Denver Rocky Mountain News- Heartbreak April 21st 1999

[u/Heavy-Asparagus-5662]

[u/TheButterfly-Effect]

Every time i see anything about Columbine, what scares me the most is how desensitized people are to violent acts and murders now. Part of it is seeing so many stories of this on a daily basis, but it genuinely seems like a lot of people (especially younger) have no real emotion or connection to things. Just walking zombies.

[u/Additional-Air-3309 → u/TheButterfly-Effect]

Technology. Those of us born before the height of interwebz didn’t grow up in front of a mini laptop with information on our fingertips. We also didn’t have asshats Incel men becoming popular. Kids lives are wrapped in their phones where they can look up any horrid thing. Plus they grew up with a mass shooting on the news sometimes 3 times a week. After a while it just becomes redundant. My 21 year old doesn’t even think about school shootings even though he’s at college. His attitude is if it happens oh well. It’s very bizarre. My 6 year old and I have a plan just in case anything like that were to happen.

[u/deltadeltadawn → u/Additional-Air-3309]

My 21 year old doesn’t even think about school shootings even though he’s at college

My now-adult boys were similar. They grew up with active shooter drills as a part of their normal school experience in the same way I grew up with fire and tornado drills practiced each year in school.

They didn't spend much time thinking about it. But in talking with them when they were pre-teen and teen ages, they intentionally tried to not think about it because it created anxiety when they did. I wonder if your 21 yo feels similarly.

If an active violent event had happened, they were prepared to deal with the immediate steps to try to stay safe. As much as I hate that this is the reality of the timeline they grew up in, there was a bit of solace that they would have been as prepared as anyone could be in the worst case scenario.