Yet another school shooting has occurred, this time in Santa Fe, Texas on May 18, 2018. Ten people were fatally shot and thirteen wounded. The perpetrator was Dimitrios Pagourtzis, a 17 year old student at Santa Fe High School. Reports from survivors include gruelling details, including a claim that the shooter was repeating “another one bites the dust” for each victim he shot. Eight students and two teachers were killed in the attack, including Sabika Sheikh, an exchange student from Pakistan. She was laid to rest in Pakistan, and was scheduled to come home shortly after the end of Ramadan, which was about three weeks away from the time of her death. Even in Pakistan, where gun laws are present but not as enforced, the parents are rightfully calling for better gun control in the United States.
Shana Fisher was another victim in the attack, whose mother said she was rejecting Dimitrios’ advances for the past four months. Although his attorney says the attacks weren’t targeted, the conclusion can be made that there was a motive behind the attack. Although Pagorutzis has yet to undergo a mental health evaluation, and says he “doesn’t remember much of the attack,” he remains in solitary confinement, restricted to two 20-minute visits in jail each week. Shana’s mother, Sadie Rodriguez, believed it was a targeted attack due to the constant advances he made on her, and the increasing aggressiveness of those advances. She also mentioned that Shana “stood up to him” by calling him out in front of class based on the advances just a week before the shooting.
This brings up the conversation of incel culture. The father of Pagourtzis claimed he committed the shooting because he was bullied. A lot of disagreements were made, arguing that LGBTQ+ students, among others, are bullied daily and they do not commit mass shootings. The blame is always shifted onto another party, instead of the criminal at hand. Was Pagourtzis an incel? Who cares. He committed a mass school shooting, and was reported to keep the students “he liked” alive, while shooting everyone else. Shana was the first victim. However, the incels on the internet have been responding in gruesome ways, saying the kids who bullied him had it coming, among other responses.
Do women become complicit by rejecting men because they turn them into deranged killers? Doesn’t that sound like a terrible sentence? Well luckily the answer to it is no. Shana had given rejections constantly to the killer, and there is no further discussion. This sort of entitlement is not just sudden, it’s manifested over the years and can cause major problems. Guns just make it easier for them to kill.
Speaking of guns, gun control also becomes a heavy topic that is yet again touched on in the American news. Reports say Pargoutzis took the guns from his dad, which counteracts the “responsible gun owner” ideal of the US gun laws. I don’t know what’s going on in the States; from Kim Kardashian and Donald Trump meeting in the white house to talk about prison reform, the NRA trying to “take back orange” as a colour for gun violence, and all around debauchery, one can only hope they straighten something out and offer more than thoughts and prayers, or the midterm elections won’t fare well for the Republican Party.
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