Survivor Guilt, Plus a Year-Long Litany of Abuse

In an upsetting coda to the horror of last year's Parkland mass shooting, two of the survivors, and the father of a Sandy Hook shooting victim, have taken their lives recently. Besides being witnesses to horror, and coping with survivor's guilt, these individuals have been subject to torrents of abuse online, and at the hands of well-payed arms industry shills.

After every mass shooting, the trolls come out of the woodwork, with their accounts of 'crisis actors' and 'false flags'. This American Life had a recent episode about Lenny Pozner, father of Sandy Hook victim Noah Pozner, and his efforts to turn the tables on the trolls who have hounded him from residence to residence with their accusations of deception and, in extreme cases, their death threats. Mr Pozner comes across as a tough, competent, experienced individual, the sort of person who can weather the barbs and brutalities of his tormentors. Sydney Aiello and the unidentified sophomore who took his life, were teenagers, more vulnerable to anonymous tormentors.

I can't fathom the sort of cruelty which would lead people to bully the bereaved. The natural human instinct, the natural mammalian instinct, is to console the suffering... what the hell is wrong with anyone who would harangue and harass someone who has been a witness to utter horror?