Bowling For Columbine
Script - Dialogue Transcript
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Michael Moore. This script is a transcript that was painstakingly
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tweaking it, so if you have any corrections, feel free to
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Bowling For Columbine
Script
The National Rifle Association
has produced a film
which you are sure
to find of great interest.
Let's look at it.
It was the morning
of April 20th, 1999.
And it was pretty much like
any other morning in America.
The farmer did his chores,
the milkman
made his deliveries,
the president bombed
another country
whose name
we couldn't pronounce.
Out in Fargo, North Dakota,
Carry McWilliams
went on his morning walk.
Back in Michigan, Mrs. Hughes
welcomed her students
for another day of school.
And out in a little town
in Colorado,
two boys went bowling
at six in the morning.
Yes, it was a typical day
in the United States
of America.
- Can I help you?
- Uh, yeah,
I'm here to open up an account.
Okay, what type of account
would you like?
Um, I want the account where
I can, uh, get the free gun.
Okay.
I'd spotted an ad
in the local Michigan paper
that said if you opened an
account at North Country Bank,
- the bank would give you a gun.
- You do a CD
and we'll hand you a gun.
We have a whole brochure here
that you can look at.
Once we do the background check
and everything,
- it's yours to go.
- Okay. Well, all right,
well, that's the account
I'd like to open.
We have a vault, which
at all times we keep at least
- firearms.
- Five-hundred of these,
- you have in your vault?
- In our vault.
Wow.
We have to do
a background check.
- At the bank here?
- At the bank,
which we are a licensed
firearm dealer.
Oh, you are? You're a bank
and a licensed firearm dealer.
What do I put for "race"?
White or Caucasian or...?
- Caucasian.
- Caucasian.
I knew you were gonna make me
spell the... Cau-ca-sian.
- Is that right?
- Yes.
I don't think that's the part
they're gonna be worried about.
"Have you ever been adjudicated
mentally defective
or have you ever been committed
to a mental institution?"
I've never been committed
to a mental institution.
What does that mean,
"Have I ever been adjudicated
mentally defective"?
It would be something
involved with a crime.
So if I'm just normally mentally
defective but not criminal...
Yeah, exactly.
- There you go, Mike.
- Okay. Thank you very much. Wow.
- I had one personally--
- That's a nice tension.
It is and it's
a straight-shooter,
It's a straight-shooter,
let me tell ya.
Wow. Sweet.
Well, here's my first question:
You think
it's a little dangerous,
handing out guns in a bank?
Ten-ho!
Each gun makes lots
of battle sounds.
Just press the trigger,
and listen.
That sounds like a gun battle.
Over there.
- Is it real?
- Looks like real!
Hey, it sounds like real!
Right! The Sound-O-Power
military and western rifles
by Marx!
This was my first gun.
I couldn't wait to go outside
and shoot up the neighbourhood.
Those were the days.
"I was born
"in Michigan
"and I wish and wish again
that I was back
"in the town where I was born"
By the time I was a teenager,
I was such a good shot
I won the National
Rifle Association's
Marksman award.
You see,
I grew up in Michigan,
a gun-lover's paradise.
And so did this man,
the Oscar-winning actor
and president
of the National
Rifle Association,
Mr. Charlton Heston.
We come from a state
where everyone
loves to go hunting.
- Hah.
- Even the dogs.
There were actually
two of the hunters at camp.
They thought
they'd get a few pictures
of the dog dressed up
as a hunter
to kind of just have some fun
around camp.
And one of the guys
had the idea that,
"Why don't we sling a rifle
on the dog's back
to make the pictures
a little more interesting.
The victim was kneeling down
in front of the dog
when the weapon slipped.
The one round went through
the victim's shin,
the right part of his shin,
and came out through
the back of his calf.
Was the dog hauled off for any
period of time by the police?
No, it wasn't. No.
Um, in Michigan,
the law basically states
that people can commit crimes
that animals
aren't some... form of,
uh, you know,
whatever that can
commit a crime.
An animal cannot commit a crime
or be charged with a crime
in this state.
- Exactly.
- Is it possible that the dog
- knew what it was doing?
- That, I don't know.
I really wouldn't be able
to tell you that.
The dog was cute
dressed up as a hunter,
there's no doubt about it.
I mean, it was a funny picture,
um, you know, to look at.
It was... it was kind of neat.
Yup, this was the kind
of place I was from.
A box
- of s.
- Coming up.
- There you go.
- Perfect.
Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa.
Sorry about that, sorry.
So I've been discharged.
You don't need no gun control.
You know what you need?
We need some bullet control.
We need to control the bullets,
that's right.
I think all bullets
should cost $ .
$ for a bullet.
You know why?
'Cause if a bullet cost $
there'd be no more
innocent bystanders.
Every time
somebody get shot, people are,
"Damn, he must've
did something."
See, they put $ 's worth
of bullets in his ass!"
And people'd think
before they killed somebody
for a bullet that cost $ !
"Man, I would blow
your fucking head off --
if I could afford it."
I'm gonna get me another job,
I'm gonna start saving some
money, and you a dead man.
You better hope I can't
get no bullets on layaway.
Not far from where
Charlton Heston and I grew up
is a training ground
for the Michigan Militia.
Why do you use the bowling pins?
From a self-defence or
whatever tactical standpoint,
it's a small target,
which also represents
the vitals on a...
on a human being,
if you ever had to shoot at one.
The Michigan Militia
became known around the world
when, on April th,
two guys living in Michigan
who had attended
Militia meetings,
Timothy McVeigh
and Terry Nichols,
blew up the federal building
in Oklahoma City,
killing people.
The Michigan Militia
wanted everyone to know
that they were nothing
like McVeigh and Nichols.
This is an American tradition.
It's an American responsibility
to be armed.
If you're not armed,
you're not responsible.
Who's gonna defend your kids,
the cops?
The federal government?
No, none of them.
It's your job
to defend you and yours.
If you don't do it,
you're in dereliction of duty,
as an American. Period.
We're here to let them
know we're here to help.
We're not the bogeymen
we're made out to be.
We're here to help and defend
the people of this country.
I'm sure you guys
are the kind of people
that people would like
to have as their neighbour.
If somebody's in need,
you're there to help them.
Pretty much. We're all normal
people. We all have regular jobs
and this is what we do
on our time.
- What kind of a job do you have?
- I'm a draftsman.
- How about you?
- Unemployed right now.
Frank, what do you do
for a living?
I work for
a heat trading company.
- I drive a truck for 'em.
- Okay. How about you?
- I'm a real-estate negotiator
- Real- estate negotiator!
White collar all the way.
You don't bring that with you,
though, do you,
when you're negotiating
the real estate?
No.
Where do you live,
in suburban--
- Westland.
- So what do you have
- in your home?
- Smith & Wesson -millimetre.
- Nine-millimetre?
- Yeah.
- And how about you?
- With hollow points.
Twelve gage.
- Twelve gage at home?
- Yeah.
- How about you?
- M- .
- At home?
- Yeah.
- At the ready.
- I don't agree with that,
'cause you gotta worry about
where your arms are going.
I know where they're gonna go
when I aim and shoot.
Whose idea was the calendar?
That'd probably be Christian.
A picture's worth words.
A) it demonstrates a level
of sophistication that you
wouldn't expect out of Militia;
B) you know,
- we're people too.
- Right.
And we have a lot of fun
with it.
- Right.
- There was a fundraiser.
It showed, um, that we're not
so serious, you know.
We're not these conspiracy nuts
who wouldn't want our pictures
to get out. The idea...
it was a fundraiser, you know...
I've had guns, um...
pretty much since
I was old enough to...
to have them. And I learned
how to use them, um...
You're silly!
Uh, because being a female,
number one,
I felt it was important
to be able to protect myself
with the best means possible.
And one of those means
is having a gun.
When a criminal
breaks into your house,
who's the first person
you're gonna call?
Most people will call the police
because they have guns.
Cut out the middleman. Take care
of your own family yourself.
If you're not going to protect
your family, who is?
We're not racist,
we're not extremist,
we're not fundamentalist, we're
not terrorists or militants
- or other such nonsense.
- We're citizens.
We're just concerned citizens.
We have a desire
to fulfil our responsibilities
and duties as Americans,
and armed citizenry
is part of that.
- What do you grow here?
- Right now, there's tofu beans,
soy beans. Tofu-soy beans.
- You're a tofu farmer.
- Yeah. Yeah, food farmer.
- I'm a food farmer.
- Food.
I grow food for people to eat.
No herbicides, no pesticides
on that stuff.
- Right. All natural.
- Right.
- Yeah. Better.
- Certified organic.
- Uh-huh. Healthier.
- Yeah.
Basically, yeah.
This is James Nichols,
the brother of Terry Nichols.
James graduated from high
school the same year I did,
in the district next to mine.
On this farm
in Decker, Michigan,
McVeigh and the Nichols
brothers made practice bombs
before Oklahoma City.
Terry and James were both
arrested in connection
- to the bombing.
- U.S. attorneys
formally linked the Nichols
brothers of Michigan
with Oklahoma bomb suspect
Timothy McVeigh.
Officials charged James,
who was at the hearing,
and Terry, who was not,
with conspiring
to make and possess
small bombs.
Terry Nichols was convicted
and received a life sentence.
Timothy McVeigh was executed.
But the feds
didn't have the goods on James,
- so the charges were dropped.
- I'm just glad
to be out and free,
so I can get on with my life.
Did Timothy McVeigh
ever stay here?
Yes. Yes. He stayed here
several times.
For the longest period, about
three months or so, I dunno.
But, uh, he was a nice guy.
- Decent guy?
- Oh, yeah.
They didn't find anything
on this farm.
As to what,
- bomb-making material?
- Any kind of explosives.
Uh, yeah, I had blasting caps,
dynamite blasting caps,
dynamite fuse, black powder,
you know?
For muzzle loaders and...
Sure.
Diesel fuel, fertilizer, but,
uh, that is normal farm stuff
that is no way connected
any way whatsoever to, uh,
the Oklahoma City bombing
or bomb making.
Them people - law enforcement,
if you wanna call 'em that -
were here and they were shaking
in their shoes.
They were physically shaking.
Scared to death.
Of?
Because they thought this
was gonna be another Waco.
Because certain people...
namely my ex-wife
and other people,
said I'm a radical,
I'm a wild man,
I got a gun under every arm,
down every leg and every shoe,
every corner of the house.
You say anything to me,
I'll shoot ya.
If the people find out how
they've been ripped off
and... and enslaved in this
country by the government,
by the powers-to-be...
they will revolt, with anger,
with merciless anger.
There'll be blood
running in the streets.
When a government
turns tyrannical,
it is your duty to overthrow it.
Well, why not use Gandhi's way?
He didn't have any guns,
and he beat the British empire.
I'm not familiar with that.
Oscoda has a bad habit
of raising psychos.
Bad habit of it.
This is Brent.
And this is his buddy DJ.
They live in Oscoda, Michigan,
across the bay
from the Nichols farm.
Eric Harris,
who would later go on
to commit the massacre
at Columbine High School
in Colorado,
spent part
of his childhood here.
Eric lived on
the air-force base in Oscoda,
where his dad flew planes
during the Gulf War.
Twenty percent of all the bombs
dropped in that war
were from planes
that took off from Oscoda.
I asked Brent if he remembered
anything about Eric.
I never knew him,
but I knew of him.
He left here before I got here.
I've only lived here seven years
- off and on.
- He was about the same age
as you, so you must have people
in your class--
A friend of mine knows him,
he was in class with him.
He's lived here all his life.
I went to school with him
and it shocked me to hear it
on the news.
That especially a kid from here
would be doing that.
I didn't last too long
in high school.
I got kicked out,
I got expelled.
- Why was that?
- I had a run-in with a kid
one time and I pulled a weapon
on him, I pulled a gun on him.
- What kind of gun?
- Nine-millimetre.
I could've made a mess
out of that situation.
- Could've been worse.
- Could've been a lot worse.
- Could've been Eric Harris.
- It could've been.
- So they kicked you out?
- Yeah, they kicked me out
for days or days,
whatever a full school year is.
For the longest time, that's
what my plan was, to move out
- to Colorado.
- Colorado?
'Cause I've got family
out there.
Matter of fact,
one of my uncles is a janitor
for Columbine School.
- Really?
- Yeah.
After Columbine,
what was it like here in Oscoda?
My name was second-highest
on the bomb list,
because of the reputation
you get in this town.
Why? You mean
they did a list of--
- Of suspects.
- Of students who potentially--
- Yeah.
- ...would call in a bomb threat
- after Columbine?
- Yes.
And you were number two
on the list?
I was second or third
on the list, yeah.
- Why is that?
- Because the whole fact is,
like I said, this town
really gets people down.
Yeah, but why
did they single you out?
- Because I was a troubled kid.
- You were in trouble in school?
Oh, yeah.
Why did they put you
number two on their list,
after Columbine,
of the students
that could be a threat?
- Come on, there must be a reason.
- Well, okay. The thing is,
I have a thing, it's called
the "Anarchist Cookbook."
It shows you how to make bombs
and stuff like that.
If there's anything
that went wrong,
they're gonna come to me first.
- And I don't need that.
- Just 'cause you owned a copy
- of the book?
- Just because I own a copy--
- Never made a bomb yourself?
- No. Oh, I've made 'em.
It was nothing big; it wasn't
even as big as a pipe bomb.
It was just... some make it
like a little tennis- ball bomb
or something like that.
Out of the "Anarchist Cookbook,"
the latest thing I built...
I think, would have to be...
I think I made it, like,
about a good five-gallon drum
of napalm.
You know, homemade napalm.
Kids knew that
you were doing this?
- Yeah.
- So you were number two, then,
- on the list.
- Right.
- Who was number one?
- I don't know.
They never told me that name.
Which kind of made me mad.
'Cause I didn't make it
to number one.
I know it's kind of silly,
but I guess
it'd been kind of an ego thing,
knowing that I was number one
at something in Oscoda, even
if it was a bomb-threat list.
Do you believe it was right
to blow up the building
in Oklahoma City?
- I'm not saying you did it.
- No. No, no, no.
- I'm just saying: was it right?
- Why was it "blowed up"?
That's a good question. Why
was that building "blowed up"?
- And who blew it up?
- But if someone did it,
- it would be wrong.
- Yeah.
It is wrong to take the lives
of those people.
Yeah.
I use the pen. 'Cause the pen
is mightier than the sword.
But you always must keep a sword
handy, for when the pen fails.
I sleep with a . Magnum
under my pillow.
Come on...
That's what everyone says.
- Is that true?
- It's true.
- If we were to go--
- The whole world knows that.
...look under your pillow right
now, would we see a . Magnum?
- Yeah.
- Honestly?
Would you take us and show us?
Right now?
He took me into his bedroom,
but told the cameraman
to stay out. Sure enough,
there was a . Magnum
under his pillow.
There it is. Okay.
Is it loaded?
Aye-yay-yay.
Okay. I believe you.
Don't do that!
- You put the gun to your head.
- I know!
- Jeez!
- I'm not gonna get hurt!
- This is loaded.
- It's loaded, it's safe.
You've got to pull the trigger,
pull the hammer and shoot it.
- Mm, put the hammer back.
- No one has a right to tell me
that I can't have it.
That is protected
- in our constitution.
- Where's it say a handgun
- is protected?
- No, gun. We should...
- Every citizen--
- It doesn't say "gun"!
- It says "arms."
- Arms. What is arms?
- Could be a nuclear weapon.
- It's not these-- That's right,
- it could be a nuclear weapon!
- You think you should have
the right to have weapons-grade
plutonium here on the farm?
We should be able
to have anything--
Should you have
weapons-grade plutonium?
- I don't want it.
- But should you have the right
- to have it if you did want it?
- That should be restricted.
Ah! Ah, so you do believe
in some restrictions.
Well, there's wackos out there.
"Happiness is a warm gun
- "Bang bang shoot shoot"
- The town of Virgin,
Utah, has passed a law requiring
all residents to own guns.
Cary McWilliams
proudly displays the target
he used to pass
his shooting test.
But the thing is,
he can't see it.
He's blind.
Cary has had a love affair
with guns
since he first got his hands
on an M- as a teenager.
I'm actually most comfortable
with assault rifles.
Woo-hoo!
This is a great place
to raise your children.
A really great place
to raise your kids.
Very close-knit community
we have here.
Everybody looks out
for everybody.
- Good people.
- Good people.
This just happens to be
a place where two young men
made very bad,
very wrong decisions.
And there's been international
notoriety as a result of it.
Other than that,
I don't know that Littleton
is a lot different
than a whole lot
of other suburban communities.
Economic Development P.R. Video
Good morning, Mr. Edwards,
members of the board.
I'd like to report that
I've found the perfect location
for our new corporate office,
South Metro Denver.
You can see,
I don't need these.
Because South Metro Denver
has about the same amount
of sunshine and precipitation
as Southern California.
It's so incredible,
you're just gonna have
to see it for yourselves.
How's this look, Mr. Edwards?
Denny Fennel
Home Security Consultant
We're south of Denver,
in a community called Littleton,
and this house is pretty much
your average middle-class
suburban home.
The burglar or the rapist
is still here
in the neighbourhood somewhere.
And so citizens
sometimes think that...
I have people tell me
all the time--
Where exactly is the burglar
or rapist right now?
If I was to try and stab you
through this, right here,
you're gonna have to be
really close. Right?
And here's the bottom line
on this.
What if I had a spear?
Now, downstairs is where
the safe-room was constructed,
and this is a solid-core door,
a very heavy door.
And now, the criminal
has to break through this door,
so you've created
another barrier.
- An axe would do it.
- An axe would do it.
I think that Columbine
did a couple of things.
One is that it changed how
we talk. That's the first thing.
- How's that?
- Well, for instance,
if I say "Columbine,"
everybody knows what it means.
I don't have to explain to you
that Columbine...
- Is... What's wrong?
- Nothing, I just...
- What's wrong?
- I-- I just...
sometimes Columbine bothers me.
I'll be fine. Just a minute.
- That's okay, that's okay.
- Um...
There...
there's something, um...
something overwhelming about
that kind of... viciousness,
that kind of predatory action,
that kind of indiscriminate, uh,
killing.
World's Largest Weapons Maker
This facility,
where we're located right now...
Evan McCollum
Lockheed Martin Public Relations
and two other major facilities
where our employees work
are either in
or very near Littleton.
So we have over employees
at these facilities,
quite a number of whom
live in Littleton,
many of whom have children who
attend Columbine High School.
I suppose in one way you could
say that what happened
at Columbine High School
is a microcosm, uh...
of what happens
throughout the world.
You know the signs
that we see around here,
the ones that say:
"We Are Columbine,"
is that how you,
Lockheed Martin, feels,
that you're the biggest employer
here in Littleton,
you're the biggest weapons-
maker? "We Are Columbine."
I think we probably
embody that spirit,
that, yeah, we're all members
of this community
and that it behoves us to help
one another and to reach out
to assist one another, yeah.
He told us that no one
in Littleton,
including the executives
at Lockheed, could figure out
why the boys at Columbine
had resorted to violence.
Why would kids do this?
Uh, some of the root of that
probably has to do
with their anger
about various issues
and we became aware of a program
that provides
anger-management training.
And so we made
a $ contribution
to the Jefferson County schools
to use this training
in the schools. We hope to help
both teachers and students
learn alternative ways
to deal with anger.
So you don't think our kids
say to themselves:
"Well, gee, Dad goes off
to the factory every day
and, you know,
he built missiles." These
are weapons of mass destruction.
What's the difference
between that mass destruction
and the mass destruction
over at Columbine High School?
I guess I don't see
that connection,
that specific connection,
because the missiles
that you're talking about were
built and designed to defend us
from somebody else who would be
aggressors against us.
Societies and countries
and governments do things
that annoy one another.
But we have to learn
to deal with that annoyance
or that anger or that
frustration in appropriate ways.
We don't get irritated
with somebody
and just 'cause we're mad
at them, uh,
drop a bomb or shoot at them,
or fire a missile at them.
Oh my goodness!
Oh my word!
Oh my word!
South of Denver in Littleton,
on the grounds
of the U.S. Air Force Academy,
there sits
an actual B- bomber.
The plaque underneath it
proudly proclaims
that this plane
killed Vietnamese people
on Christmas eve, .
It was the largest bombing
campaign of the Vietnam War.
Just outside Denver
is Rocky Flats
the largest plutonium-
weapons-making factory
in the world,
and now a massive
radioactive dump.
A few miles away,
buried inside a mountain,
is NORAD, which oversees
our nuclear missiles,
many of which dot
the Colorado landscape.
And once a month, Lockheed
transports one of its rockets,
with its Pentagon payload,
through the streets
of Littleton,
passing nearby
Columbine High School
on its way to an air-force base
on the other side of Denver.
The rockets are transported
in the middle of the night,
while the children of Columbine
are asleep.
Largest one day bombing by U.S.
in Kosovo war
Twenty-two NATO missiles
fell on the village
of Bogutovac near Kraljevo.
Deadly cargo was dropped
upon the residential part
of the village.
We're striking hard at Serbia's
machinery of repression,
while making
a deliberate effort
to minimize harm
to innocent people.
On the hit list were a local
hospital and primary school.
We all know there has been
a terrible shooting
at a high school
in Littleton, Colorado.
I hope the American people will
be praying for the students,
the parents and the teachers.
And we'll wait
for events to unfold
and then there'll be
more to say.
Jefferson County, .
There's some boy at Columbine
High School, someone killed...
Do you know
if anybody's injured?
- Yes.
- They've got pipe bombs,
pipe bombs...
- You're shitting me.
- I'm not.
Student hit in the spine
at Columbine.
- Okay.
- We've got...
- He's shot in the head.
- He's shot in the head?
- Deputy cashier's office.
- We have automatic weapons,
- okay?
- Yes.
All right. Can you get us lots
and lots of paramedics?
- So he's still under an attack?
- Yes, sir, the school is.
We got a couple of kids
out in the hall that are shot,
so they're trying to get to
them. Do not let anybody else in
- until we tell them.
- Jefferson County .
Hi, it's Izzy Povich
at NBC News.
We're calling about
the school shooting.
We're on the air live
right now on MSNBC.
Can you-- Is that something
you could just, literally,
patch through to my desk,
or you could tell us on the air?
I could put you through
- right now--
- I understand that...
Now they said he's gone
to the library;
he stayed in the building.
He's gone into the library
and he's in the building.
Hi, this is Stephanie Gold
from Dateline. How you doing?
- Good, how are you?
- Fine, thanks.
- I love your show.
- Oh, I'm so glad. Thank you.
- I watch it every night.
- Thank you.
- Jefferson County .
- Yes, I'm a teacher
at Columbine High School. There
is a shooter here with a gun.
- He just shot out a window.
- Has anybody been injured?
Yes! And the school
is in a panic
and I'm in the library.
I've got students down.
Under the tables, kids!
Heads under the tables!
I saw a student outside!
Okay,
I was on hall duty, I saw a gun!
"What's going on out there?!"
He turned the gun straight at us
and he shot, and my God,
the window went out.
The kid standing there with me,
I think he got hit.
We've got help on the way,
ma'am.
- Oh God!
- Stay on line with me.
Oh God!
I think he's shooting
in the library right now.
He's firing shots
from the library.
- Firing shots in the library.
- ...our way.
Do we need to leave?
Okay, hold on.
...inside the cafeteria
I'm gonna have to try and get
outta here and call you back.
I called in before,
trying to find out
where I'm supposed to go
and they put me on hold
- for freaking ever!
- Hi, it's Wendy at CNN still.
Hi. We're just taking names
and numbers for the press.
Fox has somebody from
your office on now--
We've talked to
a bunch of people
and we can only do so many,
we got so many more calls
coming in.
I gotta get to my daughter
at Columbine.
I've been trying for an hour, I
can't get anywhere near there...
Sir, okay, calm down, okay?
I think we're entitled
to information as parents
- on where our children are!
- We have a lot of units
- out there right now.
- I can't get anywhere near it.
I wanna find out
how to get in touch
with my daughter.
How do I get information
on my daughter?
I don't have that information
right now--
Why in the hell not?
It's been over an hour!
My son is Eric Harris,
and I'm afraid
that he might be involved
with the shooting
at Columbine High School.
Involved how?
He's a member of what they're
calling the "trench-coat mafia."
- Have you spoken to your son?
- No, I haven't.
- Have they picked up anybody yet?
- They're still looking
for suspects. Your son
is with who? What gang?
They call them the "trench-coat
mafia". I just heard that term
- on TV.
- Stay low, because if you try
to leave, I don't want you
to get shot.
Stay very low and quiet.
Low and quiet...
Everybody just stay quiet.
When the shooting was over,
Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold
had killed students
and one teacher.
Dozens of others were wounded
by the over- rounds of ammo
that were fired. It is believed
that the guns that they used
were all legally purchased
at stores and gun shows.
And many of the bullets
were bought
at the Littleton K-Mart
just down the street.
Harris's diary also detailed
ideas about hijacking
an airplane and crashing it
into New York City.
Some may characterize that
as fantasy...
In the end, they turned
the guns on themselves.
And then he came
into the library,
shot everybody around me,
then put a gun to my head
and asked if we all wanted
to die and...
We started hearing shots
in the hall
and then they came in
and they all told us
to get under the desk
and we all got under the desk
and then they started coming in
the library and opening fire...
I just started screaming
and crying and telling them
not to shoot me.
And so he shot the girl,
he shot her in the head
in front of me.
Then he shot the black kid,
because he was black.
I have only five words for you:
From my cold, dead hands.
Just days after
the Columbine killings,
despite the pleas
of a community in mourning,
Charlton Heston came to Denver
and held a large pro-gun rally
for the National
Rifle Association.
- Good morning.
- Good morning.
Thank you all
for coming and thank you for
supporting your organization.
I also want to applaud your
courage in coming here today.
I have a message
from the mayor,
Mr. Wellington Webb,
the mayor of Denver.
No, no, no, no, no.
He sent me this,
and it says: "Don't come here.
We don't want you here."
I said to the mayor,
"This is our country.
As Americans we're free
to travel wherever we want
in our broad land."
Don't come here?
We're already here.
I am here today...
because my son Daniel
would want me to be here today.
If my son Daniel
was not one of the victims,
he would be here with me today.
Something is wrong
in this country...
when a child...
can grab a gun...
grab a gun so easily...
and shoot a bullet...
into the middle of a child's
face, as my son experienced.
Something is wrong.
But the time has come
to come to understand
that a Tech- semi-automatic
-bullet weapon
like that that killed my son,
is not used to kill deer.
It has no useful purpose.
It is time to address
this problem.
We have work to do,
hearts to heal,
evil to defeat
and a country to unite.
We may have differences, yes,
and we will again suffer tragedy
almost beyond description.
But when the sun sets
on Denver tonight,
and forever more, let it
always set on we the people,
secure in our land of the free
and home of the brave.
I, for one, plan to do my part.
Thank you.
Or like when they had
their convention in Colorado,
a week, whatever,
the month after Columbine,
that was just stupid.
Just don't do that.
Of course you have "the right
to," but what are you doing?
Upsetting a whole city full of
people, why would you do that?
This is Matt Stone.
He grew up in Littleton
and has fond memories
of Columbine.
Yeah, Columbine,
it's just a crappy school
in the middle of a bunch
of crappy houses.
Matt and his friend
Trey Parker
found a way to take out
their anger of being different
in Littleton
and turn it not into carnage,
but into a cartoon.
"Just another Sunday morning
In my quiet...
"Mountain town"
"You can see your breath
Hanging in the air
"You see homeless people
But you just don't care
"It's a sea of smiles
In which we'd be glad to drown
"It's Sunday morning
In our quiet little
"White-bread redneck
mountain town"
Columbine is a normal
high school--
- Yeah.
- ...in a normal suburb--
- Yeah.
- ...you know, basically.
Yeah. Painfully, painfully,
painfully normal.
Just absolutely, painfully,
horribly average.
Littleton in general is...
I remember being in sixth grade
and I...
had to take the math test
to get into Honors Math
in the seventh grade.
And they're, like,
"Don't screw this up.
Because if you screw this up,
you won't get into Honors Math
in seventh grade.
And if you don't get in
in seventh grade,
you won't in eighth grade,
then not in ninth grade.
And th and th grade
and you'll just die poor
and lonely."
And that's it, you know?
You believe, in high school -
and a lot of it is kids,
but the teachers and counsellors
and principals
don't help things.
They scare you into conforming
and doing good in school by
saying: "If you're a loser now,
you're gonna be a loser
forever."
So that with Eric and Dylan,
people called them "fag."
They're like, "You know what?
If I'm a fag,
now I'm a fag forever."
And you wish someone just
could've grabbed them and gone,
"Dude, high school's
not the end of...
A year, a year and a half,
was it? I don't even know.
- You just move out--
- No, no, they were two weeks
- away from graduation.
- Yeah, you're done.
It's amazing how fast you lose
touch with all those people.
They just beat it in your head
as early as sixth grade:
"Don't fuck up.
'Cause if you do,
you're gonna die poor
and lonely.
You don't want to do that."
You're, like, "Fuck,
whatever I am now,
I'm that forever." Of course,
it's completely opposite.
All the dorks in high school
go on to do great things
and all the really cool guys
are all living back in
Littleton as insurance agents.
Almost person to person,
it's completely that way.
If somebody
could've told them that,
maybe they would've
have done it, but...
I guess we'll never know
why they did it,
but one thing adults
should never forget:
It still sucks
being a teenager.
And it really sucks
going to school.
What's your view
on high school?
Uh, I love it.
Uh, I learn, I get picked on
by bastards who hate me,
and the principal's a dick.
All right.
What causes school violence?
Uh... him.
- Him?
- Yeah.
Yes, and after Columbine,
it really sucked
being a student in America.
Since last spring's shooting,
at Columbine High,
schools nationwide
have extended
zero-tolerance policies,
suspending and expelling
students for all kinds
of behaviour considered unruly,
or warning signs
of violence to come.
This second-grader in Illinois
was suspended for days
for bringing a nail clipper
to class
"That's a weapon,"
his school said.
An elementary school
suspended a first-grader
for pointing a chicken strip
at a teacher in the cafeteria.
The eight-year-old
was fooling around with a friend
at lunch last week when he
pointed a breaded-chicken finger
at a teacher and then said:
"Pow pow.
He pointed a folded piece
of paper shaped like a gun,
and told his classmates
he was going to kill them
during a game
of cops and robbers.
If this isn't a warning sign,
then what is it?
This Virginia high-school
student spent a month
out of classes,
originally sent home
- for dying his hair blue.
- A high-school honour student
from Michigan could be expelled
later today
in a school-board hearing.
Seventeen-year-old Jeremy Hicks
wore a Scottish
bagpiper's outfit to his junior
prom that included
a plaid kilt, a feathered hat
and a traditional knife
known as a "skein dhu."
This T-shirt
landed a high-school student
in court.
She wanted to start
an anarchy club.
The little time-bombs
that are out there ticking,
waiting to go off. And there are
many of them in every community.
Students in at least seven
different states
have been suspended or arrested
for talking about or planning
plots of their own.
It's almost
like guerrilla warfare.
You don't know
from which direction
the enemy will be coming.
Having a well-conceived
and strictly enforced dress code
can dramatically improve
the safety of a school,
and can ensure a positive
learning environment
for everyone.
As this student's appearance
demonstrates,
having a lax policy about dress
makes it easy
for a student
to conceal a weapon
and makes it difficult
to identify intruders on campus.
A dress code can reduce
weapons violations,
relieve tensions between gangs,
reduce disciplinary infractions
and generally improve
the atmosphere of the school.
Our policy requires that
students tuck in their shirts,
making the beltline visible
at all times.
Our students may not wear
baggy pants
or colours or insignias
that are commonly associated
with gang activity.
This policy
was a collaborative effort.
Yes, our children were indeed
something to fear.
They had turned
into little monsters.
But who was to blame?
All the experts had an answer.
Angry, heavy-metal subculture.
- Where were the parents?
- Violent movies.
- "South Park."
- Video games.
- Television.
- Entertainment.
- Satan.
- Cartoons.
- Films.
- Society.
- Toy guns.
- Drugs.
Shock-rocker Marilyn Manson.
Marilyn Manson.
Marilyn Manson has cancelled
the last five dates
of his U.S, tour out of respect
for those lost in Littleton.
But the singer
says artists like himself
are not the ones to blame.
This is perhaps
the sickest group ever promoted
by a mainstream record company.
"I'm not a slave
"to a god
"that doesn't exist"
After Columbine, it seemed
that the entire focus
on why the shootings occurred
was because the killers
listened to Marilyn Manson.
Two years after Columbine,
Manson finally returned
to Denver.
The Oz Fest
at Mile High Stadium
brings shock-rocker Marilyn
Manson to Denver tomorrow.
There were protests
from the religious right.
But I thought I'd go
and talk with him myself.
When I was a kid growing up,
music was the escape.
That's the only thing
that had no judgements.
You can put on a record
and it's not gonna yell at you
for dressing the way you do.
It's gonna make you
feel better about it.
Some will be so brash
to ask if we believe
that all who hear Manson
tomorrow night
will go out
and commit violent acts.
The answer is "no."
But does everybody
who watches a Lexus ad
go and buy a Lexus?
No. But a few do.
I definitely can see
why they would pick me,
because I think it's easy
to throw my face on a TV,
because I'm, in the end,
sort of a poster boy for fear.
Because I represent
what everyone's afraid of,
because I do and say
what I want.
If Marilyn Manson can walk
into our town and promote hate,
violence, suicide,
death, drug use
and Columbine-like behaviour,
I can say, "Not without
a fight, you can't."
The two by-products of
that whole tragedy were, uh...
violence in entertainment
and gun control.
And how perfect that
that was the two things
that we were gonna talk about
with the upcoming election.
And also, then we forgot
about Monica Lewinsky
and we forgot about...
The president was shooting
bombs overseas,
yet I'm a bad guy because I sing
some rock'n'roll songs.
And who's a bigger influence,
the president or Marilyn Manson?
I'd like to think me, but I'm
gonna go with the president.
Do you know the day
that Columbine happened,
the United States dropped
more bombs on Kosovo
than any other time
during that war?
I do know that and I think
that's really ironic,
that nobody said, "Well, maybe
the president had an influence
on this violent behaviour.
Because that's not the way
the media wants to take it
and spin it
and turn it into fear.
'Cause then you're
watching television,
you're watching the news; you're
being pumped full of fear.
And there's floods,
there's AIDS, there's murder.
You cut to commercial,
buy the Acura, buy the Colgate.
If you have bad breath,
they're not gonna talk to you.
If you got pimples,
the girl's not gonna fuck you.
It's a campaign of fear
and consumption.
And that's what I think
that's it's all based on,
is the whole idea that:
keep everyone afraid,
and they'll consume.
And that's really as simple
- as it can be boiled down to.
- Right.
If you were to talk directly
to the kids at Columbine
and the people
in that community,
what would you say to them,
if they here right now?
I wouldn't say
a single word to them.
I would listen to what
they have to say.
And that's what no one did.
- I'm Nicole Shleif.
- And I'm Amanda Lamontagne.
- And you went to Columbine?
- Yes.
And you were with
Eric and Dylan?
- In their class?
- Yeah,
- we were in their bowling class.
- In their bowling class?
- Yes.
- What's bowling class?
Just an elective you can
take for a gym credit.
Where's the educational value
of this, though?
Um... I guess
there isn't really any.
No, there's not.
I learned how to bowl a lot
better, that's for sure.
What were Eric Harris
and Dylan Klebold like?
- Weird.
- Yeah?
I mean, not very social.
I didn't really know
who they were.
Not very social, just
kinda kept to themselves.
How good a bowlers
were Eric and Dylan?
When we played them,
all I remember is they
were just, like, crazy.
- They would just chuck the ball.
- Chuck it down there.
Throw the ball down; didn't
really care how they bowled.
Yeah, they didn't really
care about their scores.
Deputy Sheriff Steve Davis - What were
the suspects doing the morning of attack?
I told you that I'd heard
that they were bowling;
that's the only thing
I'm aware of.
So did Dylan and Eric
show up that morning
and bowl two games
before moving on
to shoot up the school?
And did they just chuck
the balls down the lane?
Did this mean something?
Um, I guess they went
to their favourite class.
Why wasn't anyone
blaming bowling
for warping the minds
of Eric and Dylan
to commit their evil deeds?
Wasn't that just as plausible
as blaming Marilyn Manson?
After all,
it was apparently
the last thing they did
before the massacre.
But wait a minute. There's
lots of bowling going on
in other countries.
And don't they listen
to Marilyn Manson in Germany,
the home of sinister
Goth music?
Some Gothic festival.
Don't they watch the same
violent movies in France?
Most of the violent video
games are from Japan.
Many people in America believe
that it's the break-up
of the family unit
that's caused so many wayward
youth to turn to violence.
I'll save you the trouble.
I'll run away and kill myself!
How would you like that?
You can't keep me here!
But statistics show
that there are more
broken homes and divorce
in Great Britain
than in the U.S.
It's official:
Fergie's marriage has ended.
Liberals contend that it's all
the poverty we have in America
that causes all this violence.
But the unemployment rate
in Canada
is twice what it is here.
Of course, most people say
it's because we Americans
have a violent history,
a violent past.
Cowboys and Indians,
the Wild West,
a history of conquering
and bloodshed.
Well, if that's all
it takes to end up
with such a violent society
like we have in America,
how do you explain this?
Yet in spite of all this,
how many people are killed
by guns each year?
In Germany:
In France:
In Canada:
In the United Kingdom:
In Australia:
In Japan:
In the United States:
But that, to me, brings up
an important question:
Then what is so different
about Americans?
Tom Mauser
Father of Columbine victim
Are we homicidal in nature?
Because in Europe and Australia,
most other free-world countries,
they don't have this.
They don't have people who snap
and go on murderous rampages.
Well, no, they're just like us.
They have the occasional person
that snaps and kills
a lot of people.
How about a British soccer riot?
Those aren't Quakers there,
Every time that
I bring up comparisons
with other free-world countries,
what I hear is:
"Oh, our culture is so
different. We're so different."
And as you said, they have
violent video games,
they have violent movies,
they have alienated youth,
they - like us - don't have
prayer in schools.
What is so radically different?
What is it about us?
- What is it?
- What is it?
- What is it?
- What is it?
I don't know.
Now, it's time for...
Hi, boys and girls.
Ready to get started?
Once upon a time, there were
these people in Europe
called pilgrims and they were
afraid of being persecuted.
So they all got in a boat
and sailed to the New World
where they wouldn't have
to be scared ever again.
- Oh, I'm so relaxed.
- I feel so much safer.
But as soon as they arrived,
they were greeted by savages.
- They got scared all over again.
- Injuns!
So they killed them all.
Now, you'd think
wiping out a race of people
would calm them down, but no.
Instead, they started getting
frightened of each other.
- Witch!
- So they burned witches.
In
they started killing the
British, so they could be free.
And it worked.
But they still didn't feel safe.
So they passed a nd amendment,
which said every white man
- could keep his gun.
- I loves my gun, loves my gun.
This brings us to
the genius idea of slavery.
You see, boys and girls,
the white people back then
were also afraid of doing any
work. So they went to Africa,
kidnapped thousands of black
people, brought them to America,
and forced them to work
very hard for no money.
And I don't mean no money like:
"I work at Wal-Mart
and make no money."
I mean zero dollars.
Nothing, nada, zip.
Doing it that way made the USA
the richest country
in the world.
So did having all that money
and free help
calm the white people down? No
way. They got even more afraid.
That's because after
years of slavery,
the black people now outnumbered
the white people in many parts
of the South. Well, you can
pretty much what came next.
The slaves started rebelling.
There were uprisings
and old masters' heads
got chopped off
and when white people heard of
this, they were freaking out.
They going: I want to live!
Don't kill me, big black man.
Well, just in the nick of time
came Samuel Colt, who,
in invented the first
weapon ever that could be fired
over and over without
having to reload.
And all the settlers were like:
Yee-hah!
But it was too late.
The North soon won the Civil War
and the slaves were free to go
chop the old masters' heads off.
Then everybody was like:
Oh, no, we're gonna die.
But the freed slaves
took no revenge.
They just wanted
to live in peace.
But you couldn't convince
the white people of this.
So they formed the Ku Klux Klan
and, in
the same year the Klan became an
illegal terrorist organization,
another group was founded:
the National Rifle Association.
Soon, politicians passed
one of the first gun laws,
making it illegal for any black
person to own one.
It was a great year for America.
he KKK and the NRA.
Of course, they had nothing
to do with each other;
it was a coincidence. One group
legally promoted responsible
gun ownership; the other shot
and lynched black people.
That's the way it was till
when a black woman
broke the law by refusing to
move to the back of the bus.
White people just couldn't
believe it.
- Huh? Why won't she move?
- What's going on?
Man, all hell broke loose.
Black people everywhere demanded
their rights. White people had
a major, freaky-feel meltdown
and they were all like:
Run away! Run away!
And they did. They all ran
fleeing to the suburbs,
where it was all white and safe
and clean. And they went out
and bought a
quarter-of-a-billion guns.
And put locks on their doors,
alarms in their houses,
and gates around the
neighbourhoods.
And finally, they were all safe
and secure and snug as a bug.
And everyone lived
happily ever after.
Because if you turn on
the evening news,
America still seems
like a pretty scary place.
Who is he? Is he dangerous?
What's he up to?
What are you trying
to pull, man?
Remember all the Y Kscares?
Weren't we told that our very
society was about to collapse
because somebody forgot
to type in a couple of digits
on the computer?
There's gonna be mass
chaos and confusion.
Tonight, the countdown begins.
All day, store director
Rick Smith
- watched consumers get Y K ready.
- Batteries sell extremely well.
The lamp oil, generators.
After sending the country
into a panic,
the clock struck midnight...
And nothing happened.
Or how about those killer bees
that were going
to attack America?
We're almost certain
they'll arrive this year.
Schmidt expects the Africanized
bees to reach Texas this year,
cross into Arizona in about
two to three years.
He's concerned because the
killer bee is overly aggressive.
They will follow you
for half a mile.
The bees never came.
Remember the first time
you heard
that someone had hidden a razor
blade in an apple at Halloween?
Before long,
kids were not permitted to go
out in the dark on Halloween
and go trick-or-treating
at strangers' homes.
Many people say they won't give
out candy treats on Halloween.
It's too dangerous
and they're too scared.
Well, guess what?
There never was any
razor blade in the apple.
In fact, only two kids
in the past years have been
killed by Halloween candy.
And both of them were poisoned
on purpose by relatives.
Bye.
It was like
a scene from a horror movie.
This man was mowing his lawn
when a fox darted out
of the woods and attacked
his riding-mower.
A warning about a popular
weight-loss supplement.
What you don't know
may kill you.
You ride them every day,
but in an instant,
an escalator can mangle you
or a loved one.
We reveal why you may be
riding on stairway to danger.
You might want to take
some extra precautions:
keep a low profile,
don't go around dancing
with a bunch of Americans
in the streets.
Make sure that you don't draw
a lot of attention to yourself
and the fact
that you're American.
Nation's top doctor says
one in five Americans
suffers some form
of mental disorder.
The surgeon general David
Satcher pleads with people
to seek help now.
The media, the corporations,
the politicians,
have all done such a good job
of scaring the American public,
it's come to the point
where they don't need to give
any reason at all.
Today, the Justice Department
did issue a...
a blanket alert.
It was in recognition of a
general threat we received.
Uh, this is not the first time
the Justice Department
have acted like this.
I hope it's the last.
But given the attitude of
the evildoers, it may not be.
I just love these boulevards
down here, though.
You don't get this
in most of L.A.
South Central
Los Angeles
How come whenever
I'm out here, though,
I turn on the -o'clock news
and I hear, you know:
"Tonight in South Central,
drive-by shooting."
Or: "Tonight in South
Central..."
Prof. Barry Glassner
Author, "The Culture of Fear"
...this, that or whatever. I mean,
they're not making that up, are they?
No, they're not making it up,
but they're choosing
what they're covering. If you
turn on the TV, on the news,
what are you gonna hear about?
Dangerous black guys, right?
Unnamed black guy who, you know,
- accused of some crime or...
- Right.
You're gonna see pictures
of black guys doing bad things,
and hearing stories about black
guys doing bad things.
And we've heard this
our whole lives.
Now, the suspect is a black
male in his twenties.
We are told he has
a large afro, sideburns,
he was wearing a
silver chain at the time.
Police say the suspect
is a black man.
Six foot one, to pounds,
about years in age.
Suspect is a black male,
age to .
The suspect is
African-American.
- Police believe--
- Police say--
- The black man--
- Suspect--
- The suspect is a black male
- A black man.
A black... black... black...
A black man.
Susan Smith drowns
her two children.
- She tells people a black guy...
- Correct.
Stole the car
and stole the kids.
And everyone, at first,
bought it.
Some guy jumped into her car,
with her two kids in it.
Then he took off.
That's a black guy, she says.
- Black male?
- Yes, Ma'am.
And I told them I loved them.
I hollered I loved them
And it's just a tragedy.
The anonymous urban -
which means usually black -
male, comes by and does this.
It's the excuse
for all kinds of things.
Charles Stewart,
a lawyer in Boston...
- Right, exactly.
- ...kills his pregnant wife,
says a black guy did it;
everybody buys it.
The suspect described as a
black male about six feet tall.
Chuck and Carol Stewart
were robbed at gunpoint
as they left a Lamaze class.
It seemed the ultimate
urban nightmare.
You know, the thing I love
about this country of mine,
is that whether you're
a psychotic killer
or running for president
of the United States,
the one thing you can
always count on
is white America's fear
of the black man.
We've heard the stories
on the news and in the papers
and they have killed people.
Killer bees, also known
as "Africanized" bees.
I'm scared. I'm really worried.
Rose Shipley never expected a
nest of Africanized killer bees
to shack up across the street
from her.
But I'm terribly allergic
to them and so are my grandkids.
They're originally from
southern and eastern Africa.
Dr. Warrick Care brought some
to Brazil in
and tried to mate them
with the European bee,
the kind that we're used to.
But they got loose and moved
to the southern United States.
The main difference between
a traditional honey bee
and an Africanized bee is
the bee's aggressiveness.
If I was to do this
to an Africanized bee's hive,
I could have several hundred
stings in a matter of minutes.
Danny Self raises the kinder,
gentler European bees,
and he's done the research.
The only way that you can tell
the two of them, is doing
measurements on the body parts.
Quite frankly,
the black community has become
entertainment for the rest
of the community.
Meaning what?
The entertainment being
that the crime of the day -
you know, "If it bleeds,
it leads" -
gets to be the front story and
then that becomes the perception
and the image of
an entire people.
Which couldn't be further
from the truth, in my opinion.
In fact, you'll find, I think,
most African-Americans are quite
adverse to gun possession.
In suburbia, I think,
there's some notion that there's
going to be an invading horde,
come from either the city
or from someplace unknown,
to savage their suburban
community.
To me, not only is it bizarre,
but it's totally, uh...
unfounded.
And these pistols,
curiously enough,
weren't being taken off kids
in the city of Flint,
but were being taken off of kids
out in the out-county area,
in the suburban communities.
And--
I didn't think that's
what you were gonna say.
I thought you were gonna say
that it's all these black kids
in the inner-city schools
that had these guns.
No, that's...
We've never really had many
problems with guns in the city.
Not to say that we haven't;
we've had some.
But that's never been
the biggest problem.
The biggest problem has been
the gun possession
by these adolescents
in suburbia.
How'd you get a gun?
I stole mine. I stole it
from a friend of mine.
His dad owns a bunch of guns.
What we're you doing
with the stolen guns?
We went down to Detroit
and started selling them.
'Cause I can get, like, a buck
fifty a pop for a -millimetre.
Oh, really. Who were you trying
to sell them to?
Anybody that would really want
'em. Gangs and stuff like that.
- Gangs in the city of Detroit?
- Yeah.
- Black?
- Uh, predominantly. Yeah.
Yeah. So now you're out now,
you're okay.
Yeah, I'm free now.
I'm completely clear.
- You can keep selling guns.
- I can't keep selling guns.
It's getting too risky.
Everybody knows me up here.
People want guns, drugs or
alcohol, they come to my house
and that's just too much.
- Yeah, too much hassle.
- Yeah.
My favourite statistic in all
the research I did discovered
that the murder rate had gone
down by %. The coverage -
that is, how many murders are
on the evening news -
it went up by %.
The American people are
conditioned by network TV,
by local news,
to believe that
their communities are
much more dangerous
than they actually are.
For example, here,
in this community,
crime has decreased every year
for the past eight years.
Yet, gun ownership,
particularly handgun ownership,
is on the increase.
Crime rates have been
dropping, dropping, dropping.
Fear of crime has been going
up, up, up.
How can that be possible?
It doesn't make any sense.
But it makes perfect sense
when you see what we're hearing
from politicians and seeing
in the news media.
So we're, uh, we're right here
on the corner of Florence
and Normandie.
It's kind of Ground Zero
for the L.A. riots.
Right.
You know, if a couple
of white guys
would go down and walk around
South Central,
they're gonna get killed.
Which I can tell you
is a common perception.
The odds that something's
going to happen to us
are really, really slight.
- Minuscule.
- Right. Okay.
But you know,
if you look up there,
you get a different symbol
of the Hollywood sign.
It means something
very different
than the corner
of Florence and Normandie.
For most Americans
and most of the world,
it means glamour and Hollywood,
except that we can't see it.
I can't see the Hollywood sign.
Where is it?
Right. You can't see it because
of something that's probably...
much more dangerous for us
right now,
which is the stuff
we're breathing.
The pollution that's blocking
the Hollywood sign,
we're breathing this.
That's far more dangerous than
all the other stuff the media's
- telling us to be afraid of.
- Right.
As we left the corner
of Florence and Normandie,
I noticed that a number
of helicopters
had appeared in the sky.
Within seconds, the news media
- started to arrive.
- So what's the story here?
I'm waiting.
I thought you would know.
No, I don't know anything.
The Sergeant just told me
there's a guy with a gun.
But they're not sure.
That's all they told me.
Since there's no action,
I'm not getting my camera down.
I just happened to see the
chopper, going to another story.
- What story are you going to?
- It's a near- drowning.
- It's a drowning?
- A near-drowning.
How about a story
about how you can't see
the Hollywood Hills
because of the pollution?
Could you maybe do a story
on that tonight?
Pollution, that's rather good.
I find that good.
You can't see it. You can't see
anything around here.
If you have to choose
between a guy with a gun
and a near-drowning of a baby -
you could only be one place--
- I go with the gun.
- You go with the gun, always.
Is it all over, here?
It's all over? All over?
- Not yet, not yet.
- Looks like it.
Just wait for these sergeants
down here to come down,
'cause they got all the details.
Okay. Hey, I was
just wondering -
I just got here to L.A. today -
I can't see the Hollywood sign,
down on the hills there,
down Normandie.
You can't see the sign
'cause of the pollution.
- Right.
- Is there anybody you can arrest
- for polluting up the air?
- Absolutely not.
- Nobody?
- No.
Why is that?
Why is that, Sergeant?
He's fighting!
For over a decade,
there has been one show
on American television
that has consistently brought
black and white people together
in an effort to reduce
our fears
and celebrate our diversity.
That show is Cops.
I went to see a former
producer of "Cops"
and executive producer
of World's Wildest
Police Videos:
Mr. Dick Herland.
Look "liberal" up
in the dictionary
and I think my picture's
in there somewhere,
So then, you know, why not be
compelled to do, you know,
a show that focuses on, you
know, what's causing the crime,
as opposed to just chasing
the criminals down?
Because I think it's harder
to do that show.
I don't know what
that show would be.
Anger does well, hate does
well, violence does well.
Tolerance and understanding
and trying to learn to be
a little different than you were
last year does less well.
- Does less well in the ratings.
- Oh yeah.
Maybe because we,
in the television business,
because we tend to demonize
black and Hispanic people,
then those watching it at home
are going:
"I don't want to help
those people.
I'm not going to do anything
to help them.
Because I hate them now,
because they may hurt me."
- You know what I'm saying?
- I know what you're saying,
I'm not sure that's
what we're doing.
I'm not sure we're demonizing
black and Hispanic people, uh...
particularly.
I don't think we show
black and Hispanic people
as being criminals.
I'd like to say not more often,
but probably
they are more often.
But I certainly don't think...
We're certainly not trying
to demonize black
and Hispanic people.
We show them on the news,
we show them on TV,
as pretty scary people.
Yeah.
And I agree. I'd like
to see that reversed
as much as possible. I...
- Start tonight.
- Well, the thing is,
I don't know how
to start tonight.
I don't know how to tell
that story.
If I was smart enough
to do that...
- I'll pitch you one.
- Okay. All right.
Um... um...
Do a show called not Cops
but Corporate Cops.
"Corporation man
Hey Corporate man
"We're coming out to get you
better run while you can
"We're coming out to get you
better run while you can"
Uh... I love the idea.
I don't think it would make
very interesting reality TV.
Unless we can get those people
to get in their SUVs
and drive really fast down
the road away from the police.
But I'm telling you,
everyone in America
who's got just your basic,
everyday job
is gonna love watching the boss
being chased down the street
with his shirt off,
thrown to the ground
and a knee to the neck. I tell
you, that is gonna get ratings.
Yeah, I'm with you. And if
I can find a police outfit
that would prosecute corporate
criminals appropriately
and would go after them
appropriately... In other words,
what you do to a man who's
just stolen a lady's purse
with $ to it,
than you need to do
an appropriate response
to a man who has just stolen $
million from indigent people,
then, boy, we're gonna be
out there filming that.
But as a matter of fact,
when police go after the guy
who's just stolen $ million,
they treat him like he was
a member of the city council -
as he may or may not be - and
it's not exciting television.
If you could get that guy
to take his shirt off...
Right.
Yeah, and throw his cellular
phone at the police
as they come through the door,
try to jump out that window,
then we'd have a show.
You watch violence on TV
in a place like Canada
and you know it's not happening
next door.
You watch it here, and you know
it is happening next door.
- Right.
- I think that's...
I don't know what
the difference is,
- but there's a big difference.
- Yeah, but why isn't...
Why isn't it happening
in Canada?
Why aren't there, you know,
murders a year?
I don't know, but I want
to go to Canada to retire,
or something, 'cause it sounds
like where we want to be.
I'd like to find out what that
difference is. Wouldn't you?
Yeah. Yeah, I'm trying
to find out.
Where are you supposed
to be right now?
- School.
- School.
School.
Aren't you worried about
what you're not learning?
Nah, I'm mostly helping
everybody else in the class.
- Then I barely get to do my work.
- How about you? You're not
- worried about your education?
- Well, I've got the textbook.
Why do you think
we have so many, uh...
- gun murders in America?
- Uh...
I have no idea. People must hate
each other or something.
Oh, you mean Canadians don't
hate each other?
Well, we do but we don't go to
the point of shooting somebody
- just to get revenge.
- What do you do?
I don't know.
Tease them, maybe.
- Make fun of them, ridicule them.
- Throw eggs at them.
How many gun murders
in Sarnia this year?
- None.
- Last year?
I believe we had one,
at the time.
The year before that?
I can't recall what we had
in the way of--
Maybe one in the last
three years?
- Probably, yes.
- Mm-hm.
Very low. Very low
for this city.
Well, of course,
there's no murders here
because there's only
people
and it's the kissing
capital of the world.
So I went down the river
to another Canadian city
that was five times
as large as Sarnia:
Windsor, Ontario, just across
the river from Detroit.
I was sure there'd be
more murders in Windsor.
Ever hear of anyone being shot
by a gun in Windsor?
No. No.
You remember any murders here?
Uh, there was one
a long time ago. Probably--
- How long ago?
- Oh...
- In your lifetime?
- In my lifetime,
probably around years
ago, there was one murder.
In fact, this Windsor
policeman told me
that the only gun murder
he could recall in Windsor
in the last three years
was committed by a guy
from Detroit,
who had a stolen gun
from Minnesota.
With nearly people
in the Windsor area,
there were simply no Canadians
shooting other Canadians.
I thought it might be time
for some fun facts
about Canada.
I hit the streets of New York
to find out what
the average American thought
about our friendly neighbour
to the north.
Canadians don't watch as much
violent movies as Americans do.
That's wrong.
Hordes of young boys,
all throughout Canada,
eagerly await the next
Hollywood bloodbath.
Then one of the guy gets
his leg taken off.
- Oh, wow!
- And there was a lot of girls,
- and naked at one point.
- I like that stuff.
- What movie did you see tonight?
- Sixth Day.
- With Arnold Schwarzenegger?
- Yeah.
Did it make you want
to come out here
and play this shoot-'em-up game?
Well... yeah.
There's no poverty in Canada
like there is here...
in the States.
Wrong again.
Mayor Mike Bradley
Sarnia, Ontario, Canada
Actually, we've also had
a much higher unemployment rate.
When Michigan rate was running at %,
we were still at - %,
We seem to have an institutional
unemployment rate.
I think there'd mostly be
white people in Canada.
Hmm... that's strange,
'cause when I'm in Canada,
I see black people everywhere.
And yellow people,
and brown people...
and % of the country is
non-white.
So the Canadians are
pretty much just like us. And the
reason that they have (Toronto, Canada)
so few murders has to be
because they've got
so few guns.
- What kind of guns do you own?
- Uh, I hunt.
I own rifles and shotguns,
and I own pistols.
- Mm-hm. So how many guns total?
- Uh... Probably about seven.
- Seven guns?
- Yeah.
- Do you have a gun?
- I have a few.
- How many guns do you have?
- Half a dozen.
You could name how many people
that own guns, that you know?
- Two, three, a dozen?
- More than that.
There's a tremendous
amount of gun ownership.
We're a large country
geographically.
We grew up with hunting and
fishing being a tradition.
In Canada, with a population
of just around million -
there's about
million families -
and the best estimate is
somewhere in the region
of seven-million guns.
Wow!
Canada was one gun-loving,
gun-toting, gun-crazy country!
- Where can you get a gun?
- Uptown, any time I want.
I see you're a Glock owner.
Where can I get a Glock
in Canada?
Most gun stores'll sell 'em
to you
if you have the proper
permits and stuff.
In fact, despite all
their tough gun laws,
take a look at what I,
a foreign citizen,
was able to do
at the local Canadian Wal-Mart.
- Where's the ammunition at?
- Where's the ammunition?
- Yeah.
- Back here.
- What kind are you looking for?
- You know, like, bullets.
That's right.
I could buy as much live
ammunition as I wanted to
in Canada.
You take American?
Do you lock your doors?
- No.
- Are you afraid of anything?
Sarnia, Canada
- Nah, not really, no.
- Do you lock your doors at night?
- No.
- You don't lock your doors?
- No.
- Well, what do you...
- Are you afraid of anything?
- Not really.
- Have you ever been broken into?
- Yes, I have. Yeah.
- What happened?
- They broke into my home.
I wasn't there. They broke in,
they stole some booze
and cigarettes and they left.
So I figure it must've been
some teenagers
out to have a little bit of fun.
That's all they took, though.
Just some booze
and some cigarettes.
Have you ever been
a victim of crime?
- Yes.
- What kind of crime?
Uh, I've had people walk in
while I've been sleeping
and vandalize my home
and steal from me.
And that didn't want to make
you lock your doors at night?
No. No.
As an American with
three locks on his doors,
I found this all
a bit confusing.
Even here, in Toronto,
a city of millions,
people just didn't lock
their doors.
So you don't lock your doors but
we, Americans, do. Why is that?
You must be afraid
of your neighbour.
Do you ever leave your doors
unlocked at home?
- Yeah.
- Yeah, you do?
- Where do you live?
- Right around here.
- Toronto?
- Around here.
- You leave your doors unlocked?
- Yeah.
You'd think, as Americans,
that the lock is keeping people
out of your place.
We, as Canadians,
see it more as, uh...
when we lock the door, we're
imprisoning ourselves inside.
You don't want to do that.
Not really, no.
We don't want to... No.
I decided to go unannounced
to a neighbourhood in Toronto
to see if this unlocked-door
thing was true.
Oh, hi. I'm sorry.
Just checking.
Oh, hello!
- Oh, hi.
- Hi.
Nobody locks their doors.
Nobody locks their doors
in this town.
- You want to lock?
- No, no, no.
- Do you like living here?
- I like it very much.
- Yeah? And the T-shirt?
- The T- shirt too.
This door was wide open.
And you're not afraid?
- Should I be afraid?
- I don't know. You live here.
- I don't think I'm afraid.
- You're not, are you?
- Thank you very much.
- All right. No problem.
- I'm sorry about the intrusion.
- No, no problem.
- Thank you for not shooting me.
- No problem at all.
- Bye-bye.
- Okay.
As an American,
I gotta say this all
seemed kind of strange.
Until I looked up at the TV
in the bar and noticed
what they watched
for their evening news.
They're friends of ours.
We'll certainly listen to them
courteously and carefully,
but you don't just make war
just 'cause someone says so.
The Canadians weren't being
pumped full of fear.
And their politicians seemed
to talk kind of funny.
Mayor Mike Bradley
Sarnia, Canada
...making sure they have good daycare,
assistance for their parents
when they're elderly and need
to be in an old-age home,
that they have proper
health care that insures
that they won't lose
their business or their house
because they can't
afford their medical bills.
That's how you build
a good society.
No one wins unless everyone
wins. And you don't win
by beating up on people
who can't defend themselves.
And that's been the approach,
unfortunately,
that's been spreading with some
of the right-wing governments
across North America.
They pick onto people
that can't defend
themselves and at the same time,
they're turning around and
giving financial support
and tax breaks and tax benefits
to people that don't need them.
Where are the indigents in
the city? Where do they live?
Uh... indigent... uh...
You act like you've never heard
the word before.
There's... We don't have that
problem here, really. It's...
So I asked him,
"Could you at least take me
to a Canadian slum,"
and well...
this is what a ghetto
looks like in Canada.
Is this the same mentality that
says, with Canadians, if someone
gets sick, they should actually
be able to have health care?
- Yeah.
- Oh, definitely.
- Yeah.
- Yup.
Why?
Because!
Human rights. Everyone's got
the right to live.
You just came out of
the emergency room?
Yes, I did.
How much did you have to pay
for your treatment?
The bill is covered
by our hospital plan.
You're telling me you didn't
have to pay anything?
No, I don't.
I have family that lives
in the States.
They used to live in Canada
and moved over there.
- And it's so different.
- They get afraid more easily.
Oh, yeah.
Yeah, very much so.
'Cause everybody reacts
over there just like that.
They don't stop and think.
First reaction is pull the gun
out. "You're on my property."
You know, like...
I don't know. It's just
different over here.
- Where do you live?
- Detroit.
Come over to Canada here
for the night?
Right.
People are more open-minded
here, a bit more welcoming.
Feel any difference when
you cross over to this country?
Be honest, now, come on.
- It's a lot lighter.
The segregation over there
is definitely much more--
- In the United States.
- ...more intensified
- in the States, yeah.
- Yeah.
So you can... You can feel it.
Almost like they just
let you be.
That's Canada for you.
Every time I turn on the TV
in the States,
it's always about a murder here,
a gunfight, hostile position...
I just think the States, their
view of things is fighting.
That's how they resolve
everything.
If there's... there's something
going on in another country,
they send people over
to fight it and...
They are the most powerful
country in the world, though.
Canada's more just, like,
"Let's negotiate,
let's work something out."
Where the States is,
"We'll kill you and that'll be
the end of that."
Um, if guns were...
If more guns made people safer,
then America would be one of the
safest countries in the world.
It isn't. It's the opposite.
I heard that call,
you know, on TV someplace.
It was horrible. It was just...
'Cause he kept asking,
"Where's the shooter?"
She said, "He's gone.
I need some help."
The little girl was
in there too?
She was on the floor, yes.
And the police and
the medics came, or...
By the time the medics
were here...
The medics had just come in
and I remember him stepping in
and taking over the room.
He said, "You have to leave."
- All right.
- And then when the meds come in,
when the police come in,
you're no longer in control.
- They take over the building.
- Was she still alive then?
Her lips had become
totally blue.
Back in my hometown
of Flint, Michigan,
a six-year-old first-grade boy,
at Buell Elementary,
had found a gun
at his uncle's house,
where he was staying because
his mother was being evicted.
He brought the gun to school
and shot another first- grader,
six-year-old Kayla Rolland.
With one bullet that passed
through her body,
she fell to the floor
and laid there dying
while her teacher called
for help.
No one knew why the little boy
wanted to shoot
the little girl.
As if the city
had not been through
enough horror and tragedy
in the past two decades,
it was now home
to a new record: the youngest
school shooting ever
in the United States.
On the morning of the shooting,
it only took the helicopters
and satellite trucks
a half-hour to show up.
They check in the truck.
You know, we're doing one
in minutes again.
This evening,
about seven o'clock,
will be a public memorial
service. Hundreds of people
will mourn the loss of little
Kayla, a tiny little girl
who loved pizza, teddy bears,
and who was taken away from us
much too soon. Gina?
Good morning, Christine.
The funeral home now passing out
tens of thousands
of these pink ribbons
to support the young
girl's family.
Today will be an emotional day
and has been already,
remembering little Kayla.
Jeff Ross, Fox- News.
Nice job.
Yeah, Michelle, we're having
technical problems, okay?
Well, don't talk to me about it,
call our sat truck.
I need a haircut, man.
I'm a pig. A rug.
Here we go.
Some too choked up
even to speak about it.
There's a memorial service
scheduled here
for seven o'clock tonight.
We're live in Flint, Michigan,
this afternoon.
Jeff Ross, Q- Reports.
- Thank you.
- Thank you.
Want some hairspray?
- I kind of need it, don't I?
- Yeah, you do,
I got some...
I have some. I just didn't put
it in. I didn't have a chance.
I have hurricane-proof hairspray.
This man prayed for Kayla
then let the balloon go.
I say we have
the colour picture,
not the black-and-white.
Plenty of media here
that covered Columbine.
You know, there are
some networks, especially,
that go from, unfortunately,
tragedy to tragedy.
And, uh, I feel bad for them.
Because that's all they see...
The tragedies.
We're just trying
to crunch right now
for the five and the six.
Today, we're feeding
CNN and Fox, so...
The national media had never
visited Buell Elementary,
or the Beecher school district
in which it sat,
or this part of Flint
ever before.
And few, if any, of these
reporters bothered to visit it
even when they were here now.
If they had ventured just
a block away from the school
or the funeral home,
they might have seen
a different kind of tragedy
that, perhaps, would contain
some answers as to why
this little girl was dead.
For over years,
this impoverished area,
in the hometown
of the world's
largest corporation,
had been ignored as completely
as it had been destroyed.
With % of the students
living below
the official poverty line,
Buell and Beecher, and Flint,
did not fit into
the accepted and widely
circulated story line
put forth by
the nation's media.
That being the one
about America
and its invincible economy.
The number-one cause of death
among young people
in this part of Flint was
homicide. The football field,
at Flint-Beecher, was sponsored
by a funeral home.
The kids at Beecher have won
state track championships,
but they've never had
a home track meet.
Because around
the football field,
all they have is
this dirt ring.
Years ago, someone here
named the streets,
in this part of town, after
all the Ivy League schools,
as if they had dreamed
of better days
and something greater
for themselves.
The children are doing well.
The faculty and staff
are doing well.
But we don't forget.
We don't forget.
Just don't want this happening
to anybody else, you know?
It's...
I know.
I know. I don't want it to
happen