Columbine School Massacre

Superior Essays
Columbine School Shooting

April 20, 1999, this date for many parents, teachers, and students brings back memories of the horrific school massacre that occurred at the Columbine high school in Littleton Colorado. This event unfortunately claimed far too many lives, leaving many families, parents, students, and even officers with unanswered questions and filled with hatred and a lack of understanding. It was just like any other day,another Tuesday in fact filled at first with the usual routine. An ordinary, normal day was expected, until the shots and screams of horror rang out.

“On April 20th, two teens went on a school spree at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, killing 13 people and wounding more than 20 others before
…show more content…
“It has changed my life by changing my view on how mental health issues should be treated, and most importantly how the nation reacts to situations like this and plays the blame game” (Burr). This event has made Kendra and many other families and parents realize just how a nation, our very own country reacts to such a serious and life changing incident. Our nation played the blame game saying it was guns, we needed more gun control, we need to increase security, every other reason you could think of besides what actually happen. And today many feel as if nothing was even learned, a horrific incident that changed absolutely nothing. “ I do not feel anything was learned from this incident. Still to this day all the people are worried about this gun control. It is about knowing when a person is crying out for help due to a mental illness and putting our phones and computers down and talking to each other and getting these people the help they need to live a long successful life” (Burr). Today the blame game is still played, and know one wants to actually take the blame for what happened. And truly nothing has changed. “This isn 't the only school shooting that has occurred, there have been others since, but has school security changed, has anything ever been learned? The answers to this day is still no, and I fear that no will …show more content…
This event is something that will never be forgotten and will be forever changing and affecting the lives of many. It 's hard to believe something so horrific has to occur before society realizes there 's something wrong, that there 's a real problem and something needs to change. To this day there are still many who don 't understand why to two boys Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold did what they did. Going into their very own school and killing friends and teachers like its nothing, almost treating them like slaughter animals or killing like it 's a sport, that is something many cannot wrap their brains around. But recognizing the fact that these boys were suffering from a mental illness helps to bring closure, showing that the boys if had been in there right mind wouldn 't have ever killed anyone. Blaming the parents of Eric and Dylan, blaming the school, blaming gun control, none of this solves the real problem and it never will. One has to recognize a mental illness is something that can actually occur, before anything else. After that comes understanding, support, and help to those who need

Related Documents

  • Decent Essays

    At about 11:19 a.m. April 20 1999 Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold dressed in trench coats started shooting students at columbine high school, the weapons used by Eric were: Hi-Point model 995 carbine rifle, and Sawed-off pump-action Savage-Springfield 67H shotgun, now Dylan Klebold used: TEC-DC9 9-mm semi-automatic handgun, and Double-barrel Savage 311-D sawed-off shotgun, both carried various knifes and used bombs but most didn't go off. This was a huge Historical Turning Point in history, this changed how safety works, how people think about places, people not feeling safe, and how people will be checked before going into big places with lots of people, it changed everything with safety. How did people think about safety after columbine?To…

    • 494 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Columbine The tragedy among youth, April 20, 1999; two troubled young men lash out their rage and depression on the high school they were cast out from; Columbine High, Littleton, Colorado. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold were the two adolescents that committed this heinous crime. Over all, these murders had caused thirteen deaths and twenty one, brutal injuries. Although, most of the deaths and injuries were by gunshot, many explosives were also used. The explosive were manufactured by Klebold and there were roughly ninety nine of these devices planted throughout the campus.…

    • 740 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Decent Essays

    The third and most recent large mass killing happened in Newtown, Connecticut at Sandy Hook Elementary school. The shootings were arguably the most heart-wrenching deaths to recover from. It happened on December 12th, 2012, when Adam Lanza shot his mother at his own home, then drove to the elementary school and murdered many children and teachers. This massacre was different due to the fact that most of the casualties were First graders. Adam shot his way into the school and through the school’s security system.…

    • 201 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Decent Essays
  • Improved Essays

    On April 20, 1999, Littleton held their breaths as thirteen lives were torn from unsuspecting arms. In the rush of the moment, memories were whisked away by blindsiding bullets and two boys with one malicious dream. Attempts were made in vain to try to make sense of the massacre but none would come close for some time. Through words, Cullen disentangles the violent psyches of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold as they imagined, illustrated, and executed the attack in his nonfiction novel, Columbine. Disturbing accounts from the mouths of victims and parents of the shooters are also included to assure that no detail was spared.…

    • 786 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Columbine Research Paper

    • 1309 Words
    • 6 Pages

    They had with them two duffel bags, each containing a propane tank bomb capable of killing hundreds of people. The bombs failed to detonate, so Harris and Klebold began what is known as a rampage shooting. Guy Fiona, author of “The Columbine Effect and Mass School Shootings,” describes these shootings as, “...those where victims are random and the shooter has opened fire killing anyone they see or anyone unfortunate enough to cross their path. Rampage shootings are an attack on multiple people in a public place with a school being a common venue.” This cruel and sadistic exploit left 13 dead, 24 crippled, and the rest of the world…

    • 1309 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Superior Essays

    However terrible to say, it is no wonder why people have become accustomed to hearing tragedies of such caliber on the news. Of course, that doesn’t make it any less upsetting or case for finding closure faster than in other situations. What it does justify is the use of background checks; not being allowed to “purchase firearms without first presenting the proper government papers” (Etzioni), as mentioned earlier, and extra security measures, even if taken on “law-abiding citizens” (Garfinkel) which should not be received so sensitively because of their purpose of “[enhancing] the common good” (Etzioni). The United States we know today reported Columbine to have been “the first mass shooting in nearly eight years that killed 10 or more people”, which is clearly different than the United States of the past where “after 1999, seven years would pass without one. Today, such gaps are unthinkable.…

    • 1280 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Superior Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Role of Technology in Columbine The vast available technology plays a massive part in national crises such as Columbine. The Columbine High School massacre occurred on April 20, 1999 carried out by senior students Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, and resulted in murdering twelve students, one teacher, and injuring 24 others. The pair soon after proceeded to commit suicide in the lunchroom of their school. If there were no technology during this event, news would have taken much longer to spread, not a lot of people would even know this event ever happened, and with all the communication going around inside and outside of the school and everyone acting fast, the shooters probably could have killed more people and less would be saved.…

    • 760 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    Guns Signifiers

    • 910 Words
    • 4 Pages

    Opposing Forces The individuals who are in favor of gun control are the weaker force in the documentary and the society against gun control are the stronger force. The weakness in the society is fair of lose their rights to buy guns without permission and the goal in the weaker is fight against guns. Signifiers The first signifier is the background music of the song called “What a Wonderful World” when the documentary was showing images of cruel things that humans did to others.…

    • 910 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Sandy Hook Massacre

    • 295 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Five years ago, Sandy Hook shook the nation. People watched the national coverage of the massacre that targeted elementary aged children, many as young as 5 years old. I thought then, that the American people would never let a child stare down the end of a barrel again. Sadly, I was gravely mistaken. Since Sandy Hook, five years ago, 7,000 more children have died from gun violence in the United States.…

    • 295 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The columbine Massacre was the first of its kind. Since that day over 944 mass shootings have taken place. It has been said that seventy percent of shooters have shot in either a school or work office with sixty percent of these crimes occurring so fast that they were over by the time police had arrived and in forty percent of these cases at least three people were…

    • 210 Words
    • 1 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Improved Essays

    On April 20th, 1999, two high school students committed a crime that forever altered the mindset of the nation. In a malicious attack, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 15 people, including themselves, and injured 28 others. Both boys were troubled, suffering from both bullying and mental illness. Harris was prescribed Luvox, “an antidepressant medication commonly used to treat patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder.” While their mental health and social relations should be taken into consideration, they are not the factors that ultimately caused the teens to carry out such actions.…

    • 1070 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    The Columbine Massacre

    • 2112 Words
    • 9 Pages

    On April 20, 1999 one of the most horrific school shooting occurred at Columbine high school. In order to better understand the Columbine Massacre, readers must get to know the shooters before the incident, acquire details of what happened the day of April 20, 1999, and go inside the mind of the shooters to learn…

    • 2112 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    As soon as media coverage of the tragedy started, people started spreading the news to their friends and family. Whatever was reported is what these people believed. Very few people took the time to comb through the evidence and really understand the truth of the shooting. “What most people know about the massacre is what they learned in the first few days after it occurred” (Cullen, “The Depressive”). People tried to make sense of such a large scale tragedy.…

    • 2233 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Improved Essays
  • Great Essays

    You Mental? On December 14, 2015 a man armed with a rifle barged into an elementary school and fatally shot 20 kids and 6 adults(Fox 1). After the incident, the country was in an uproar at what happened and felt that we needed to prevent this from ever happening again. So people started throwing suggestion for ways to prevent it, some wanted to more gun law regulation while other wanted to focus on why the shooter would do this.…

    • 1231 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Great Essays
  • Improved Essays

    The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting which occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, when Adam Lanza killed 20 children and 6 staff at the age of 20-year-old. The 20-year-old assassinate is a mother then when to the school to kill the students and staffs. Mr. Lanza had a disability and, therefore, his mother’s guns should have been in a place where he could not get in contact with them. On April 20, 1999, at Columbine High school Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murder 12 students and one teacher, they have injured 21 additional people. The other deadly shooting that took place is at Oregon College nine people were killed and nine were injured Thursday by Chris Harper Mercer.…

    • 1076 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Improved Essays