Could the massacre at Virginia Tech University actually be prevented?

On the 16th April 2007, Cho Seung Hui, a student of Virginia Tech University, went on a killing rampage in the school campus before turning the gun on himself, killing 32 people. While the rest of the world continues to recoil in shock and gape at the indelible images of this macabre incident displayed on television screens, I cannot help but wonder if this horrendous episode could have been prevented. After reading many related articles, I am under the impression that the shootings could have actually been stopped and I attribute this egregious failure to stop the carnage to three factors: The refusal the of the Americans to allow Cho to assimilate into their culture by leaving him out, the failure of the police and the school to detect Cho's condition and deal with it despite having received reports about his mental state, as well as America's slack gun control laws.

It was reported that Cho came to America together with his family when he was eight and throughout his schooling life there, he was often the victim of bullying by his American peers. He was also rejected by his schoolmates and all this made him withdraw into his own world. Far from being ensconced, he became abject and his aversion for the Americans grew each day. Gradually, the aversion transformed into acrimony, and soon he began formulating thoughts of reprisals against them, which eventually materialised. Thus it can be said that the America society contributed to the hatred in him that led to the bloodshed.

Cho had also been previously apprehended after being accused of stalking two ladies, yet not charges were pressed against him. His teachers and roommates reported on his violent tendencies and his aberrant behaviour, but once again, the police and the school did not know how to deal with it. It was such dithering by the police and the school that resulted in Cho not being confined in time. Had he been locked away in some mental institute or hospital and banned from going to school, this disaster would never had happened. Cho had displayed many signs of his conditions, most notably through the playscripts he wrote and the fantasies he formulated. The police and the school could have engaged him in counselling or sent him for treatments and therapies in hospitals and mental institutes, or even kept him away from the school and forbidded him from attending lessons. It would thus be impossible for Cho to commit the kilings, and lives would not be lost.

Lastly, slack gun laws in America allowed Cho to walk into the gun shop in his area to purchase the guns he used in the massacre. Since Cho had no criminal record, he was entitled to buy a gun every month. Such easy access to guns led to the shootings, because if stringent laws were imposed on the guns, Cho would not have the guns to commit the killing spree. America has the highest number of gun-related deaths but no one in the American government is willing to push for gun controls because it is unpopular among the people and might cost government officials their jobs if imposed. That is why after cases and cases of school killings, nothing has been done to rectify the problem.

If the above measures were taken earlier, this incident could have actually been prevented. Although there is no way we can bring back the lives that were lost in this massacre, we can learn from this incident and prevent similar cases from happening again. Thus, I urge for more action from the Americans, lest killing sprees in schools continue to be a a part of America's daily headlines.

Is the use of torture ever justified in dealing with criminals and terrorists?

According to Ron Suskind in his article "The Unofficial Story of the Al-queda 14", even though torturing of criminals who committed nefarious crimes may seem to be justice done, it should not be used when dealing with these criminals because it is still considered as an act of depredation and its effectiveness is limited.

I agree with the author's viewpoint because in my opinion, torturing of criminals to extract information works against the principles of human rights so often raised up by democratic institutions. Furthermore, the efficacy of torture is rarely achieved.

It serves as a rude shock for the international community that the United States of America, calling itself the number one democratic nation in the entire world, is responsible for most of the cases where criminals and suspects get locked up and tortured while interrogators grill them for information. It is an irony because the USA is often seen pointing fingers at communist countries for depriving their people of human rights, yet they themselves are the ones breaching human rights laws when they apply torture. The worst thing is, the US government never fails to obfuscate its rationale for such measures, while their apparatchiks remain intransigent and continue to follow orders without thinking.

Also, interrogating criminals using torture is seldom effective because criminals under duress tend to give irrelevant information or distorted accounts just to be alleviated from the pain. One example cited in the article is that of Abu Zubaydah. In order to stop the pain inflicted on him during interrogations, he named countless names of possible suspects but every lead eventually came to a dead end. Thus, the ineffectiveness of torture is also why I feel that torture should not be applied when dealing with criminals.

However, some people may disagree with this argument. In a separate account by former chairman of the now disfunct National Crime Authority, Peter Faris, he argued that torture can be justified if the information extracted is for the "greater good of humanity".

In his example cited in the article, if a member of a militant Islamic group in Iraq is captured but refuses to shed light on their operations which might pontentially cause massive destruction or harm to other people, tortured may be applied to extract the necessary information needed to prevent or minimise any damage done.

Despite this, I still think that the use of torture is not justified because it is simply abhorrent.
I understand the importance of racing against time to save the day. However, the use of torture is not going to solve the problem. Other forms of interrogation can actually be used to better effect, such as those employed by FBI, which focuses on getting to know the criminal better such that information can gradually be disclosed over time as relationship between interrogators and the criminals get better. Therefore, the use of torture is not justfied when dealing with criminals and terrorists.

New Media – Power to the people or threat to stability?

In the first article, former United States Secretary of Defence Donald Rumsfeld asserted that the proliferation of blogs help the terrorist's cause as they can now spread incendiary articles around the world with impunity to invoke hatred and negative feelings among the people, leading to dire repurcussions all over the world such as riots and fightings resulted from these misguidings.

However in the second article, blogging has been lauded for being fierce advocates of freedom of speech, putting the pressure on countries notorious for clamping down on free speech to back down, thus given the name "Power to the people".

In my opinion, both arguments are valid and I will now explain why.

Let's start with the first argument. One palpable reason why blogs, dubbed the new media by many, pose a threat to stability to the global community is because they provide an avenue where pernicious messages can be send to all parts of the world with a click of the mouse. These messages may be used by terrorists to vilify the americans, thus manipulating the feelings of the muslims around the world to turn against the west. One example given in the article is about the false allegations of the desecration of a Koran by american soldiers some time back. The story was first published in a weekly magazine and subsequently on websites and emails. The effect? Deadly riots broke out in some islamic countries, with their hatred targeted against Americans. This is what blogs can do. False information can be spread without a distinctive source, promoting terrorism around the globe and help the cause of those who are intent to disrupt peace among all human communities. Therefore, the new media is no doubt a threat to stability.

The second article however, shows that blogs can actually be the source of power to the people and human rights. That is also true. My justification for this is that blogs impinge upon government of many countries, even the ones most intolerant to opprobium. Previously, it was extremely difficult for many living under tyrannical regimes to get information of the outside world or to express them. Any attempts to do so will be dealt with severely and therefore the plight of these people came under international scrutiny. However, condemnation by many nations did not stop the government of these countries to continue banning freedom of speech and access to information.

That was in the past. In today's world, people can rely on blogs to convey and to express what they have always wanted to say. No matter how hard the governments try to suppress blogging, their efforts will alway end up in vain. They can imprison bloggers, torture them or use whatever method that they think is effective, but they will never be able to overcome the huge tide of bloggers coming at them. The governments can gag one or two of the bloggers and drowning their voices by jailing them, but it is virtually impossible to supress the people's power in this aspect. Hence, the new media brought about power to the people, and that I hope, can continue to carry on in the future.

Week 3 Task 4

The writer criticised the media for revolving around the 3 'P's, popularity, prejudice and profit instead of acting in public interest by conveying the truth. However, I think I have to remind everyone that the fact the media is doing this is the corollary of placing them in a highly competitive market. I am not saying that it is of moral rectitude to not convey the truth. What I am trying to say is that they should not be the only ones on the receiving end of all the recriminations.

However, before I go on to write on why we cannot rely on the media to convey the truth and why it is not entirely their fault that they cannot do that, let's take a look at the definition of media. According to the Longman dictionary of contemporary english, media is defined as "all organisations, such as television, radio and the newspapers, that provide information for the public". Notice that the definition only refers to "information" and not "reliable information"? The main purpose of media is to give us information, but it is up to us to figure out whether this information disseminated to us is reliable. Therefore, the media does not need to possess the veracity when doing up their reports and we cannot blame them if they do not. Now we know why we always face a paucity of reliable information.

Back to the article and its issues about the 3 'P's. As stated in my first paragraph, media is a highly competitve business and media agencies have to come up with all kinds of methods to appeal to the people and to boost its popularity and reputation, such that they have a competitive edge against other agencies. Hence the first 'P', popularity. It does not pay to report on a true but insipid story, because people are looking out for the interesting articles which appeal to them. Yes, you might be reporting the truth, but very few people are going to tune into your programmes or subscribe to your services because what you have to offer is simply not attractive enough. On the other hand, you could just engage any charlatan for an interview and fabricate any canard but still have people from all kinds of business knocking at your door because your stories are interesting and appealing. For example, no one is going to pay much attention to an ongoing presidential election. However, once a scandal on one of the candidates breaks out, no matter how ludicrous it is, it will attract many people's attention.Such is the reality of business that compel many agencies to embellish their articles and therefore, we cannot blame the media for not conveying the truth and we should not rely on them for reliable information.

Next, the second 'P', prejudice. Articles and reports are churned out, not by machines, but by human beings. Humans, no matter how venerated, will have at least the slightest tinge of prejudice. To be precise, prejudice is ubiquitous. Hence, we cannot expect the media to follow the rules of egalitarianism. A slight inclination towards either party may result in the distortion of truth and hence not every piece of information is reliable. One perfect example is the caricatures in the Danish newspapers on Prophet Mohammad. The editor knew exactly that the cartoons were sensitive and invidious but allowed them to be printed because of his prejudice against Islamic extremism. Another kind of prejudice involves the selection of articles and stories. Some agencies typically favour some genres of articles simply because they bring about better consumer value. This may result in certain information that are more importatnt to be not dessiminated. Once again, we cannot blame the media for not conveying the truth, but we must have the judgement to decide whether to believe everything that is reported.

The last 'P' is no other than profit and in my opinion, this is the most important 'P'. Whenever we talk about free market in Economics, profit is the first thing that comes into mind. With interesting and appealing articles come more business and with more business comes more profit. That is the basis of how these agencies work. In order to have more profit, they must have more consumers and to achieve that, the articles or stories produced must be interesting. As described in the first 'P', the job of these media agencies is to come up with captivating articles to attract consumers and not to convey true information. Hence with all media agencies driven by profit, the truth in the articles they produce might be undermined and thus we cannot rely on them for the truth.

As substantiated above, the media can never be relied upon to convey the truth because they are bound to the 3 'P's. To them, it is not whether the consumers get the correct information that matters. What matters to them most is whether they can earn enough money to stay in the business. At the end of the day, we still have to rely on ourselves for the true and reliable information because the media will never be good enough for those who seek the truth.