We can see the causes of Cho's rampage now, so why not before?

[gravity]

By Niall Ferguson, Sunday Telegraph
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 22/04/2007

It was predictable. Cho Seung-Hui was a taciturn, moody loner. Four of his professors expressed concerns about the content of his work or classroom conduct. After complaints by two female students, the campus police and a college counsellor tried to have him committed to a mental institution. But a doctor didn't agree with the judge that he presented a danger to others. And guns are easy to buy in America (though banned on Virginia campuses). As a result 33 people are dead.

Journalists' efforts to explain the Virginia Tech massacre perfectly illustrate one of the central points of an idiosyncratically brilliant new book by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable (Penguin/Allen Lane). Having been completely caught out by some random event, we human beings are wonderfully good at retrospectively predicting it. In reality, however, Cho was what Taleb calls a "Black Swan".

Why a black swan? Taleb's starting point is what philosophers call the problem of induction. Suppose you have spent all your life in the northern hemisphere and have only ever seen white swans. You might very well conclude (inductively) that all swans are white. But take a trip to Australia, where swans are black, and your theory will collapse. A "Black Swan" is therefore anything that seems to us, on the basis of our limited experience, to be impossible.

Over 20 years of university teaching, I have seen my fair share of taciturn, moody young men. Many have had difficulties with girls. Some have needed counselling. A few have required psychiatric treatment. The risk that one of my depressive students might commit suicide is one I have often contemplated. But the risk that one might run amok and kill 32 people? Never.

More:http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/04/22/do2201.xml

[johnnie]

1. Too much opposition

We have a lot of people who say "suck it up, it all isn't that bad. There's no such thing as mental illness" and we have others saying "What about our constitutional rights! You can't just take someone and force them to get help".

I personally don't think there are any clear cut answers. There are just too many variables to look at when we consider the would-have could-haves.

I know many people didn't like NBC's decision (or other's for that matter) showing the pictures and videos of Cho, but it has generated a lot of discussion about what to do to prevent this and what should have been done. I have seen talking heads actually discussing mental illness, that is a step forward if you ask me.

[Subdivisions]

2. The panel on This Week with George S-somethingorother

talked about this this morning. I don't often agree with George Will, sometimes I do agree with Cokie Robers and Sam Donaldson. Thier take was that, in hindsight, this sort of information tends to coalesce whereas before the pieces of the puzzle were scattered.

I happen to think that some of those puzzle pieces, in and of themselves, should have sent up actionable red flags. And, at least in the mental illness department, action was taken, however limited. The stalking and intimidation expressed to the VT administration by some very scared women should have resulted in some sort of action. According the the This Week panel, we can thank VT's fear of litigation for any action they may have taken.

[Threedifferentones]

11. Sorry about the nitpicking but

I thought I had read that Cho had harrassed some women with constant, unrequested attention, but that it had fallen short of anything intimidating or potentially violent. That is he was trying to contact them constantly but had never turned violent when they turned him down/ignored him.

[marions ghost]

17. Anytime

you have someone continually contacting people who do not want to be contacted, you have a problem. This indicates an unhealthy obsession, and it should be taken very seriously. You cannot rule out the potential for violence just because a person 'seems' incapable of it.

People take stalking much too lightly. It should be seen as highly aberrant behavior, often leading to criminal acts.

[Threedifferentones]

20. There is no doubt about the severity of stalking but

the person I was responding to talked about "stalking and intimidation," implying that in addition to hounding those young women he expressed an intent of harming them. Like I said it was nitpicking, as you pointed out stalking in itself is often intimidating, but from what I have read Cho never threatened any of them and stopped when told to. That is why he was pronounced a danger to himself and not a danger to others, though he was of course hiding his true feelings.

[ends_dont_justify]

3. I think, in reality...

Jail exists to take dangerous people out of society, and in the case of the death sentence remove them. We're learning so much more about what makes people the way they are, that pretty much any criminal can be taken back to some disorder (mostly sociopathism) and be called simply mentally ill. There is no sanity which entertains insanity. So it can't be both ways. However, what if we now admit that there was treatment options for everyone to ever get the electric chair? What if we admit that the people who are killed for crimes may have been somewhat unaccountable? Could we really reverse our prison systems anyway...and despite the disorders, does it really make a criminal less guilty? We've been looking at it this way since the beginning of law enforcement. People who commit crimes are guilty....so either we take a compassionate leap and realize we've been killing/incarcerating people who may have (and more likely have) been simply slipped through the cracks of society and given a shitty hand in life, or we have to admit that....regardless of mental illness or disorder, it takes a strong dedication to COMMIT a wrongdoing to want to kill that many people.

In history, it is said that some of the greatest generals have been mentally ill, and chose instead to fight for the sake of righteousness (as they saw it). They took their anguish to the battlefield and protected those who threatened their country. Yet, as we saw in the VT massacre, cho decided that 32 perfect strangers, many female, all had to die despite the fact they were defenseless and unarmed. That not only makes him a coward in my eyes, but a murderer. Despite any bullying or conditions. I pity who cho was before he decided to kill 32 people...I no longer pity him for what he chose to become. He evolved from mentally ill, to murderous, of his own choices. Many people in his shoes choose to seek professional help...and get better. That defines a person...willingness to get better, willingness to not cause suffering.

For someone who in their early childhood suffered a great wealth of PTSD and, subsequently was put into establishments for improper diagnosis and saw a great deal of other children who were really stricken with heavy, uncontrollable disorders...I have to say even the most severely uncontrolled, the highest level of out of control patients I have ever met were always divided by two categories. Those who sincerely tried, and those who sincerely did not care. The worst cases I met went through great lengths to prevent them from allowing what they had to hurt others. Yet some of the mildest cases used the disorders they had to justify bullying. I think that speaks volumes where most people have just spoken a few verses on the matter...it takes a person to be a person and it takes a monster to be a monster; not through how someone is inherently born, but what they choose to do with their life, that defines them.

[Madspirit]

4. Parents

I HATE Cho's parents. HATE. They knew this boy needed help since he was a tiny little boy. THEY were ashamed of their "different" son. His own sister's friends didn't even know she had a brother. He fell through the cracks before he even had a chance.

I'm not a parent but I was a child and I thought that one of the actual Rules of Parenting was to take care of your sick children.

Don't tell me anything about the Korean culture either. I don't give a flying shit. Our culture treats the mentally just about as badly. Any culture that does this should be ashamed. ...and look how well it worked out.

The guilt over this boy and his victims, can be laid at all our feet.
Lee

[marions ghost]

18. Because parents

of any nationality or personality are not always the best, we need to take up the slack.

I agree with you that ANY parents who did not try to get help for a child who was severely withdrawn and silent from childhood --is grossly negligent. But then many parents are negligent in many ways. And our society teaches shame about mental illness as well as Korea does, as you say.

It doesn't help to feel hate for these parents. They obviously needed help too. It seems they are hard-working and turned out one successful child. They did want the best for their son. They just didn't know how to address his problems.

The school and the health system SHOULD have identified this child as severely disturbed if the parents were ineffectual. He exhibited plenty of signs, and we probably don't know the half of it.

[MADem]

5. Well, those English teachers had him pegged. But no one followed through. NT

[stray cat]

6. How many people with equivalent warning signs didn't kill anyone?

[BlooInBloo]

8. Jillions, approximately.

[Igel]

10. That's most of it.

Presumably if everybody shared Cho's information with everybody else--the judge, the psychologist, his professors, his roommates and acquaintances, and his parents--something would have been done, there'd have been enough information in one place at one time to say, "This puppy needs help."

That kind of information sharing is, fortunately in most cases and unfortunately in a few cases, illegal.

[gravity]

12. It's the whole security vs privacy debate

There are also consequences if we all shared this information, like false positive accusations, and people being denied jobs and opportunities because of their past psychological records.

[barb162]

16. That's right. This guy was a real case

Anyone who would talk about the Columbine guys like some heroes... you have to wonder

[BlooInBloo]

7. lol! It's as though the concept "retrospectively" just doesn't exist anymore.

[gravity]

9. It's always obvious in hindsight

[bobbolink]

13. Because, by and large, we turn our backs on hurting people.

Isolation.

It's the hallmark of our society.

:(

[SoCalDem]

14. Recognizing it BEFORE would cost someone some money. n/t

[ProgressiveEconomist]

19. BINGO! See the UCLA Psych Dept's links on school antibullying programs at URL

http://smhp.psych.ucla.edu/qf/bully_qt .

School experts know how to foster good mental health and peaceful conflict resolution, but school districts have other priorities.

School counselors cost money that's being shifted to other priorities such as preparing for high-stakes tests. Even gym/exercise has been eliminated in many schools, which may shorten hundreds of thousands of kids lives with higher incidences of Type II diabetes and other public health threats. Mental health and violence prevention are not even on the stove, let alone the back burner.

[WillYourVoteBCounted]

15. there will always be maniacs, guns and such

We have a sick culture, Cho was a big fan of the violent war game style video games, so he got lots of practice.

The Army uses the video games to train their recruits,makes it look like fun.

Cho got guns, got ammunition and went to a "gun free zone" and
murdered over 30 innocents, girls, boys, women and men, none of them armed.

-Can we detect all crazies?

-Should we get rid of all guns, and be at the complete mercy of our govt (if it becomes a dictatorship?)

-Should we make laws stricter, lock up more people, force more people into mental institutions?

I have a gun, never used it except for target practice, had plenty of gun safety lessons.

Don't know if anyone had time to get a gun out of their car,

maybe in the 2 hour period that Cho used to go to the post office,

some of the guys or teachers could have retrieved their weapons from their cars,

could have been prepared - if they had only been warned!

Why wasnt anyone warned, 2 people had already been killed.

[Djinn]

21. The overwhelming majority

of people suffering a mental illness never committ a single act of violence against another human being.

What do people suggest should happen? Anyone who presents as mentally ill (or just a bit odd) is locked up just in case they turn homicidal? Forced medication?

Sometimes people need to accept that you can't prevent ALL forms of criminal/violent behaviour, at least not without a Big Brother society.

Personally I'd rather take the risk that someone with paranoid schizophrenia might shoot me one day over the suggestion that people's mental health and/or odd behviour becomes the business of the state.