JoeClarke.Net

Killer Cho at Virginia Tech is, of course responsible for the rampage that scourged the college this past week. We can spend time for the rest of eternity attempting to dissect his psyche. What provoked him? Why did he fall into the cracks? Why was he constantly excused by the school for aberrant and even criminal behavior? What were his parents like? Were his plays inspired by Quinton Farrentino who probably dipped his pen into blood to write those monstrous screenplays such as Kill Bill and Pulp Fiction? What does Ismail Ax mean?

Let Nancy Grace decipher his modus operandi, I have more important things to do

I looked at something else: the English Department at Virginia Tech and some of the courses which would drive me crazy if I were subject to these most fem-lib core courses led by the ideals of Professor/Poet Laureate/ Racist Nikki Giovanni who led a convocation at Virginia Tech April 17 after the slaughter, which was not as mournful as it was mean.

This is Giovanni's convocation speech which was commissioned by VT to console and encourage the thousands of Virginia students who were probably even more stunned and discouraged by this hardened political screed:

Convocation Address April 17 By Virginia Tech English Professor, Nikki Giovanni, who also taught Cho Seung Hui at the same school
"We are Virginia Tech
We are sad today We will be sad for quite a while We are not moving on We are embracing our mourning
We are Virginia Tech
We are strong enough to stand tall tearlessly We are brave enough to bend to cry And we are sad enough to know that we must laugh again
We are Virginia Tech
We do not understand this tragedy We know we did nothing to deserve it
But neither does a child in Africa Dying of AIDS
Neither do the Invisible Children Walking the night away to avoid being captured by a rogue army
Neither does the baby elephant watching his community Be devastated for ivory Neither does the Mexican child looking For fresh water
Neither does the Iraqi teenager dodging bombs
Neither does the Appalachian infant killed By a boulder Dislodged Because the land was destabilized
No one deserves a tragedy
We are Virginia Tech The Hokie Nation embraces Our own And reaches out With open heart and mind To those who offer their hearts and hands
We are strong And brave And innocent And unafraid
We are better than we think And not yet quite what we want to be
We are alive to imagination And open to possibility We will continue To invent the future
Through our blood and tears Through all this sadness
We are the Hokies
We will prevail We will prevail We will prevail
We are Virginia Tech"
Nikki Giovanni, delivered at the Convocation, April 17, 2007


I was first introduced to the madness of Nikki Giovanni last year when Ms. Giovanni campaigned against an honest, Christian, gentlemanly Republican candidate for Ohio Governor, Ken Blackwell. Here are a few of her man-eating remarks:
"I am not a son of a bitch like Kenny Blackwell"
From Giovanni slams Blackwellin the Cinci Enquirer:
If Ken Blackwell does manage to become Ohio’s governor, don’t look for Nikki Giovanni to be appointed the state’s poet laureate.
Giovanni, a native Cincinnatian, read an original poem entitled “I am Cincinnati,” a paean to all that is good and great about the Queen City, like three-way chili and Spring Grove Cemetery. She read her poem during re-opening ceremonies to the new Fountain Square Saturday.
But along with her nostalgic references, Giovanni remained true to her reputation of being an outspoken activist.
“I am not a son of a bitch like Kenny Blackwell,” Giovanni said near the end of the poem.
“I will not use the color of my skin to cover the hatred in my heart. I am not a political whore jumping from bed to bed to see who will stroke my knee.”

I don't know what her sexual preference is, but I was unlucky enough to have English teachers in high school and college who had a man-hating lesbian persona which Nikki reminds me of.

This once great military oriented college has become another lib playground housing those "Most Dangerous Professors" which David Horowitz so eloquently speaks of in his book and at http://www.discoverthenetworks.org/default.asp

Here are a few other gems taught at VT and hundred of other universities. These courses did not cause Cho to go mad. They certainly did not help.
Feminist Perspectives on Pedagogy and Academe: Feminist Academic Memoir (WS 5984)
Bernice L. Hausman (Virginia Tech)
++ Post Modern Speculative Fiction: Fe(M)ale (English 4784)
Len Hatfield (Virginia Tech)
+ Women Writers Re-Presenting Marriage (English 4784)
Bernice L. Hausman (Virginia Tech)