Criticism of University Response
Sociology professor Kenneth Westhues has criticized the Virginia Tech response to the shootings and the Massengill Report. Westhues identifies the cause of the shootings as mobbing Cho experienced in the Virginia Tech English department, and suggests that the explanation for the Virginia Tech shootings should go beyond what he calls the "defective character" explanation:
A more truthful (and therefore more useful) explanation of the Virginia Tech murders focuses not on Cho’s character but on the interaction between it and the situations he was in, not on his personal identity but on the interplay between who he was and how other people treated him.Westhues cites the experiences of another Virginia Tech student in the same department as being very similar to Cho's. Westhues has criticized Virginia Tech and the Massengill Report for failing to advance a fuller explanation of the causes of the shootings, which he suggests should be one of "character-situation interplay".
Read more about this topic: Virgina Tech Shooting
Famous quotes containing the words criticism, university and/or response:
“It is from the womb of art that criticism was born.”
—Charles Baudelaire (1821–1867)
“Priests are not men of the world; it is not intended that they should be; and a University training is the one best adapted to prevent their becoming so.”
—Samuel Butler (1835–1902)
“Parents’ accepting attitudes can help children learn to be open and tolerant. Parents can explain unfamiliar behavior or physical handicaps and show children that the appropriate response to differences should be interest rather than revulsion.”
—Dian G. Smith (20th century)