Ugh!

Joe Derbyshire of the conservative National Review calls the victims of Virginia Tech cowards. Here is what Keith Olbermann had to say about Derbyshire and folks who had really awful thoughts about this tragedy.



I have been appalled at the few who are now coming out and blaming the victims for not rushing the guy with the automatic pistol with cartridges of 10-16 bullets each. You have kids in class in the morning -- probably the first class of the day. As a former college student, any class before 10 am I would be tired and out of it. Out of the blue someone goes through the door and shoots the teacher and then your fellow students before you can even form a thought. I suspect the first class had it the worst, as they didn't have the benefit of hearing the bullets and screams.

There were tales of heroism. I think that people need to cut them some slack as these people had no reason to suspect that they would have to respond to such violence in a language or engineering class. It is unreasonable to expect these people to be able to make split second calculations as to their chances against a mad man with such weapons.

It is entirely too easy and unfair to judge people in the safety of your own home and imagine what you would do. The horrible truth is that no one knows what they would do in those exact circumstances to try is pure speculative fantasy.

Can we stop blaming the victims of this tragedy and wish them peace? Can we instead think about what it is about our culture that our country is uniquely prone to this phenomena?