Give a Boy a Gun (7 page)

“Most of the attackers in the recent cases had shown signs of clinical depression or other psychological problems. But schools, strapped for mental health counselors, are less likely to pick up on such behavior or to have the available help.”

—New York Times
, 6/14/98

I sat down. You could smell the liquor on
him, and I think I might have said something about drinking alone. He got into this rap about how we were both minorities, him being an outcast and me being African American. And didn't I know that if it weren't for football, I'd be in the same boat as him? I told him I thought there might be some truth to that, but that while there were definitely some bigots around, the majority of people we knew were smart enough to know better.

He asked if I knew that some of the worst bigots in school were on the team. I said I didn't think that was the case. We talked a little more, and then I got up and said I had to get to bed. Practice the next day, you know? I asked if he was going in, and he shook his head and said he was going to stay out for a while more. He tried to be tough and cool, but right at that moment he looked mostly miserable and weak.

Since we'd been talking pretty intimately, I asked him why he was doing this to himself. You know, drinking alone and fighting and generally making himself an outsider. He
just looked up at me. Maybe it was my imagination, but I thought his eyes were glistening, like with tears. And then he said that if I weren't on the team, I'd want to kill each and every one of them too. I said I was sorry but I didn't see it that way.

— Dustin Williams

If you're going to teach ninth-grade English, you have to be prepared for some off-the-wall stuff, especially from a kid like Brendan Lawlor. You see kids like him every year. You get the feeling they're at war in their mind, fighting some constant battle inside themselves as well as with everyone around them. Brendan wrote poems that sounded like plots for nightmarish action movies. Poems about automatic-weapons fire, limbs being torn off, the smell of burning flesh, skulls crushed and brains splattered in the halls, bombs, people begging for mercy before having their throats slit, then blowing yourself away. You would almost assume it was satire, except that for a kid like Brendan it was deadly serious. There were times when you wanted to
take him by the shoulders and shake him.
Come on, wake up! You're young. You've got your whole life ahead of you. Buckle down, work hard, go on a date, go to college, and get on with it
.

— Dick Flanagan, Brendan's ninth-grade English teacher at Middletown High School

The number of kids killed by firearms has quadrupled in the past ten years. (
People
, 5/3/99)

Know what? Not everybody has to do what you A-holes want them to do. Maybe your kids did, but me and my friends chose not to. And you and your kids couldn't deal with that. And so you had to do what stupid, ignorant people always do when they don't understand—you had to attack and torment us.

And you teachers. I thought you taught us that America is supposed to be about freedom. Kids are supposed to be able to be different without the status quo police smashing us over the head and ridiculing us. But that's all you teachers did to me and my friends. Just like everyone else, you tried to make us conform to your narrow-minded expectations of how we were supposed to dress and act.

Well, screw you. Screw all of you. I hope this letter is like a knife in your hearts. You ruined my life. All I've done is pay you back in kind.

Gary thought it was all a big joke anyway. He always said life was an accident. I mean, life on this planet. It wasn't anything that was meant to be. Most of the time I didn't bother to argue. But sometimes it made me sad. People tell me I'm really angry inside. It's probably true. But at least now I think maybe it can get better. But to Gary it was always hopeless and meaningless.

I think his mom might have been religious. Anyway, I hear she's been going to church a lot since what happened.

—Allison Findley

One day in class we were talking about morality, and Brendan said there was no God. He didn't say that
he
didn't believe in God. He just said there was no God. Like
he had this special knowledge and that was just the way it was, take it or leave it. The whole class went quiet. Even Mr. Flanagan was kind of shocked. He said Brendan could feel that way if he wanted, but that was his opinion and not necessarily the truth. But Brendan, he just kept saying there was no God. Like it wasn't enough to say what he believed. He had to try and force it down everyone else's throat too. I really wanted to pound the crap out of him.

—Paul Burns

It's stupid to point at one incident and say, “It's all because of this.” It has to be something that builds gradually and eats at you for a long time until you go psycho. But having said that, I'll tell you about one thing that happened in ninth grade that really changed Brendan. It was the time they did the swirly to him. They held him by the ankles and dunked his head in the toilet. It was all over school in no time.
After Gary and I heard about it, we went looking for [Brendan], but he was gone.

—Ryan Clancy

Several people said immediately after the shooting that Michael Carneal was an atheist, or at least had associated with atheists.

Face it, there are two sets of rules: one for those who are in favor and one for those who aren't. If Deirdre Bunson is talking in world history, it's like, “Excuse me, Deirdre, now pay attention.” But if Allison Findley is talking, Ms. Arnold stops the class and stares at her. And then the rest of the kids stare at her. It's a light slap on the wrist for Deirdre. It's public humiliation for Allison.

—Allison Findley

[Brendan] called me the second night. I said, “Brendan, where have you been [for the past two days]?” He said he'd been ditching. He couldn't face anyone at school. I asked why he didn't tell his parents or the school, and he just laughed. He said if the guys who did [the swirly] found out [he'd told on them], it would only make it worse. He went to school the next day and got two weeks' detention for
unexplained absence. Is that fair?

— Emily Kirsch

Everybody's looking for someone to blame. So, of course, since I'm on the [football] team and I had some scrapes with those guys, a lot of people want to blame me. Let me tell you something. I'm not going to deny that I mixed it up with them. I did it, and I'm not proud of it. Obviously, after what they did to me, I'm gonna regret it for as long as I live. But there's just one thing. It wasn't like I went looking for them. Those guys, especially Brendan, it was like he always wanted to start something. Like he went out of his way to ask for it.

— Sam Flach

Like all other animals, we are born with instincts and a genetic blueprint of what we
must do to survive. The big difference is that humans possess the potential for becoming civilized, thinking,
reasoning
creatures. Eventually we are supposed to learn to suppress our animal instincts in order to meld with the society around us.

In 1995 alone, 35,957 Americans were killed by firearms in homicides, suicides, and accidents. In comparison, during the three years of the Korean War, 33,651 Americans were killed. During nearly eight years of the war in Vietnam, 58,148 Americans were killed.