Media credit to Jerica Fagan.

I would like to begin by stating that I am NOT a crazy death monger. I very well may be off my rocker, but a lover of death I am not. I am against the war, not just the war in Iraq, but wars in general. I do not condone the malicious killing of anyone or anything. Ask the people I surround myself with; I hate killing even ants. I once interrupted a quiet class so that I could remove a spider from the room so that it would not be killed. All that being said, my next statement might very well be considered hypocritical, I can assure you that it is rooted more in paradox than it is in hypocrisy. I believe whole-heartedly that minors convicted of shooting and killing members of their student body should be promptly and efficiently removed from society and life in general.

Let’s all travel back to 1999, shall we? I’m sure that those of you who can remember that far back will recall a little town in Colorado that became one of the most infamous towns in America: Columbine. This town is where the most gruesome of school shootings took place. After that incident, it became much more commonplace for schools to run school shooting drills. This is where our story begins.

Most of you will remember that students at Columbine High stepped onto campus in black trench coats and opened fire on their fellow student body. They targeted jocks and minorities, mostly. They went as far as placing homemade explosives all around the school and even in their cars, knowing fully well that they would not walk out alive.  Nonetheless, they were determined to take as many other lives as possible. Many authorities were horrified at the amount of preparation that these students underwent. I think most of us would agree that these students marked one of the most infamous days in the American school intuition’s history and that they were in their right minds—by no means insane. They very well might have been disturbed (understatement), but they were not insane considering their amount of preparation. Sadly, they killed themselves on the scene, knowing that they would receive no mercy at the hands of the justice system.

Let’s fast-forward a few years, yes? How about, oh, I don’t know, October 10, at Success Tech Academy in Cleveland, Ohio. Not too long ago, was it? For those of you who are not familiar with Success Tech Academy, it is one of Cleveland’s better high schools. It has a 94% graduation rate. Impressive. Not a place that one would expect to see a Columbine style shooting take place. But apparently it is. A student stepped on campus, once again dressed in rather dark clothing and with black painted fingernails. He shot and killed four people. Two teachers, two students. He knew all four and authorities say that he was targeting these individuals for his rampage. He also shot himself. 

Once again, I reiterate my point. If you are of the mind to walk onto campus and shoot individuals specifically, you are sane. If you are coherent enough to realize that the justice system will kill you, or at least imprison you for the rest of your natural born life, if you don’t do it first, then you are just as sane as the people you just put burning lead into.

One last example, before you finish reading. Tacoma, Washington, January 3. A student is taken into custody for shooting and killing another student the day before. He gave himself up willingly to the policemen approaching him. If he is sane enough to realize that he has murdered a person and that the police are looking for HIM, then he is sane enough to be put on death row.

Now, I realize that you may be thinking, “Geez, Daniel, that’s not very hippie-tastic of you.” But think of this: if your cousin/brother/sister/best friend is shot down for something as petty as being a jock, black, Mexican, or blonde, then you would be taking up the chant to kill the person who did it, whether it was a kid or not. If you had a gun pointed at your head and watched as it turned to kill to the person next to you, you would be just as adamant in wanting the death of the person who pulled the trigger.  Now imagine that the person did not get the justice he deserved after taking his own life. Imagine how angry you would feel at the injustice of the world and the need for revenge. You would most probably take up the banner of any given cause that tried to prosecute a minor who opened fire on a school.

I’ve never experienced such loss, but I know people who have. I’m not for the death penalty in all cases. I’m not for imprisonment in all cases for that matter. As I said above, I don’t dig killing. But when someone has a black soul like the Columbine shooters or any of the rest that I listed out, then I will be the first to say “Death penalty.” They have appeals. If they are truly innocent than whatever deity they follow will get them off. But they need to pay for their crimes. When someone kills another that has his or her entire life ahead, for no reason other than that “They’re different from me,” than that person is no longer human. That person is no better than the diarrhea coming out of my sick dog’s rectum.