The HyperTexts

Courtni Webb's Sandy Hook Poem

Related pages: Sandy Hook Poems, Aurora Poetry, Columbine Poems, Courtni Webb's Sandy Hook Poem and Possible Expulsion, Darfur Poems, Gaza Poems, Haiti Poems, Hiroshima Poems, Holocaust Poems, Nakba Poems, 911 Poems, Trail of Tears

Courtni Webb, a 17-year-old high school student, has been suspended from her San Francisco high school, the Life Learning Academy, and is in danger of being expelled for writing a poem that mentions "understanding" the motives of the young man who murdered 26 people at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Here’s an excerpt from her poem:

They wanna hold me back
I run but still they attack
My innocence, I won't get back
I used to smile
They took my kindness for weakness
The silence the world will never get
I understand the killing in Connecticut
I know why he pulled the trigger
The government is a shame
Society never wants to take the blame
Society puts these thoughts in our head:
Misery loves company
If I can't be loved no one can

When I read the poem, I don’t see any indication that the poet is threatening anyone. Rather, it seems to me that she is simply explaining why, in her opinion, the killer “lost it.” She sees government and society as part of the problem. The final lines suggest that the killer may have felt that if he couldn’t be happy and loved, no one else had the right to be happy and loved.

Now Courtni Webb has been suspended indefinitely and faces possible expulsion. But all she did was say that she could see and understand what drove Adam Lanza to become a serial killer.

The poem was not submitted as a class assignment, but was read in her personal notebook by a teacher who reported the young poet to the school's principal. The school district is now considering whether Webb can return.

Speaking on NBC Today, Webb claimed she was merely expressing herself and exploring ideas about feelings of darkness and hopelessness behind the massacre. She said: "Never in my life have I heard that you couldn't mention a tragedy that happened. I didn't say that I agree with it, I said I simply understand it."

Webb added she felt the school was branding her a "monster." Her mother believes her daughter's right to free speech is being violated.

Webb told ABC San Francisco that the poem was just her way of expressing herself: "The meaning of the poem is just talking about society and how I understand why things like that incident happened. So it's not like I'm agreeing with it, but that's how the school made it seem."

"Why are we oppressed by a dysfunctional community of haters and blamers? The meaning of the poem is talking about society and how I understand why things like that incident happened. So it's not like I'm agreeing with it, but that's how the school made it seem," said Webb.

Life Learning Academy is a 60-pupil vocational school; it was named the "2010 Charter School of the Year" by the California Charter School Association.

According to Gawker: "A letter from a Life Learning Academy official said Webb's writing 'contained deeply concerning and threatening language related to the recent school shootings in Newtown, Connecticut.'"

Webb says she didn't turn in the poem as an assignment; instead, the teacher discovered it in class and took it to the principal. But Webb says she's turned in dark poems about suicide and sadness in the past with no problem. It's a genre she likes. She compares herself to Stephen King, saying, "He writes weird stuff all the time. That doesn't mean he's gonna do it or act it out."

But the atmosphere has changed drastically since the Sandy Hook tragedy, and now the school is emphasizing its policy that Life Learning Academy takes a zero tolerance approach to violence, the threat of violence, and a violation of any of these rules can result in dismissal from the school.

"I feel like they're overreacting. Why? Because my daughter doesn't have a history of violence. She didn't threaten anybody. She didn't threaten herself. She simply said she understood why," said her mother, Valerie Statham.

Webb says her poems are a therapeutic way of expressing herself, but now it's up to the San Francisco Unified School District to decide if the poem is a form of art or a  threat to the safety of Webb's fellow students. If she's expelled, someone should lock up Stephen King and Anne Rice. 

Related pages: Sandy Hook Poems, Aurora Poetry, Columbine Poems, Courtni Webb's Sandy Hook Poem and Possible Expulsion, Darfur Poems, Gaza Poems, Haiti Poems, Hiroshima Poems, Holocaust Poems, Nakba Poems, 911 Poems, Trail of Tears

The HyperTexts