A recent editorial by The Miami Hurricane encouraged students to temper their attitudes toward FSU by keeping in mind the old adage that it’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt.
Now, someone has.
Three people, in fact, were injured last night at the FSU Strozier Library by a lone gunman quickly shot down by the police. This incident is in no way linked with the competition between UM and FSU, but it should remind us that this rivalry, often breaking out red and itchy like a rash, only really runs skin deep.
Whatever lingering knee-jerk resistance you may feel toward the acronym “FSU,” put it aside, and put yourself in the shoes of the students at the Strozier Library who were wrenched from their books and their notes by the words, “Someone has a gun.”
It’s not hard to picture, is it? That this event occurred on a campus with a gun-free policy, with security described by the campus police chief as “not lacking,” reinforces the notion that such tragedies can happen anywhere.
No, you shouldn’t live your life in fear of random violence. But convince yourself that you’re immune, and you’ll risk distancing yourself from the empathy and understanding that connect human beings when they recognize their own similarities.
Panicking, running out doors, barricading stairwells, FSU students were forced to rely on primary survival instincts to which it is each of our fervent hopes we will never have to resort. The least we can do is to exercise, in solidarity, another such basic human response: compassion.
Because today, we are not rivals. Today, we remember that underneath the orange and green, underneath the garnet and gold, under blues and yellows and purples, we are all human.
Editorials represent the majority view of The Miami Hurricane editorial board.