Judith Kleinfeld on Librescu?s Heroism and the Lesson to Learn from the Virginia Tech Massacre
“A 76 year-old Holocaust survivor named Liviu Librescu stood tall, [and] who blocked with his own body the doorway to his classroom so his students could jump out of the windows. His students lived, and Librescu died.”
Judith Kleinfeld of the Boys Project has an interesting new piece on the courage of Liviu Librescu (pictured), a hero in the recent Virginia Tech massacre. The piece is Blocking the door a character lesson (Anchorage Daily News, 4/27/07). Kleinfeld writes:
“The most important story [of the Virginia Tech massacre] has received virtually no national press coverage at all.
“This is the story of courage, of a 76 year-old Holocaust survivor named Liviu Librescu who stood tall, who blocked with his own body the doorway to his classroom so his students could jump out of the windows .
“His students lived, and Librescu died.
“Blocking the door was an incredible act of goodness, courage, and self-sacrifice. But have you heard this story? I doubt it. And the reasons why tell us a lot about the deficiencies of character education in bringing up children, why so many suffer from ‘moral illiteracy.’
“Character education occurs in part through the telling and retelling of stories which celebrate and offer compelling examples of such virtues as courage…
“The tale of blocking the classroom door is a modern version of the classic story of Horatio at the Bridge…
“Once there was a war between the Roman people and the Etruscans who lived on the other side of the Tiber River. The King of the Etruscans raised a great army and marched toward Rome. The city had never been in so great danger.”
“All that stopped the Etruscans from destroying Rome was a wooden bridge. If the Etruscan horsemen could get across the bridge, Rome would be lost.
“Now, among the guards at the bridge, there was a brave man named Horatio. When he saw the Etruscans coming on their horses, he called out to the Romans behind him to cut down the bridge, even though he was on the other side and most certainly would die…
“Horatio held back the Etruscans with shield and spear and kept the Etruscan horsemen from crossing the bridge. He died but he saved Rome…
“Moral education is a subtle and complicated enterprise. We teach our children the rules. We also know our children pick up what we do, more than what we say.
“But we also need stories of virtue so that children can see the ideals and our admiration for these ideals, even if we ourselves do not always live up to them.
“We need to hear about the Virginia Tech shooter, but we also need to hear about the hero, Liviu Librescu, who, like Horatio at the bridge, used his own body to bar the door.”
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This nation has no will to fight even to live.
A brave man.
I wouldn’t count on Professor Nancy Hopkins of Harvard to do that. She’d probably faint or throw up. In fact just hearing of Mr Liviu Librescu would cause her to faint or throw up at his Patriarchal critique of equal opportunity.