Why don't I feel retributive?

Why don't I wish that Cho had survived to be punished harshly? Why don't I feel the retributive urge for him to answer for his deeds at Virginia Tech?

I think there are two categories of the violently imbalanced. There are those who are socially successful to the point that they can control people (e.g., Charles Manson, Jim Jones). When they do terrible things, they are using their power over others. I have no problem wishing the worst punishments upon them.

On the other hand, there are the meek who occasionally explode. They are the opposite of the Charles Mansons: they are social failures with no power over anyone. The bitterness they feel because of this situation causes their explosion. Why do I feel more pity than anger at these people?

I suppose I feel they are a manifestation of the unfairness of the world, perhaps even the evil and sinfulness of the world, to give it a more religious overtone. As society becomes less and less inhibited, more and more materialistic, etc., it slaps these people in the face every day, flaunting and highlighting what the socially successful have. In times past, perhaps societal restrictions and modesty kept things on a more even keel. It wasn't quite so "in your face." But now it is, and occasionally people who don't have a lot of success in society will explode. Most people, say 85%, are "successful" enough by the time they reach Cho's critical age, having found some modicum of companionship and comfort. Most of the rest manage to rationalize an acceptance, based on religion, meditation, discipline, force of will, whatever, that keeps them from exploding. But a very few can't manage that. There can be a multitude of reasons for their situations (looks, physical deformity, shyness, and bad luck perhaps being the most common). The less control they had over their predicaments, perhaps the more likely the explosions.

To explore the religious overtone a bit more, I see all of this as a manifestation of society's imperfection, sin if you will, that everyone can't be embraced sufficiently to prevent rage. I am not claiming that I'm any better than anyone else at "embracing." I step to the other side of the street when a homeless person who looks like he might smell starts walking toward me. And I'm sure that people whom I've liked or loved more than was reciprocated have taken steps to avoid me. So we are all sinners and victims at the same time, avoiding those we silently despise and trying in vain to gain the approval of those we admire and like. For most of us, the net balance of what we "get" is enough to keep us content enough. But despite my own constructions and results that keep me at peace with society, when I see society setting its self-serving rules (personal liberty; free will; do what you want as long as you don't interfere with anyone else, etc.) in some grand, conclusory presumption, I can't help but see the hypocrisy in it through the have-nots' eyes. What does free will, but constrained by the rights of others to free will, mean to such a person, when any thing he would truly want is necessarily an imposition on others who would prefer to avoid him? Perhaps I have straddled the fence at points in my life so that I can at least see what life can be like on either side. I can't help but feel pity, sympathy, and understanding accompanying any anger I feel for Cho's acts.

If only Cho could have seen the futility of striving for or envying worldly measures of success, the delusiveness and unimportance of it all! It is hard to imagine from the description of Cho's life that he was actually striving for those measures of success rather than merely envying them, but perhaps just getting out of bed each morning and facing a society with which he didn't know how to engage, was his striving.

As Rhett Butler famously observed in the famous novel, he knew of only one person he could call truly good. I feel that Mother Theresa (RIP), the Dalai Lama, Jesus (RIP), Ghandi (RIP), and Buddha (RIP) are probably pretty good, as good as humans have been (I almost said, "can be"). I personally find my comfort in the counsel of Buddha, who teaches me to strive to accept everything.