transportat cu zborul Elal nr. 2 de la New York la Tel Aviv, insotit de citiva reprezentanti ai unei organizatii religioase si de membri ai familiei. Profesorul Liviu Librescu s-a nascut in 1930 in Romania. Dupa ce a supravietuit Holocaustului, a refuzat sa se inscrie in Partidul Comunist si si-a pierdut slujba ca inginer aerospatial. In 1976, Liviu Librescu a publicat in secret o carte in Norvegia in care a emis o teorie revolutionara pentru tehnologia aerospatiala. In 1978, dupa ce mai multe grupuri din Israel au facut lobby, lui Librescu i s-a permis sa plece din Romania si s-a stabilit in Israel. La Virginia Tech a inceput sa predea din 1985. Librescu era membru al mai multor academii de constructii din Ucraina, Armenia si Statele Unite ale Americii si a fost distins cu multe premii de catre mai multe organizatii internationale. El avea peste 500 de materiale publicate in mai multe reviste de specialitate sau ca lucrari personale. -- Sursa Originala: http://www.ziaruldeiasi.ro/cms/site/z_is/news/omagiu_lui_liviu_librescu_in_israel_142568.html
Florin Nicula (florin.nicula@ziaruldeiasi.ro)
The tragedy of Virginia Tech is partly a tragedy of bureaucracy
From the Editor May/June 2007 by Kathrin Day Lassila '81 The tragedy of Virginia Tech is partly a tragedy of bureaucracy. I don't mean the sort of complaint people usually make about bureaucracy -- too much paperwork and red tape. I mean the opposite. Too few records. Too little discussion and sharing of information. Too few staff, perhaps. I'm not blaming the state of Virginia or Virginia Tech for failing to stop a determined murderer. But enough bureaucracy, of the right kind, would have given them a chance. The gun salesman would have known Seung-Hui Cho had a history of mental illness and wasn't entitled to buy guns. The associate dean who told a worried professor last fall that she hadn't heard of any previous problems would have known about the two complaints to the police and the judge's ruling that Cho was a danger to himself. The competing needs for privacy and protection can't be perfectly balanced. Colleges and universities serve a vulnerable demographic. Usually, "major mental illness first shows itself somewhere between the ages of 17 to around 25," says Lorraine Siggins, chief psychiatrist at Yale Health Services. Against those rare but terrible events, universities need discreet and careful systems. If a student has trouble and the trouble is resolved, the university has to leave the student alone to live the ordinary turbulent life of a young adult, in privacy, without stigma. But if trouble recurs, the right administrator has to be able to find out fast that this isn't the first time. The competing needs for privacy and protection can't be perfectly balanced. After VT, says Betty Trachtenberg, dean of student affairs at Yale College, university officials everywhere thought, There, but for the grace of God . . . But it's easier to have good systems and enough staff at a wealthy, relatively small private institution than a large public institution. Siggins speaks of a "web" of people at Yale who act as a safety net. Medical privacy rules prevent her staff from taking action or sharing information on any patient unless that patient is an immediate "threat to self or others." (She wouldn't comment on how often that happens and said Health Services doesn't give out statistics.) Instead, "what most frequently happens is that the person comes to people's attention in lots of different ways." The campus police report any incident involving a student to the disciplinary committee and the student's dean. In Yale College, the 12 residential college deans are the people who, says Trachtenberg, "notice when somebody's in trouble." In the professional schools, relationships with teachers and fellow students serve this need, as most schools have small student bodies (from 120 art students to 670 law students). The Graduate School has only two associate deans of student affairs for 2,600 students. But Graduate School dean Jon Butler says the 50-plus department directors of graduate studies are the people who call his office when a student is in trouble. Once the warning flags go up, administrators can, for instance, suspend a student or require the student to seek treatment. In a meeting after the VT massacre, Trachtenberg and the deans of the colleges agreed that Cho's multiple episodes of stalking and frightening students -- "behavior that is not consistent with living in a community" -- would have triggered action. Not that they can be certain. "It's very hard to think that something like this would fall through the cracks" at Yale, says Trachtenberg. "Nevertheless, I am knocking wood as I talk to you." -- Original Source: http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/current/editor.html
Permission granted by author Kathrin Lassila, kathrin.lassila@yale.edu
Romanian born Hero Liviu Librescu received Highest Award
[April 18] Romanian born Hero Liviu Librescu received Highest Award romanian-gymnastics.com BUCHAREST/ The President of Romania, Traian Basescu, has signed today, April the 18th the year to end, the decree concerning the post-mortem conferring of the National Order The Star of Romania with the rank of Grand Cross to Mr. Liviu Librescu, Ph.D., University Professor. The National Order The Star of Romania with the rank of High Cross has been conferred as a sign of high appreciation and gratitude for the entire scientific and academic activity, as well as for the heroism shown in the course of the tragic events which took place on April the 16th, 2007, in the Campus of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, the United States of America, through which he saved the lives of his students, sacrificing his own life. -- Original Source:http://www.romanian-gymnastics.com/news/2007/04/romanian_born_hero_received_highest_award.htm
Fastest Presidential answer to a citizen request
[May 17] Fastest Presidential answer to a citizen request Miami, FL, US / (Press Release) The record for the World's "Fastest Presidential answer to a citizen request" has just been accepted by the World Records Academy. The new record holder is President Traian Basescu (Romania), who promptly answered to an emergency citizen request on April 18 and has issued in less than two hours a Presidential Decree conferring of the National Order „The Star of Romania" to Mr. Professor Liviu Librescu. Also as requested, two days later, in Israel, a special envoy of the Romanian president presented to his widow and two sons the Star of Romania medal in recognition of his courage and contribution to science. Romanian born Professor Liviu Librescu is the hero "who, at the cost of his own life, saved the lives of his students during the massacre at Virginia Tech." -according to Jewish War veterans of the USA. The Certificate for this new world record will reach President Basescu during the next days and his record will be listed in the 2008 edition of the World Records Book, the official publication of the World Records Academy. "The main point of this story which convinced us to recognize this somehow unusual (but very human-appealling) world record was that a President which knew he has only few hours left before being suspended by the Parliament, a President which has to approve and sign tons of documents during his last few hours as President, left everything behind -as requested by an ordinary citizen (a 23 years old girl, a marketing student!)- and did what a President always has to do in the first instance: served his Country, above anything else, even above his own personal political problems", said Tom Howard, Head of Records for World Records Academy. He also added "We all have dreamed about changing the World in better, some still hopes, aren't we? If the young generation still has this dream, it's encouraging, especially when somebody like...a President, does fulfill their dreams." "It's kind of 'It could happen to you' story, but this time it wasn't anything material involved, only the noble desire to pay respects to a Hero, and pay them on time! In that movie, during the evening before loosing their restaurant, the goodhearted couple still have the patience and heart to open their cafe and handle a last bowl of soup to a street man (an undercover journalist). This time, possibly being just a-step-to-his-career's end, a President left everything behind and did a notable gesture." "No wonder why this President has become so popular among regular citizens in his country, Romania, and why the younger generation widely supports him: if you write a message (in a matter of National Interest) to a President and he do what he was asked to do, simply because the request was right, that's the President I think anybody would LOVE to have!" -- Original Source: http://www.worldrecordsacademy.org/amazing/fastest_presidential_answer_to_a_citizen_request_70180.htm
Karen Harper 22 Apr 2007 There will be a lot of blame dished out in the aftermath of the Virginia Tech massacre. But one element will be missing and that is the system itself. Capitalism and the society it nurtures will remain unscathed in the big business press. In the aftermath of another school shooting in the US, many will be asking why and some will be trying to lay blame. The shooter's parents will be blamed for how they raised him; the school will be blamed for how it dealt with his mental illness; and his schoolmates past and present will be blamed for how they teased and ostracized him. However, the blame will mostly not be laid where it appropriately belongs; on the head of capitalism and the social values that it has nourished. No individual can be looked at out of context of the larger society, and this young man and what he became cannot be understood without first looking at the society he came from. Unfortunately, the "angry loner" type that has done these sorts of shootings in the past is not the product of an isolated genetic mutation that happens unpredictably and that cannot be prevented. Such people are a real product of their environment and the direct result of capitalism's impact on personal development and mental health. This society promotes individuality, self-absorption, and competition over solidarity and collective struggle. Is it any surprise that some young people are so incapable of not only identifying with the group and its larger good, but also of even, in severe cases, forming any kind of meaningful relationship with another individual? These people after years of painful experiences can come to the conclusion that they are completely unloved and unlovable. Because we are social beings, this conclusion makes life difficult to continue. Capitalism is daily bombarding our self-esteem; we are never good enough under capitalism. There is always some drug to make us happier, some surgery to make us thinner, some car or house or job that will make us more respected. The inevitable consequence of this pressure is that some people will consider themselves failures when they judge themselves up against the values of this society. In some cases this will only further increase some individual's isolation and anger. This terrible brutal crime is an ugly, warped but nonetheless, direct product of big business'‚ value system. Capitalism will continuously attempt to encourage an obsession with money, fame and the worship of individualism. This in turn will inevitably be accompanied by what we saw at Virginia Tech this week. This will not be the last individual so void of solidarity as to massacre his classmates. The outpouring of empathy towards the victims of this crime is a sign of the enormous human and working class solidarity that exists in this society. The crime itself is a consequence of the corrupt and rotten values of those who are in control at the top. Related http://www.laborsmilitantvoice.org -- Original Source: http://chicago.indymedia.org/newswire/display/77317/index.php Licensed under Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication.
Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication
What May Come: Asian Americans and the Virginia Tech Shootings
By Tamara K. Nopper | 04.19.2007 April 17, 2007 Like many, I was glued to the television news yesterday, keeping updated about the horrific shootings at Virginia Tech University. I was trying to deal with my own disgust and sadness, especially since my professional life as a graduate student and college instructor is tied to universities. And then the other shoe dropped. I found out from a friend that the news channel she was watching had reported the shooter as Asian. It has now been reported, after much confusion, that the shooter is Cho Seung-Hui, a South Korean immigrant and Virginia Tech student. As an Asian American woman, I am keenly aware that Asians are about to become a popular media topic if not the victims of physical backlash. Rarely have we gotten as much attention in the past fifteen years, except, perhaps, during the 1992 Los Angeles Riots. Since then Asians are seldom seen in the media except when one of us wins a golfing match, Woody Allen has sex, or Angelina Jolie adopts a kid. I am not looking forward to the onslaught of media attention. If history truly does have clues about what will come, there may be several different ways we as Asian Americans will be talked about. One, we will watch white media pundits and perhaps even sociologists explain what they understand as an "Asian" way of being. They will talk about how Asian males presumably have fragile "egos" and therefore are culturally prone to engage in kamikaze style violence. These statements will be embedded with racist tropes about Japanese military fighters during WWII or the Viet Cong—the crazy, calculating, and hidden Asian man who will fight to the death over presumably nothing. In the process, the white media might actually ask Asian Americans our perspectives for a change. We will probably be expected to apologize in some way for the behavior of another Asian—something whites never have to collectively do when one of theirs engages in (mass) violence, which is often. And then some of us might succumb to the Orientalist logic of the media by eagerly promoting Asian Americans as real Americans and therefore unlike Asians overseas who presumably engage in culturally reprehensible behavior. In other words, if we get to talk at all, Asian Americans will be expected to interpret, explain, and distance themselves from other Asians just to get airtime. Or perhaps the media will take the color-blind approach instead of a strictly eugenic one. The media might try to whitewash the situation and treat Cho as just another alienated middle-class suburban kid. In some ways this is already happening—hence the constant referrals to the proximity of the shootings to the 8th anniversary of the Columbine killings. The media will repeat over and over words from a letter that Cho left behind speaking of "rich kids," and "deceitful charlatans." They will ask what's going on in middle-class communities that encourage this type of violence. In the process they may never talk about the dirty little secret about middle-class assimilation: for non-whites, it does not always prevent racial alienation, rage, or depression. This may be surprising given that we are bombarded with constant images suggesting that racial harmony will exist once we are all middle-class. But for many of us who have achieved middle-class life, even if we may not openly admit it, alienation does not stop if you are not white. But the white media, being as tricky as it is, may probably talk about Cho in ways that reflect a combination of both traditional eugenic and colorblind approaches. They will emphasize Cho's ethnicity and economic background by wondering what would set off a hard-working, quiet, South Korean immigrant from a middle-class dry-cleaner- owning family. They will wonder why Cho would commit such acts of violence, which we expect from Middle Easterners and Muslims and those crazy Asians from overseas, but not from hard-working South Korean immigrants. They will promote Cho as "the model minority" who suddenly, for no reason, went crazy. Whereas eugenic approaches depicting Asians as crazy kamikazes or Viet Cong mercenaries emphasize Asian violence, the eugenic aspect of the model minority myth suggests that there is something about Asian Americans that makes them less prone to expressions of anger, rage, violence, or criminality. Indeed, we are not even seen as having legitimate reasons to have anger, let alone rage, hence the need to figure out what made this "quiet" student "snap." Given that the model minority myth is a white racist invention that elevates Asians over minority groups, Cho will be dissected as an anomaly among South Koreans who "are not prone" to violence—unlike Blacks who are racistly viewed as inherently violent or South Asians, Middle Easterners and Muslims who are viewed as potential terrorists. He will be talked about as acting "out of character" from the other "good South Koreans" who come here and quietly and dutifully work towards the American dream. Operating behind the scenes of course is a diplomatic relationship between the US and South Korea forged through bombs and military zones during the Korean War and expressed through the new free trade agreement negotiations between the countries. Indeed, even as South Korean diplomats express concern about racial backlash against Asians, they are quick to disown Cho in order to maintain the image of the respectable South Korean. Whatever happens, Cho will become whoever the white media wants him to be and for whatever political platform it and legislators want to push. In the process, Asian Americans will, like other non-whites, be picked apart, dissected, and theorized by whites. As such, this is no different than any other day for Asian Americans. Only this time an Asian face will be on every television screen, internet search engine, and newspaper. Tamara K. Nopper is an educator, writer, and activist living in Philadelphia. She is currently finishing her PhD program in sociology at Temple University and is a volunteer with the Central Committee for Conscientious Objectors, an anti-war and counter-military recruitment organization (http://www.objector.org). She can be reached at tnopper@yahoo.com e-mail:: tnopper@yahoo.com Homepage:: http://www.objector.org -- Original Source: Philadelphia Independent Media Center http://www.phillyimc.org/en/2007/04/38736.shtml Free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere.
Free for non-commercial reuse, reprint, and rebroadcast, on the net and elsewhere.
On Being A College Professor after the VT Massacre
Thursday, April 19, 2007 I had nightmares about the VT massacre last night. It was on a two day delay. I knew that eventually the horror of what had happened would start to eat away at me. In part, I think my dreams haunted me precisely because I didn't talk, or rather listen, to what students thought about this. I didn't check in to see if they were suffering, in shock, afraid . . . I had to think a lot about why I didn't, especially after the Provost sent us a thoughtful email encouraging us to do so. What it comes down to is that I didn't want to think about it. I didn't want to actually confront the horror of this event. I wasn't prepared for hearing any vitriol, anger or racist statements either (not that students would've made such statements, but I worried). I am scared and frightened by what happened, and in my selfishness, I didn't want to hear anything about it, or how it affected my students. I started to realize how frightened I was by the events yesterday while talking to my colleagues in the Philosophy lounge. I had been studying the faces of the dead at the NYTimes website. But, more importantly, I had been studying the faces of the dead professors. One of them, Jamie Bishop, looked like the sort of colleague I have here. He was young, married, and well-loved by his students. Don't get me wrong, I paused on pictures of young women and men, who could've been my own students, and found myself speechless over the loss. But, seeing the pictures of dead professors haunted me the most. And, it is precisely that which I dreamt: being hunted by a former student, being called to protect my class from an armed assailant. These are not tasks that one signs on for when he/she becomes a college professor. Kerry reminded me of a student we both had a few years ago, who I am convinced was schizophrenic. He was the right age and gender for the onset of schizophrenia. His papers were long, stream of consciousness writings full of references to disturbing sexuality. The more I was around him, the more frightened I became of him. I would shudder if he came to my office and I never had any idea of what to do with his papers. During his senior thesis presentation, I think we all just sat, aghast at what nonsense had been uttered and scrambled to figure out what to do. I think that one of the hard realities that we, as college professors, have to face in the wake of the VT massacre is our responsibility to get troubled students serious help (even if they frighten us). Many of us like to just avoid this responsibility (me included). After all, we're not therapists! And, I am not claiming we should start acting like therapists either. But, I do think we have a serious obligation to pay attention to our students who seem deeply troubled, and figure out ways to get them help. If we just try to get them out of our class, or ignore them, or rationalize to ourselves that they are just lazy, mean or insubordinate, then we may find ourselves deeply regretting that we didn't do something to stop them from hurting others or themselves. The story of Cho Seung-Hui is not an anomaly. We know that there are lots of disaffected, troubled young people in our schools. And while the news reports are starting to show that his professors, at least, tried to take action, what stands out to me is how most people just ignored his behavior. Everyone knows the loners on their campus. And, most of the time these loners are the butt of jokes. Allowing such a disconnected community to exist is no longer safe, forget the moral concerns. So, the lesson I draw from the VT massacre is that I can no longer afford to ignore the students who are manifesting very troubling behavior; I am responsible to them as well as my community. Posted by Aspazia at Thursday, April 19, 2007 -- Original Source: http://melancholicfeminista.blogspot.com/2007/04/on-being-college-professor-after-vt.html Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 2.5 License.
Aspazia / Mad Melancholic Feminista Blog
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