It's a touchy thing, second-guessing how people responded in a crisis. I wasn't there in that Virginia Tech classroom building, and I can't say for certain how I would have reacted had I been there. But there have been news reports that some of the victims were lined up and executed. At least one student survivor reported that the gunman burst into the classroom and started shooting, and they all "hit the floor" and waited for their bullet. This deeply saddens me.
Libercontrarian had a similar reaction, and some apropos comments:
For the mad dog who is only interested in slaughter, only three things can make him quit: suicide, attack by an organized security force, and disarmament by the pool of as-yet uninjured victims. The first two have the annoying tendency of coming well after the terminus of the event, thus resulting in the highest casualties. The last is what stops cold the attack, but requires the will to not be like the citizens of Babi-Yar, who marched nervously to the unending hammering of the machine guns, telling themselves that the Germans were giving them delousing showers. This perhaps requires the greatest courage: to take the chance that by risking more, personally, you may end the affair before it reaches the originator's intent. That is the Warrior Spirit.
I am not sure that there is an answer here. I would, however, prefer to be armed if I was to be locked into a room with a crazed gunman. I would hope for a bit of the Warrior Spirit to rely upon in any case – I could conceive no worse end than pleading with some twisted individual, on my knees, living my last several moments knowing that I was unable to prevent my death because of my fear of losing the opportunity to get away without confronting the evil that has revealed itself before me.
But the definitive articulation of what Libercontrarian and I felt came from LawDog (HT: FreedomSight):
There are reports — granted unconfirmed at this time — that several students were forced to line up, kneeling, and executed from behind.
I pray to the old gods — the gods of war and blood and thunder — that this is not the case.
I pray that some students went down fighting.
Because as bad as this is — and this is a horror — as bad as this is, if fifty some-odd people were injured and killed by one person whilst on their knees begging like so many Eloi, like a herd of sheep — if no one stood up and fought back, then this is becomes an example of evil.
Not the evil that allows a man to kill other men — although that is here in abundance. No, I am speaking of the putrescent evil which convinces good men not to fight back; the sordid filth of the soul which allows one bad man to prevail against fifty — or 25,000 — good men because good men have been systematically denied the mindset required to meet with, engage and defeat evil — even if all you have is fingernails and rage.
I beg you to go read the rest. I dare you to not be moved.
