Resentment – the cancer of society

As the Newspapers of Montreal unfolded the story of Kimveer Gill, the shooter at Dawson College, it became evident that the hatred that drove him to this act was deep. The hatred came from some where. Yet when the family members were interviewed these was no reason apparent. According to reporters, the family had not witnessed anything unusual in his behaviour that would have given them a warning of any kind. Kimveer did have a deep fascination for guns – which they thought was simply his hobby. Over the previous weeks he had become somewhat withdrawn and quiet – but they thought nothing of it.

Kimveer has an East Indian heritage from what they have told us. He also grew up and lives in Quebec. He is not French. He was not part of the society that he lives in. One of the good articles that describes in a detailed analysis was written by Jan Wong in the Globe and Mail Newspaper – September 16, 2006 entitled “Get Under the Desk”

The following is from her article…
Quote…
This week, Montrealers were asking: Why us? Youths elsewhere in Canada are addicted to violent video games. Youths elsewhere in Canada live in soul-less suburbs. Youths elsewhere are alienated and into Goth culture. Yet while there have been similar high-school tragedies, all three rampages at Canadian postsecondary institutions occurred here, not in Toronto, or Vancouver or Halifax or Calgary.

"A lot of people are saying: Why does this always happen in Quebec?" says Jay Bryan, a business columnist for the Montreal Gazette, the city's only English-language daily. "Three doesn't mean anything. But three out of three in Quebec means something."

What many outsiders don't realize is how alienating the decades-long linguistic struggle has been in the once-cosmopolitan city. It hasn't just taken a toll on long-time anglophones, it's affected immigrants, too. To be sure, the shootings in all three cases were carried out by mentally disturbed individuals. But what is also true is that in all three cases, the perpetrator was not pure laine, the argot for a "pure" francophone. Elsewhere, to talk of racial "purity" is repugnant. Not in Quebec.

In 1989, Marc Lepine shot and killed 14 women and wounded 13 others at the University of Montreal's École Polytechnique. He was a francophone, but in the eyes of pure laine Quebeckers, he was not one of them, and would never be. He was only half French-Canadian. He was also half Algerian, a Muslim, and his name was Gamil Gharbi. Seven years earlier, after the Canadian Armed Forces rejected his application under that name, he legally changed his name to Marc Lepine.

Valery Fabrikant, an engineering professor, was an immigrant from Russia. In 1992, he shot four colleagues and wounded one other at Concordia University's faculty of engineering after learning he would not be granted tenure.

This week's killer, Kimveer Gill, was, like Marc Lepine, Canadian-born and 25. On his blog, he described himself as of "Indian" origin. (In their press conference, however, the police repeatedly referred to Mr. Gill as of "Canadian" origin.)

It isn't known when Mr. Gill's family arrived in Canada. But he attended English elementary and high schools in Montreal. That means he wasn't a first-generation Canadian. Under the restrictions of Bill 101, the province's infamous language law, that means at least one of his parents must have been educated in English elementary or high schools in Canada.

To be sure, Mr. Lepine hated women, Mr. Fabrikant hated his engineering colleagues and Mr. Gill hated everyone. But all of them had been marginalized, in a society that valued pure laine.

End quote…

Where the cancer comes in…. “Resentment”
This story is not limited to the Quebec borders. It happens in lots of places.
Maybe it just doesn’t end in such tragic ways as did the three events in Montreal.

I believe it is possibly a result of “Resentment”. Recently I was able to get a copy of a book entitled “Quiet Courage” by Paula Todd. The first section in her book she writes of Dr. Graeme Cunningham and his battle with alcoholism. Dr. Graeme Cunningham stated a powerful thought about “Resentment”…

"Resentment comes from the Latin verb resentire—to feel again. When you do something bad to me, what my head does is replay the events and you get worse and / get better. Then, you end up living rent-free up there in the dangerous neighbourhood called my mind. I deal with that by becoming selfish."

As I read this powerful statement I was deeply moved to realize that many possibilities have come my way to allow me to build up resentment… and many times I have taken that journey because of the “resentire—to feel again” that comes my way. The valuable rent-free space taken by the thought in my mind resulted in selfish attitudes and actions on my part.

Now place this idea grid on Kimveer Gill, Marc Lepine or Valery Fabrikant and see how their selfish acted out – they took other’s lives – the ultimate act of selfishness.

In the very important Psalm 139 David says these words…
Psalm 139:23-24(KJV)
23 Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:
24 And see if there be any wicked way in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

But if you look closely to what he is stating just prior to this famous statement there is a hint of his mind space where he may have given free-rent to some bad thinking. The real possibility is there for resentment to have had control over his life. His ultimate selfish sin was that of adultery. It certainly has me thinking about David and me and Kimveer.