Should the gunman from the Virginia Tech massacre be forgiven?

United States
April 23, 2007 6:58am CST
This young man was obviously mentally ill. No sane and rational person wakes up one day and decides to murder more than thirty people. No sane and rational person commits murder, pauses to construct an angry rambling manifesto, and then continues killing. However, is mental illness an excuse? Does this man deserve our forgiveness or our hatred?
1 person likes this
4 responses
@jasdownie (165)
• Philippines
23 Apr 07
I hope that the family of the VT victims can forgive (in time). It wouldn't happen right away for most, it could take years for them to heal their wounds...However, in the end, i think it would probably benefit people to forgive him, it's apart of the healing process and moving on. Grief and anger will destroy you... Let's just pray for the victim's families and hope that they all find strength to go on with their lives...
@mdilan (803)
• United States
23 Apr 07
Did you hear what Dr. Phil said at Larry kind live? We are not going to focus on him, specifically. What are we going to learn from this? First of all, Dr. Phil said that yes, he was ill. But the moment he committed all that was not a psychosis moment. It was too planned. I agree. What I personally think is that God sometimes sends us lessons. Why do we still make fun of the people? Why do we leave people behind? These people will just keep themselves quiet, and everyone will say: Oh, ok, he or she is okay. Then one day, they explode. That is our lesson I think. We should stop mocking and bullying, I'm talking about all of us. It's just a personal view. It might not be what God intended to tell us. But definitely this didn't come out of nowhere. God made possible for us to understand good and evil and what to learn from it.
1 person likes this
@funfreak2k2 (1734)
• India
23 Apr 07
no. but i think the authorities at the universities should take steps to see that no one is overly and continuously mistreated.
• United States
23 Apr 07
How was he mistreated? I keep hearing that phrase thrown around, but I've yet to hear any specific incidents where anyone harrassed him. At worst, it seems everyone just sort of ignored him. He was allowed to stay in the school after stalking 2 different women, though.
• United States
27 Apr 07
NO! He should not be forgivin. He does not deserve any sympathy. Cho became what he hated. a bully. He didn;t shoot the people who picked on him, he shot innocent people that never met him before. He is just a murderer burning in hell now. End of story.