Having lost someone that meant a lot to me, I can understand the need to see someone blamed. Someone must be punished for the horrible crimes committed. But who do we point the finger of blame at?

Many will volunteer various forms of the media. Groups will claim the violence portrayed in television, movies, song lyrics and the excessive carnage in video and computer games influenced the attackers. As a society we cannot accept that our youth, our teens, are capable of concocting the schemes behind such acts of senseless aggression. We feel the media must have corrupted their impressionable young minds and never showed the consequences or made the violence look bad. Instead it only glorified the violence. However, today’s teenagers are much smarter than they are given credit for. They are not naive and are capable of rational thought. Today’s teens can fully comprehend the difference between reality and the fantasy worlds offered by the media.

After the media, the shadow of blame is generally cast on the parents of the attackers. While sometimes violent behavior can be traced to abusive parents, this is not always the case. No parent can be expected to be perfect. All any parent can do is teach their children as best they can, the difference between good and bad, and the values of right and wrong. Yet, no matter how well a parent has done their job, the child ultimately makes the decision to listen to or ignore the voice of experience offered to them.

So who is left to blame? While it has been proven that violent forms of media and abusive families have been contributing factors in cold-blooded acts of hate, they can not always be held accountable. Most people have the capacity to choose the best, non-violent course of action in situations that are frustrating. The rational thought can be momentarily turned off by extreme levels of sudden emotions like anger that can be acted out in such ways as hitting something or throwing an object across the room. However, these school shootings show thought behind them, and the fact that those violent thoughts became brutal actions show a contempt for all the individual had been taught about tolerance. Only those who have taken the time and energy to plan such a heinous crime can be held accountable for its aftermath. They chose to ignore reason, common sense and respect for humanity and therefore they are the only ones that should be held responsible for the pain and suffering caused by their actions.

Those fifteen who died so needlessly will be added to statistics in time. For now, while the thoughts and terror are still fresh in the public’s collective mind, they will be an example. Bills and laws will be proposed and possibly passed to insure our children are safe at school. But is a safer learning environment really enough?

Even if we turned the public school system into nothing more than an educational prison system for children, it would not guarantee their safety off school grounds.

The two teens responsible for the carnage that took place in Littleton, Colorado pointed to the unfair hierarchy at work among teens. Targeting “jocks” on their rampage, they targeted the high school equivalent to nobility who held the power of popularity in their grasp. If we each take a moment to think back to our own days in high school, we may remember that it was the athletes who had the social power in the school. It is an unfair and often isolating class system designed to focus on those who can play sports while those who can’t are often left in the shadows, ignored because their names weren’t in the local newspaper’s sports section for winning the game.

However, this unfair class system can end. What we need to do, collectively, as a nation, is to think back to our high school days and remember what it felt like to be ridiculed for something, whether it be a bad complexion or just not playing a sport. If we can remember the feelings of isolation, the feeling of not being good enough, we can in some small way understand what those two Colorado teens were feeling.

Once we have remembered what it was like to be the outcast, we must convey and explain those feelings to our children. Perhaps if they know how the feeling of not fitting in hurts others, they can learn to accept people. If we teach them that just because someone is smart, pretty or athletic, it doesn’t make them any better than anyone else. The things that separate us are only our thoughts and beliefs, not what we do, look like or have. It is vital for our children, those who will make tomorrow the future, learn the real meaning of the words “all men are created equal” today.