Brazil Mourns Today, Twelve Dead in School Shooting in Rio

Brazil this week joined a list of countries that can claim a link to senseless violence which sends chills among its innocent population and their children. Today Rio buried 12 of its youth who were murdered by a gunman yesterday at a school in a working class area of Rio de Janeiro. The gunman, Wellington Oliveira, was a former student of the school and did not seem to have any known motivation or criminal record that would have pointed to this type of violence being a possibility. Oliveira’s act was however very brutal as he lined up victims and shot them in the head, 10 girls and 2 boys between the ages of 12 and 15 years old. The 23 year old Oliveira was shot in the legs by police, and killed himself before he was taken into custody. Today is a day of national mourning in Brazil, with President Rousseff shedding tears along with the rest of the nation and the world.

Brazil is not immune from violence, and in fact it is a major issue in the country but it is often linked to Rio’s favelas and gang warfare and crimes linked to poverty and the lack of opportunity for many in Brazilian and in Latin American society as a whole. This school shooting placing the students of Rio in the line of fire is a great surprise for Brazilians and differs in character as it shows that anyone, anywhere, can become a victim and there is no way to find out who might commit the act. Teachers at the school implored the government to increase security at schools in Rio and Brazil as a whole, but without any way to discover who might commit such acts it will be difficult to know why a person would want to shoot any children until that person publishes their intentions in a letter. Oliveira’s letter did not state why he did this act, it just said he wished to die.

Since Columbine there have been numerous shootings with similar results within the US, but also Japan, China, Russia, Canada, as well as parts of Europe and other incidences have occurred all over the world. While Columbine received a great deal of attention as it was the first such incident of this type in the US, the number of similar actions including the most deadly incident at a college campus by a Korean student and even a similar act by a US Army psychologist at a base in Texas now has a limited story life in the media as these shootings become more common in the media and society. Once thought a result of pressures in American society as illustrated in Michael Moore’s film “Bowling for Columbine”, the explanation for similar incidents internationally have little warning and are hard to explain as these tragedies continue.

There is no simple explanation for why these incidents occur and the solutions are as perplexing as the reasons why any individual would target children for such violence, and target them with such callousness and venom in the process. The Russian example was explained as mothers who lost their own children in Chechnya took over a Russian school as a reprisal to their own loss, but in most other cases the violence is senseless and extremely unpredictable. Deterring such an act is difficult as well as the gunman often expects and wishes to perish as an end result and this is often how those situations come to a conclusion. It is clear however that this is no longer an American phenomenon or a result of poverty or even a logical path in societies where there are high rates of other types of violent crime. An international dialogue and solutions to these issues need to be created in order to claim back safe communities, at least for the youngest of its members.