The Firing Pin (Guns and Madmen Parts I and II)

***The below ramble was originally written back in April, 2007, upon the heels of the Virginia Tech massacre. It has two parts, because I don't seem to know how to put things simply, or with any kind of brevity.***

The Firing Pin (Guns and Madmen Part I)

The Virginia Tech shooting this week simply reinforces some of my beliefs about the arrogant ignorance rampant in this country. The first is regarding gun control, and the other is the stigma regarding mental illness.
Our very worldview in this country supports these continued outbreaks of violence. The new people want to equate this sort of incident as equivalent to terrorism. How many people who climb to the top of towers, hide in the trunks of their cars, break in to classrooms, schoolyards, places of businesses, and begin killing people at random are mentally stable people with a socio-political agenda? None. And a great deal of the time, they are people in agony who have been either overlooked or squeezed out of the system.

Last July we had a shooting at the Jewish Federation in downtown Seattle in which one woman was killed and six others severely wounded (one of whom is a member of the UUC). The shooter stated he hated Jews, and blamed them for all his ills. He'd been mentally ill for years, but authorities had always looked the other way. His mother had gone to the public heath services and requested help for years, but her requests had fallen on deaf ears. And he had access to guns.
There was a great deal to the solutions Michael Moore proposed in Bowling for Columbine. Sadly, his voice is one in which I can no longer place a great deal of trust. Moore has gotten to the point in his politics that I actually no longer trust his "liberal" moralizing. I don't think he is the progressive he believes himself to be...because he is not above using cheap tactics that I find to be beneath him. And I still have to admire someone who is so terribly successful at getting in people's faces.
I don't think enough has ever been done about gun control in this country, and the combination of blind persistence in upholding archaic ideals and the total lack of compassion and progressive care of the mentally ill will only continue to result in the continuation of these bloodbaths. They'll just keep happening and people will continue to be shocked and amazed and bewildered each time. And when the media storm passes, they go back to lowering their heads and muttering, "that'll never happen here."

Because we are unable to look at this problem as society, as a culture, it's always easiest to blame the shooter, call him an isolated freak incident and move on...until it happens again.
I believe that perhaps 90% of people in this country, who own guns, don't need them.
I believe that perhaps 90% of people in this country who are mentally ill receive no form of support, medication, therapy, or compassion.

Case in point. My downstairs neighbor, Dave, is a Vet from the First Gulf War. Five years ago he was working as a mailman, when he came across an apartment where the resident had committed suicide. He reported it to the authorities and they left the body to decompose for several days. He had to pass by the apartment every day. The decomp apparently triggered PTSD from his time in combat, and he started having anxiety attacks which resulted in a nervous breakdown. He's been unable to work since. He collects disability. But now the Veterans' Affairs administration has Outsourced out their Mental Health Evaluators and begun a process of cutting funding. The inference here has been that the Bush administration seeks to cut VA funding so cash can be funneled into his tidy little war in the Middle East…so he can make more Vets.

Dave tried to go back to school, but the state says they will not fund him because they cannot determine if he is mentally healthy enough to warrant investing in his education. ACT the organization that re-evaluates VA funding has just cut his benefits in half, because he has missed his mental health evaluations, because of depression. Now Dave is trying to subsist on half a disability income.

Catch-22?

I care about Dave, and I am not afraid of him or his angry rants. And trust me, he has plenty. But would I be surprised if he pulled a Columbine or a Virginia Tech? No. And though it may sound cold and harsh, and inhumane, I wouldn't blame him. Because he has asked for help time and time and time again, and been turned away. And when he does make an appointment, when he does get someone's attention, they give him the bum's rush and push him through the system.

I also wish to state that I am not against people bearing arms. I am not against hunting. After living in Wisconsin for 7 years, and working in theater companies in rural areas, I saw so many people destroy their vehicles, and nearly lose their lives, to accidents involving deer. There are too fucking many of them. Man has killed off all of their natural predators, and plowed further into their living spaces. Frankly, the hunter's in WI couldn't deplete the population sufficiently, so there was always a large percentage of deer dying in agony on the roads, dying of disease, and starving in the winter. Shoot 'em up. We've got plenty. Have a ball.

But who in hell NEEDS automatic rifles and armor piercing bullets to bring down a three-point?

I tried to make these points to a co-worker; I stated that this kid at VA Tech was mentally ill, and shouldn't have access to guns, as should few other people, her argument is "Well, there are plenty of people who drive cars, and they kill all the time--there are plenty of incidents where people drive through crowds and kill people." I couldn't even begin to discuss an issue with someone who totes the Republican sloganeering of the Fox "News" Network. I let another coworker deal with her. He knows how to "Banter Safe." I am too passionate; I was going to blow my top from the second she opened her mouth regarding the tired and clichéd gun-control counter arguments.

I also refuse to enter into combat with an unarmed person.

A person who's essential perspective in the majority; Guns don't kill people…and the mentally ill are evil and should be put down.

And they don't seem to understand why this keeps happening. Why the bodies continue to pile up.

What is wrong with saying, "This society is sick, and we need to work on a cure?"

Why is that so terrible, why is that so much like admitting to some kind of wrongdoing? Because before you seek a cure, you have to admit there is an illness.

Somebody tell me I am not alone.

I will follow up this blog with a LENGHTY piece I have written for my Coletrane entries at Steam.FM. I have yet to determine if posting the other piece in that venue is a wise plan or not.

-C


Firing Pin (Guns and Madmen, Part II)
Current mood: angry

Hey All,

With the events on Virginia Tech campus this week, many recollections have come up for me. Recollections and sensations I have not felt for a very long time. Why now? We've had school shooters crop up on a regular basis for the last twenty years or more. Perhaps it is because this most recent took place on a college campus, and because life on a college campus was such a vital and influential time in my life that this event seems almost blasphemous. Or maybe it is because these events are just so damn similar.

In the fall of 1984 I was staring my freshman year at the University of Oregon. My father was UO alum from the generation before. He went to school on the GI Bill after his stint with The Marines, and pledged Sigma Alpha Epsilon, I have the impression he had a terrific time.

If you know me well, you will be equally puzzled as to why I followed my father's advice and registered for Fraternity Rush. I am and was too, but I was entering a new world, with no real friends or support group to speak of, and Dad was just so damn convincing.

It was an uncomfortable time. Not simply because it became readily apparent that I was correct in my assumptions that the other males with whom I would be interacting in the process of "selling myself," to some elite and archaic order of masculinity shared little kinship with me, but because I'd had all four wisdom teeth pulled the week before. The hinges of my jaws felt stripped raw, a socket that had not been properly sutured was being slow to heal, and I was sporting a prominent black eye.

It was a long week. I slept on the sleeping porch of my old Fraternity house. Drank milkshakes, hung around campus, and visited bookstores during the day, and marched from Frat house to Frat house in the evenings. And I sat in the SAE house lounge and watched a lot of MTV.

Near the end of the week, and despondent over my housing prospects, I entered a house that seemed to stand out from the rest. For one thing, it was positioned just south of MacArthur Court, and not part of the dense cluster of houses that made up Frat Villa, to the west of the library. It was kind of isolated. The young men inside came across as genuine, warm and sincere. I discovered the house president had done theater in high school, and another young man, sporting the frosted swoop of many a new-wave band, pegged jeans, and ankle-high Beatle boots seemed to share my interest in music, movies and (maybe even) comics. His name was Michael Feher. I liked him, and I thought he was kind of cool.

When it came time to fill out the "bid cards," for the houses I wished to pledge. Delta Tau Delta was my A-Number-One.
In response to my bid, I received an obligatory offer from Sigma Alpha Epsilon, as I was what you call a "legacy," thanks to my father prior membership. I also received an offer from a house I do not even recall visiting, and a puzzling note from Delta Tau Delta; they couldn't take me in, but wanted me to sit tight, as they wanted to put my request to a second vote when the remaining balance of their members had returned from summer break. Puzzling.

The house president (we'll call him Bryan) suggested I take up residence in their sleeping porch, and hang out until another vote could be cast.

And my first day of college classes was coming up in a few days.

So, I hung out and partied with the fellows from DTD. They seemed a cool lot. And out of all the Fraternity boys I met over the last week, I seemed to share the most with them.

The weekend before classes were to start, they voted on me again, and the vote was against. I really didn't understand. It made no sense. I got along with all the fellows I met; I had things in common with the guys, what was the big deal? Was I not wealthy enough? Too short? Pursuing the wrong degree? I was fairly upset, and I was up against the wall. I'd put in a reservation for a room at the dorms simultaneous to putting my name on the docket for Fraternity Rush. To my knowledge, the window had closed for me to get my dorm-room deposit back. I assumed that to mean that there would no longer be a room available for me as well.

I picked up my belongings and went to the only other place I could think of…the Theta Chi house, the house of which I had no recollection of visiting that had offered me a membership. It was readily apparent that the Theta Chi's campaign to attract pledges had been fairly unsuccessful. Many rooms stood empty.

The house president put me in a rather large room, full of packing cartons and broken furniture. The door was twisted on its frame and wouldn't close. I put my suitcase against it in an effort to hold the door closed. That evening two fellows were wrestling in the hallway, and threw open the door. I asked them, politely, to take their homosexual courtship down the hall. One spied my earring and said, "Homo? Who's the fag with the earring?"

Yeah, I know. But it was 1984.

This was starting to reek of high school, and that smell was twisting my tummy.

The next morning, after a rather intimidating first day of class in a lecture hall full of over 200 students, I made my way to the UO Housing Department offices. Some small, and overlooked god-ling was smiling upon me. According to the leather-faced lady behind the counter, my deposit on a room was still good and, yes, there was a room available.

I moved my suitcase and books into the tiny room in Bean Complex. My new roommate was nowhere to be seen. I went to the cafeteria and ate lunch. I later met a girl who lived the floor above me, Christine. She had her sister in tow. I already knew her sister, I'd met her at one the DTD parties, and she was Mike Feher's girlfriend. We chatted a little about how my life had been in flux, and how I was sad and disappointed that I didn't get accepted into the fraternity. The sister didn't really say much, just looked into the distance, or found the brick wall behind me far more interesting than my disappointment.
I met my roommate, a husky African American man from LA named Warner. Warner was a philosophy and economics major. But he liked SF and comic books or, at least, tolerated them. He claimed that he had received so many head injuries while playing football in high school that his heart beat was slower than that of a normal person. He also claimed that he had had several operations on his knees and ankles from torn ligaments and shattered bones that left him listing to the left as he walked. I liked him a great deal.

And my father had to admit he was in error, for the first time in my recollection. He said, "I'm really sorry son, but the Fraternity System has really changed since my day."

Not really, Dad. They're still a fraternal order, based on elitism and secrecy.

I started to do something I never imagined I would accomplish at college; I began to fall into a routine.

Early in the morning, a week and a half later, the Resident Assistant stopped several of us in the hall, she said their was a sniper at Autzen Stadium, and we were to steer clear. I doubt even a stray bullet could reach us from Autzen Stadium, it was over a mile away, on the other side of the McKenzie River.

By noon we'd learned from the local news that the sniper was dead, as was one other man, an exchange student from Africa attending UO on a track scholarship, in training for the Olympic track team. He was a married father of one. Wounded was a member of the UO Wrestling team, a young man named Rick O'Shea. Yes, that was his name. Don't ask me how I remembered it.

Dead by his own hand was Mike Faire. The young man, from Delta Tau Delta, I'd met during Rush Week, the young man sporting the frosted swoop of many a new-wave band, pegged jeans, and ankle-high Beatle boots, who seemed to share my interest in music, movies and (maybe even) comics.

According to the local news, Mike owned an AK-47 semi automatic rifle. He kept the weapon at the fraternity house. But the house president (Bryan) demanded he keep the weapon's firing pin in the house safe. On Friday, the day before the shooting began, Mike said he was going hunting, and requested the return of the firing pin. Mike didn't go hunting, not for Deer, at least. He stole a car, drove to a local sporting goods store, broke in through a back window and stole another automatic rifle, several rounds of ammunition, and a SWAT officer's midnight blue nylon jumpsuit. Michael then swathed his face in camouflage paint.

He then drove to Autzen Stadium, hurdled the fence, and waited for dawn.

At dawn he killed Chris Braithwaite with a single shot through the heart as he ran the jogging trail that lead to the stadium.
Mike then fired several rounds at the arriving wrestling team, and kept them at bay in the weight room through the entire siege. When he got bored, Mike shot out the scoreboards and the windows in the stadium.

As we watched the information unfold on the television set of a hall-mate, Christine arrived. I asked her if she knew the name of the shooter. Sure, she said, "Mike Feher…"

"Yes, but isn't he your sister's boyfriend?"

She paled and ran for the pay phone.

I was correct. Though the realization made me feel dizzy and my vision stuttered. Christine hung up the hall phone and ran out the door for her sister's sorority house.

Campus shut down for several days. The local authorities attempted to hold the Delta Tau Delta Fraternity accountable for Feher's actions and voiced their disdain and indignation over allowing the young man to keep a lethal weapon in the house.

I recall viewing a television a press conference where I watched my erstwhile Fraternity Brothers parade past the cameras. It was the first time in my life I actually moaned in disdain. One of the women in the room put her arms around me. I couldn't help it; the tears began to run. I can only draw up an overall sentiment of those moments; that none of those young men felt any accountability for Feher's actions or their ill attention to his problems. Ah, Brotherhood.

Several weeks later, a personal ad appeared in the campus newspaper, The Emerald. I never saw it, I only heard. It went something like,
"To Our Brother, Michael. We miss you. May you be at peace."
And so it goes…

Please Fast Forward The Tape.

It is 1990. I am working on a second BA at the UO. That degree in Film and Television just doesn't seem to be opening the career doors my father thought it would when he suggested it at my Major field of study six years before. I've come back to complete a theater degree. Yes, laugh, please. It's really all I can do as well at this point.

What I was doing at "Rod's," one of the only Gay Bars Eugene, really isn't important. I was there with a friend, and what kind of relationship he and I had really isn't important either. Suffice it to say that I liked the music they played, I liked the atmosphere, the drinks were strong, but I seldom encountered someone of my particular preference. Its not that girls were scarce at Rods, its simply that the female clientele were far from my type. Perhaps it had something do do with the corse facial hair and cork books, I dunno...But the person I did encounter that evening drew up some old and contorted feelings. As I bellied up to the bar, a young Asian man immediately recognized me. Tu had rushed the Delta Tau Delta house the same week as I. I'd lost touch with him long ago. I did know he had been accepted to the house. I wondered if their was some racial quota they were expected to make. I'm pretty damn Arian, after all.

Tu was Vietnamese, and had come to this country as a teenager. He was a pleasant guy, but spoke in a rocky and sometimes broken dialect…and his speech was terribly sibilant.

After a brief hug he said, "Do you remember Mike Feher?"
"Sure."
"That guy was really messed up."
"Well, obviously."
"No. Not only did they let him keep his guns in the house, after he did all those things, they found all kinds of child pornography in his room. And lots of cocaine…They said he was snorting cocaine that whole time he was shooting up the stadium."
"That must have been terrible for you guys—that whole experience."
"Not too bad for me, I didn't really know those people that well yet. I mean, I could tell you who was gay and who wasn't…"
"Really?"
"Yeah, you know the house president at the time? He was the only one really in the closet."
"He told me he had a girlfriend. He showed me pictures of her."
"Oh, sweetheart, like that ever matters…"
"It really upset me that they wouldn't let me join the house."
"Why? You're straight, aren't you?"
"Yeah."
"Most of the guys on the board knew that—they were trying to keep you away from Bryan. He was a very manipulative person. He was also into younger guys. They wanted to spare you."
And a canvas that had been blank for several years began to fill in with detail. But my next question was, did the conflicts of social mores, sexual politics, and subterfuge contribute to Mike Feher's outbreak of violence and madness? As I mulled this, Tu was bustled away by some colorful compatriots. I never saw him again.
Strange to learn you were oblivious to total strangers acting in your interest, stranger still to wonder why, they were so concerned about me becoming a Cabin Boy for the DTD house president, how they could possibly overlook their own compatriot, who was so lost, so angry, so troubled as to shoot up Autzen Stadium, and then chew on their own bullets.
Sometimes I wonder if anyone even remembers the incident. Early on, I kept expecting someone to dramatize the events as a made-for-television movie. Now, comparatively speaking, Mike Feher's story hardly warrants a short film for You Tube. I mean, look at it--the body count was SO LOW by today's comparison.

We all want to say we were present at some relevant turning point in history,
"I saw Buddy Holly play the night before his plane crashed…"
"I marched with Dr. King…"
"I fought for my country in Vietnam…"
"I saw the first tower fall…"
But who wants to say they were present for the inception of a dark and violent societal trend?


What is that trend, you ask? Campus Mass Murder/Suicide? School Bloodbaths?
These things don't just happen spontaneously. People don't act on their mental fears and anxieties solely because they are "sick in the head." And if I were to admit I believe in genuine evil, this would not be it.
These massacres have become commonplace, and I am amazed at the state of denial in which our culture persists in existing. These events are happening for a reason, people. The shooters cannot be written off as simply mad, bad, and unloved. They are sick. Why? And why now with such regularity? We need to start asking these questions, and asking them out loud. And when we get the answers, we cannot turn from them. There is a sickness in our society, and it must be cured or the bodies will continue to pile up.

Think about it.
More later,
C