Originally Posted by Karl Childers
I believe he did indeed exploit a horrible national tragedy by highlighting the incident and using it as the impetus for his film. He used the events because they were so horrific, knowing such details and a recalling of the event would stick in people's minds.
Directly speaking, the Columbine incident is this generation's Kent State: A tragic event which shakes up a nation and serves to epitomize a symbolic fear or evil which currently seizes it.
I agree, but at the same time it's that tragic nature that makes it such a relevant event in our history--and an event that creates such a shockwave as did Columbine, Kent State, or 9/11 is the very sort of event that begs analysis. If we let them pass without the sort of commentary that Moore makes in
Bowling for Columbine, then we'll forget the most important things about them: the fact that people died senselessly, the fact that something in our culture--not simply the perpetrators--is to be partially blamed for these tragedies, and the fact that we as a society will continue experiencing the effects of these events for the foreseeable future.
And these are the kinds of things that you don't understand simply by watching the news reports or the footage.
I don't believe Moore made an attempt to portray Columbine and everything surrounding it in an honest light which would have examined the culture of violence objectively. If he had chosen to do so, he would have interviewed the father of one of the student-victims who made a plea warning Americans that violence was the not the result of the gun, or gun owners, or gun makers. It was about responsibility and disarming the heart. Moore wanted no part of that.
He could have also neglected to not alter his video and narration to deceive viewers in regards to the Lockheed Martin plant, the bank gun promotion, and the Heston interview.
He lied because the facts on their own would not have served his anti-gun agenda. In doing so, he exploited the Columbine tragedy by not addressing the entire issue, and subjectively pursuing his own issue.
Again, I agree that it was not an objective film or analysis. However, having a personal biases on the issue at hand does not constitute exploitation. We're seeing Moore's opinions on the screen, and while he claims to have the right answer, there is no "right" answer. He knows (or he should) that stricter gun laws would not bring an end to violence, even gun-related violence--but he does believe that a
lassez faire attitude towards guns is one of the reasons that Columbine happened. He also believes that fear is another major factor, and so much of the film centers on those two issues and how they dovetail. Part of it, too, is his analysis of the symbolic nature of guns and the right to bear arms--and what effect this symbolism has had on American culture.
It would be impossible to boil all this down to a two-hour film and adequately and objectively cover everything, and Moore knew it.
And, yes, he is biased, but his stance on these issues is his thesis for the film. I'll go back to my grad student analogy: you have to go into a analysis with a basic thesis. You then use the facts (or the text) to back up that thesis. And a certain amount of fudging--again, I'm not condoning it
--often works its way in. Now, a good thesis is open-ended enough to allow you to use those elements that
don't hold up your thesis. And a good writer/thinker is smart enough to be able to counter those elements with other arguments.
I believe Columbine itself spurred Michael Moore to make a film that looked at the basic fear that drives American culture: the fear of each other, of ourselves--and if the sniper shootings had not happened later, they too would have become a large part of the film, I'm certain. I also believe Moore used Columbine because it was so relevant to that problem, not because it was a handy base for his anti-gun platform.
I do understand your indignation, Karl--and I feel it somewhat, too, in the sense of the spin Moore puts on his information--but I don't agree with its basis. And, overall, I think
Bowling for Columbine is an important film that more people need to see.
Reply to Topic
