Editorial: VT and The Global Village

Marhsall McLuhan famously predicted that technology and information would lead us to what he called "the global village," a revolution of technology that would inevitably unite us and give us the ability to communicate to anyone in the world at anytime with just about any means. 

I am a senior in college and in three weeks I'll graduate with degrees in Advertising and Public Relations.  One of my morning classes deals with Crisis Management:  how to handle tough situations, having a plan in place, communicating facts and answering questions appropriately, etc.  My morning class today, Persuasive Communication taught by Dr. Robin Meyers (author of the famous speech, "A Minister Fights Back on Moral Values" and author of "Why the Christian Right is Wrong",) took a detour from the syllabus - about Marshall McLuhan - to just talk.  It's difficult to gauge how you're feeling as readers, but as a student I find myself not needing to see political banter or politics for a few hours, at least a few minutes, and rather find myself just wanting to talk.

As a student in Oklahoma City, I felt the building shake as I sat in my fourth grade classroom at 9:02AM on April 19, 1995, the morning of the Murrah Building Bombing.  I drove through the torrential rains and heard my mother scream as the phone disconnected the night she was buried underneath her own house by the largest tornado on record - May 3, 1999.  I sat in my 11th grade Government class and watched as the second plane crashed into the World Trade Center on September 11th, 2001.  Yesterday, I sat in an empty room, the living room where I'll soon occupy in my new home, and listened to the cries of a university, a city, a state, a country, about the horrors of what transpired at Virginia Tech University.

My life and the technology within it has allowed me to step out from a small suburban classroom, from a city-wide terrorist attack, from a statewide natural disaster, into what was the first of, unfortunately, many global tragedies.  The global village has its ups and downs, and the down is that we must all experience the devastation of tragedy without ever feeling the ground shake or hearing the shots fired.

At the time of this publication, we have learned who the shooter was and and have begun to piece together the history of the individual:  What he did in life, what initial warning signs were evident in hindsight, what steps could have been taken to alleviate his madness.  We've watched a university stumble in crisis from lack of preparation, failure to warn their students for over two hours, and lack of control over its campus.  We've watched media outlets frantically interview second- and third- and fourth-hand witnesses and provoke emotional reactions.  We've watched Fox News tell you how this will impact the stock market and the war on terror and the security and sanctity of our schools.  Unfortunately, until now, we have yet to just talk.

McLuhan says, "The Medium is the Message."  In this place, the home of inclusion and open-mindedness and intelligent dialogue, I hope the message can resonate from those values.  I needed to engage the global village, to speak back to it instead of merely observing it.  I hope you'll do the same.

If there's anything you'd like to share - comments, critiques,condolences, thoughts in general - please use the comments section todiscuss.

Comments

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Larry Johnson posted at Booman Tribune "Now do you understand ?" I ran across a post saying the shooter was a jilted lover - and another that there were two shooters.My thought was - counseling for mental trauma is indicated.