by Thomas Scarborough

Cho Seung-Hui was pictured large on the second page of our local newspaper in Cape Town, holding a gun to his head. I summed it up for myself: Another tragic massacre in the USA. Little did I expect that the story would relate to me in a personal way. I am registered as a postgraduate student in the USA, and have spent more than two years in close contact with professors and students at a well known academic institution there.

I put my finger to Cho’s words. Surprisingly, I felt an immediate affinity with what he said. Much of what he said is what I deeply felt, in American academia. Of course, these were selected words, and I have not until today read all that he said. I would hasten to add that I did not ever entertain thoughts of violence or destruction as did Cho. And of course, the experience might not be the same throughout American academia. There is much, too, that has been good in my experience, and I am deeply appreciative of my American education. Yet Cho put his finger on the dark side.

The massacre had two features which seemed to me to be immediately obvious. Firstly, it represented a radical rejection. Cho’s act of cruel murder was rejection pure. At the same time, it came as a response to rejection. Cho claimed that American academia had been “extinguishing” his life. Secondly, the massacre had a clear character. Massacres have been a tragic part of human history for millennia — yet each has had its specific character: ethnic massacres, family massacres, gang massacres. Although our newspaper didn’t use the term, it seemed written all over: “cultural”. It was a radical rejection of academic culture in the USA.

Prior to my first visit to America to pursue my studies there, the faculty introduced the students to the education “paradigm”. It was their purpose, they said, to be explicit about their methodology. Students were required to read “Learning to Listen, Learning to Teach” by Jane Vella — a classic in education. This included the core principle: “affirmation of every offering”. I felt disquiet. When I wrote up the book, I noted that this might perversely tend in the very opposite direction, namely to “dis-affirm” the adult learner. That is, the very “affirmation” of my efforts could be failing in truth to affirm what might be deeply important to me.

I myself experienced this, time and again, as rejection. Conversely, it led within me to a tendency to reject the academic culture — but again, I did not entertain any thoughts of violence or destruction. In fact, I limped between resignation on the one hand, and courteous yet spirited engagement on the other. An American professor coached me from the sidelines. He wrote: “In the American classroom, I do encounter what you observed …” I suggested that I was deeply dispirited. I would henceforth “be there” but would “check out” in my heart. He said no, no, another foreign student had done just that. I would be denying my own person, I would be denying the institution what it so needed to hear.

The focus of my studies in the USA is theology and Christian leadership. I have reflected often on how Jesus interacted with others. He was the ultimate Affirmer — and yet He harried people, He contradicted people, He confronted them with deep emotion, He told them bluntly and freely that they had little faith, or stubborn hearts. This is true affirmation. But the “affirmation of every offering”, the stacked reading lists, the inscrutable professors, the complacency of affluence, the stage management, the cold silences, the suspicion of alternative opinion, the dullness to other realities, the channeling, re-routing, and deflection of deep interests and concerns is the dis-affirmation of one’s person.

In short, the education “paradigm” meant, for me, that while students were shown perfect courtesy from day to day, yet they were rejected with disdain. Cho himself characterised the problem as unremitting, claiming that there had been “a billion chances” to avoid it.

A week after I had opened our local newspaper, I read the American press. The reporting was markedly different. The selection of Cho’s words was different, too, and seemed to purge vital characteristics of the tragedy. It spoke vaguely of “an accumulation of risk factors” — genetics, gun laws, psychology, and so on. Cho was portrayed as a bizarre young man, and people were said still to be “searching for clues” as to the motive. The suggested solutions included vigilance, meditation, legislation, and more.

From here, however, it seemed patently and tragically clear. In important ways, Cho was right. But his response was so desperately and tragically wrong. Allan Bloom, twenty years ago, surveying the “intellectual climate” in America, cautioned that there was “much clearer communication” in guns. Until America understands what Cho experienced, I would feel deeply concerned for the safety of American academia.