Cause And Effects Of The Columbine Shootings

Kristine Thornton

ENGL 111-08

Prof. Gravely

28 September 2017

Columbine

The Columbine Shootings were one of the greatest tragedies that the nineties faced; and changed the world that was once known. The fault for this tragedy falls on popular culture, moral climate, and the parents of the shooters; not the shooters themselves. Society has greatly affected the minds of the youth, and viewing violence on television, video games, and on the internet, has planted a negative seed of thought in their minds.

Violence became very popular in the nineties on various forms of media. In modern media, children are exposed to drugs, guns, violence, and sex amongst other things. Unfortunately, Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, fell victim to the overexposure of nineties media through video games, movies, music, and television. They failed to make the distinction between fiction and reality, and this led to them taking the lives of thirteen innocent

Klebold and Harris were both staunch Atheists, and went out of their way to target students who were openly Christian. The argument could be made that if religion was taught in school, Klebold and Harris would both be exposed to ideas of faith and perhaps would have a better understanding of their peers and what they believed. Instead, they carried resentment for the people of faith at Columbine High, most notably Cassie Bernall whom when Harris asked if she was a Christian and believed in God answered “Yes”. Harris killed her solely on the premise of her belief in Jesus. In Elliot Aronson’s article, How the Columbine High School Tragedy Could Have Been Prevented, he stated that “When we develop the ability to understand what another person is going through it increases the probability that our heart will open to that person” (360). Klebold and Harris did not understand others blind faith, and chose to hate it