Another tragic school shooting. This time at an Indian reservation in Minnesota. My sympathy goes to the victims. Ten people killed, and a dozen wounded, the Washington Post reports:

Ten people were killed and more than a dozen were wounded yesterday by a gunman who opened fire at a high school and a private home on an isolated Indian reservation in northern Minnesota and engaged in a brief gunfight with police before killing himself, the FBI said.

The gunman killed his grandfather and his grandfather’s wife, local officials said. They said he then traveled to the high school in Red Lake, a town of a few thousand on the southern shore of an inland lake, where witnesses said he charged into the school waving his gun and grinning as he shot down students, teachers and a school security guard.

As usual, I now brace for the backlash. Though judging by the coverage so far (from what I’ve seen in the Post, and on ABC) there might not be as much backlash. Unlike for past school shootings, these articles seemed to be fairly balanced. They mentioned Columbine, and I certainly don’t blame them for that, but they didn’t make any other general statements about youth or youth crime. Nor did they reference any proposed zero tolerance policies or anything as a solution. They did mention that the shooter wore black and was kinda a loner, but they didn’t spend 3 paragraphs detailing what video games he plays, and what music he listens to.

Of course there is plenty of time for hand wringing in the days to come, but in the last few years it seems school shootings haven’t stirred up quite as much biased anti-youth hysteria as before. So I won’t be surprised if the standard shock and outrage hits the talkshows now, but for the moment at least things seem to be improving. Now if only the press could hold onto their impartiality and integrity when a teen gets in a car accident, we’ll be set.

The only additional coverage that the Post included was a final paragraph or two about past trouble at the reservation where the shooting occurred. While I certainly don’t like any implication that past trouble at the reservation is an explanation for this random, senseless act of violence, its a breath of fresh air for someone on edge expecting several paragraphs bemoaning the state of youth culture.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 22nd, 2005 at 10:27 am and is filed under Youth Rights. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.