Were Harris And Klebold In An Altered
State?
How could anyone in
their right mind have committed terrorism against their fellow classmates? Obviously, Columbine shooters, Eric
Harris and Dylan Klebold weren't in their right mind.
What in the world could have caused
this apparent evil mind to take over?
A recent Dateline television show may provide a clue. The two Columbine High shooters were enrolled
in a Creative Writing class. A girl
in the class said Harris and Klebold wrote disturbing
stories about guns and bullets. Is
a Creative Writing Class just a reflection of thoughts or could it be used as a
vehicle for influencing thoughts?
Students in my daughter's Creative
Writing class also wrote about disturbing issues. My daughter was enrolled in a Creative
Writing class at East Valley High School in Spokane, Washington. She posted writings of several class
members work on her walls. Much to
my surprise, death was the most frequent theme expressed by the kids in her
class. I immediately asked her
about these macabre pieces. She
said everyone in the class wrote similar stories. I wondered why.
A friend of mine told me that she and
another mother had visited the teacher the year before to express concern about
some of the strange methods the teacher used in this class. I phoned the teacher who admitted she
had taken the students on "guided fantasies" to help improve their
creativity. My research showed that
"guided fantasies" were a type of hypnosis, which altered a student's
state of consciousness.
I immediately called the teacher and
visited the principal to let them know that I disapproved of this
technique. I insisted that my
daughter was to leave class when psychotherapeutic therapies such as guided fantasies
were used by this teacher. The
principal and teacher promised me this would never happen again. Later, I phoned the teacher who said my
daughter had decided to stay in the class when the other students were taken on
a guided fantasy. Both the teacher
and principal disregarded my request.
I also met with the vice principal and
shared numerous articles about the danger of teachers using guided fantasy
techniques on students. I poured
over curriculum books and articles on self-esteem from local teaching libraries
to read about guided fantasies.
Authors admit that a guided fantasy alters a student's state of
consciousness. Psychiatric books
call guided fantasy a type of hypnosis.
My daughter and classmates had been hypnotized in their class!
I couldn't help but wonder if possibly
Harris and Klebold were in an altered state of
consciousness when they shot the other students. Maybe they learned how to get into this
'state' from instruction they had received in their Creative Writing class. Of course I can only speculate, but I
can't help but wonder how and why nice kids in my daughter's class wrote about
death and killing after they were hypnotized.
Two years ago, Spokane Representative
Mark Sterk sponsored a bill to stop hypnosis and
guided fantasies in Washington state schools. This bill — HB
1598 — passed out of the House Education Committee, but died in the next
committee. If one has Real Audio on
their computer, they can listen to the audio of the February 14, 1997, House
Education Committee hearing on HB 1598 by accessing
the TVW website; then scrolling the page and typing in
HB 1598.
Listen to the compelling testimony from
a Mead High School (north of Spokane, Washington) student who observed the
unusual behavior of her classmates.
Her teacher appeared to utilize psychotherapeutic techniques to lead
students into a guided tour of a building with several rooms which represented
scary, emotional feelings.
John Talbott
(who is now Spokane's Mayor) read the student's legislative testimony to a
group of parents a few days after the legislative hearing in 1997. A Spokesman Review reporter was
present. Several articles appeared
in newspapers across the state about the student's compelling testimony.
I think we need to take another look at
the danger of teachers acting as psychotherapists in a classroom of kids. Teachers may unwittingly be contributing
to disturbing thoughts in children by hypnotizing them. After all, they are not trained to
properly hypnotize students or deal with ill effects which could occur. Legislators should reconsider the
Hypnosis Bill to help safeguard our children in our schools.
We can't control influences outside of
the classroom, but we must control bad influences in the classroom. This could be a matter of life and
death.
© April 1999
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