Jimmy Mizen’s dad plea to stop ‘angry Britain’
The dad of murdered teenager Jimmy Mizen demanded an end to “angry Britain” yesterday as his son’s killer was jailed for life.In a rallying cry to decent people, Barry Mizen said the country was rapidly losing its civility and called for a return to values based on manners and kindness.
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Showing extraordinary dignity, she vowed not to be overcome with anger over Jimmy’s death.
Referring to Fahri, she said: "I feel for the parents of this boy.
“That’s their child, they held that boy in their arms as a baby. They must be in pain.”
This UK story has me pondering something I’ve long had an interest in - parents, or more generally family members who resist what can be immense media and social pressure to fall into anger or ‘victimism’ in the wake of the murder of a loved one.
For me, the prototype of this kind of grace was the extraordinary gesture of the family of Jason Lang, a 17 year old kid from alberta shot in a (probably copycat) school shooting 8 days after Columbine.
http://www.cbc.ca/news/background/taber/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/W._R._Myers_High_School_shooting
The shooter was a 14 year old with, like so many school shooters, a history as the target of a lot of bullying, but no one says that the boy he shot was among the bullies. He was a well liked and apparrently kind preacher’s kid who was among the first the shooter saw when he entered the school.
What struck me then, however, was the fact that the dead kids parents publicly forgave their son’s murderer very soon after the killing, and long before the trial.
This is something that almost never happens, in my experience. This was a killing committed by a ‘youth’ in Canada’s province that is ‘toughest’ on youth crime. During the trial, the prosecution applied (as the law here allows) to have the case transferred to adult court, where offenders go to adult jail (to improve the sex lives of the other prisoners, I’ve always presumed) and can be sentenced to life instead of the juvie max, (which was then three years, I think, but which since has been raised to a touch less than then years, largely to satisfy Alberta). The application was refused, btw.
All the press was filled with stories about the scourge of youth crime, and was ready for some mad as hell quotes from the Lang family; when the case came to trial, the family would have been invited to make victim impact statements, which are supposed to ‘inform’ the judge prior to sentencing, and whose operating logic is all about anger and the desire for vengeance.
Which they pointedly refused to make. Instead, the Lang family issued a statement that has struck me ever since as being filled with grace. They spoke of their loss, but refused to blame the shooter. As far as they were concerned, he too was a victim who would have his own journey to make, and they wished him the best with it.
Sadly, the ten years since have erased this from the net, at least for those without a Lexus-nexus subscription, but here’s a story from a little later:
http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2000-1/issue4/forgiveness.html
There was a weighty silence and some tears shed in the East Gym Wednesday morning as a hundred SFU students listened to Rev. Lang describe the afternoon of the shooting. "You could never have convinced me that in a town of 7,000 people, in a high school of 450 students, that my son could’ve been shot. I can’t begin to tell you about the pain of that moment.
“I prayed for the young man who had shot my son, I forgave him, and I asked the community to forgive him.”
Rev. Lang spoke about the alienation experienced by many youth today, including the teenager who shot his son. He emphasized a need to “break down the walls that separate us,” pointing out that “in every high school, every university and college, there are people hurting.”
He says his message has a particular impact on high school students, who “are very aware of the abuse that goes on, with kids getting picked on. It’s an issue that’s really touching them personally.”
Instead of blaming gun control laws or the media, Rev. Lang attributes acts of violence like his son’s murder to "a diminishing of what it means to be a person.
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The reverend stated several times that it was through his strong Christian faith that he was able to forgive his son’s murderer. “I am so blessed to be able to be free from the anger and bitterness, but really I had no option but to forgive.”