Understanding the 1999 Columbine High School Shooting

April 20th, 1999, Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, experienced a mass shooting. Thirteen people were injured and more than twenty were injured. Twelve were students and one was a teacher. Two students, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold opened fire on their high school for forty one minutes before turning their guns on themselves and committing suicide. School shootings are notorious for making headline news but in 1999, school shooting were not as prevalent as they are in the present day. The media blew up on the catastrophe that was Columbine and many questions were raised, who were these kids and why did they do this? Speculation arose about why they did it. Maybe they were bullied for being goth and social outcasts or maybe they

Harris was “the callously brutal mastermind” while Klebold was the “quivering depressive who journaled obsessively about love and attended the Columbine prom three days before opening fire” (Columbine High School, History). On an article published by Cullen on Slate.com, it reveals the true motivation and meaning behind the actions of Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. The article titled “At last we know why the Columbine killers did it” shows an in-depth look into the minds of Harris and Klebold. Cullen explained that people went on to believe one of two wrong conclusions about the Columbine shooters. One: they were taking revenge on the bullies or two: that the “massacre was inexplicable: we can never understand what drove them to such horrific violence” (At last we know, Cullen). A team of FBI agents, psychiatrists, and psychologists reached a different conclusion than that of the media. A conclusion that was “both more reassuring and more troubling” (At last we know, Cullen). Cullen says in the same article, “We can’t understand why they did it until we understand what they were doing.” It was more than just a school

But Harris and Klebold planned for a year and dreamed much bigger. The school served as means to a grander end, to terrorize the entire nation by attacking a symbol of American life. Their slaughter was aimed at students and teachers, but it was not motivated by resentment of them in particular. Students and teachers were just convenient quarry, what Timothy McVeigh described as "collateral damage."” Harris and Klebold could’ve chosen any place to stage their bombing as it wasn’t about the school. The school had absolutely nothing to do with their intentions, it was just an opportunity to do what they dreamed of doing. They had no intention of starting a school shooting as was stated in the same article as above, “The killers, in fact, laughed at petty school shooters. They bragged about dwarfing the carnage of the Oklahoma City bombing and originally scheduled their bloody performance for its anniversary. Klebold boasted on video about inflicting "the most deaths in U.S. history." Columbine was intended not primarily as a shooting at all, but as a bombing on a massive scale…. It wasn 't just "fame" they were after… they were gunning for devastating infamy on the historical scale of an Attila the Hun. Their vision was to create a nightmare so devastating and apocalyptic that the entire world would shudder at their power.”