by Emily Bays

Editor-in-Chief

   Like most other LGHS students, I first heard that Dennis Cyncor-McMillan was missing through the announcement made by Mr. Ramezane after fifth period on Monday, March 9. I made my way slowly to class, where my close friends were as completely confused as I was. When I got home that afternoon, the first thing I did was log on to the Mercury News website, where I hoped to find an updated story. I read the rather inconclusive news that was available, and then saw the comments at the end of the article.

   
     On this virtual, faceless, anonymous website, adult users were posting some of the most blatantly insensitive and aimless comments I have ever seen. I sat on my couch sobbing as I read comments calling Dennis “garden-variety stupid” and “a Darwin Awards recipient.” My misery evolved into a sort of fury as I registered for an account on the website to respond to the posts.

    I attempted to retain my civility and politeness as I typed away. This was the second time I had seen anonymous users post terrible comments after the death of a friend of mine, and I could not bear not to reply. I made my post (which was deleted a few hours later) and tried to gather my thoughts.

    What entitles those with no concrete knowledge of a person or situation to make such callous statements? Even now, nobody has a completely clear picture of what happened that night. The judgments made after Dennis went missing were not exclusive to those online users; many parents sought to turn the situation into a “lesson” for their own children, to turn Dennis into a sort of cautionary tale.

    But Dennis was not a situation. He was not a story, or just another stupid teenager making a mistake. He was an amazing, intelligent young man, who lived life in a way I have heard more than one person describe as “beautiful.” Dennis was free-spirited, he was determined, and he was strong. He had a natural intelligence and an ability to retain information that I have always envied.

    For those who have never known Dennis to judge him for one night of his beautiful life is not just absurd, it is harmful. In the case of those posters online, it seems that some are more than willing to make terrible, grief-intensifying statements for a few self-gratifying moments of attention. The anonymity of the Internet allows them to post these insults without even having to divulge their identities or back up their statements.

    Those who turn Dennis’s story into a lesson, likewise, are trivializing our grief by turning a person whom we loved into a sort of object. Speaking critically about Dennis’s decision is not only potentially false given the ambiguous information anyone has about that night, but also hypocritical and self-righteous.

    How many of us make terrible mistakes with troublesome regularity? For example, how often do we drive too fast? I could not help but think of the adults judging the friends we have lost getting in their cars after a few beers. Many of the mistakes that we deem inconsequential are nothing but. Therefore, I am called to a familiar passage: “First take the plank out of your eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.”

    There is something to learn from Dennis’s life, and it has nothing to do with the mistake he may have made that night. The lesson is simple: we should try to love life as fiercely as Dennis did.

    The Los Gatos community has lost so many beautiful young lives in recent years. We will grieve, yes. We will cry over old losses and new. But as long as we, young and old, avoid judging those wonderful individuals we have lost, our grief is in honor of those friends. We in El Gato encourage this community to mourn in each other’s arms and to celebrate those we love.