Posted on 12/04/2004 8:24:58 AM PST by Loyalist
Montreal — Every year, in memorial ceremonies across the country, Genevieve Bergeron's name is heard first when the list of the victims of Canada's worst mass shooting is read.
The tragedy of her death overshadows her life for most Canadians. They're seldom told she was a loving, inspirational sister, a top student, a gifted musician and a talented athlete.
"For me, she was like the sun," said Catherine Bergeron, who fought tenaciously for tougher gun laws after her sister was killed.
"I see her like sunshine. She was a beautiful blond, with blue eyes, always smiling."
Genevieve was 21 when she and 13 other women were killed during Marc Lepine's hate-fuelled rampage at Montreal's École Polytechnique engineering school on Dec. 6, 1989.
Mr. Lepine, only a few years older than most of his victims, proclaimed he was getting even because feminists had ruined his life when he opened fire at the school 15 years ago Monday.
Genevieve was in her second year of studies in civil engineering when she died. She had proudly gained admittance on a scholarship because of her high grades in junior college but lost it the second year because the crushing workload caused her grades to slip.
"We were laughing about that because Genevieve was the kind of student who got 100 per cent in high school and junior college," Catherine recalled.
"It tells you how hard it is to go through Polytechnique and how hard you have to work."
Genevieve could easily have become a musician instead of an engineer, her sister said. A gifted clarinet player, she also sang in a professional choir.
"She loved Mozart."
In the end, Genevieve, who looked at things with a level head, weighed the career prospects of music and engineering carefully.
"We discussed it," said Catherine, who is now a lawyer. "She didn't know if she could have a nice living with music. It's harder. So she decided to go into engineering and have a more sure career.
"She was still singing in a choir while studying engineering," Catherine said, with a touch of sisterly pride in her voice. "She could do both."
Bubbling energy seemed to power Genevieve.
"She was a very happy person and a very sensible person too. I remember her crying easily, a very emotive person," Catherine said with a fond chuckle.
"She was like energy."
Laughter came as easily as tears.
"She was the type of person you liked to have as an audience because she laughed at everything. She was a giggler."
One of the most widely seen pictures of Genevieve shows her with her head thrown back, apparently laughing loudly at some joke or incident, her eyes squeezed into a mischievous squint by her big smile.
Genevieve was a cherished mentor to Catherine, but not the type to always be offering advice. Just when it counted.
"She was always there when I needed her," she said. "Always there."
On the last day of her life, Genevieve had gone to the school to work on a project with her friends.
"I think it was a computer project," Catherine recalled. "I remember she was in the computer room and she went down to the cafeteria with her friend when Marc Lepine just came in and started to shoot."
Ms. Bergeron was with Ms. Edward, who had just been named to the university ski team.
The cafeteria was decked out for the holidays with festive red and white balloons, while free wine was also being offered to celebrate the end of term.
Late-day meals were being chosen when people rushed into the cafeteria and began pushing others into the facility's small kitchen, slamming the door behind them.
Ms. Bergeron and Ms. Edward were among those who didn't make it.
They made a run for it. Lepine apparently caught a glimpse of their long, flying blond hair as they dashed for cover.
Ms. Edward's mother Suzanne, who like Ms. Bergeron's mom Therese Daviau became a leading gun-control advocate, said later the two young women were holding each other tightly in their arms when Mr. Lepine calmly strode over to their hiding place and raised his rifle once again.
The effects of that day would unleash the efforts of survivors and relatives of the victims of Mr. Lepine's rampage to tighten Canada's gun laws, legislation that still faces challenges in the form of the controversial gun registry.
Wendy Cukier, president of the Coalition for Gun Control, said the families of the victims never shrink from fighting to preserve the law and the registry.
"Many of them consider the legislation a monument to the young women who were killed that day and it's ironic they have to work so hard to preserve it," she said.
Catherine Bergeron acknowledges the gun law is part of her sister's legacy but it's not the only way she wants her to be remembered.
"I would like Canadians to remember her and the other 13 women, not to be sad but to go on in life in a better way," she said.
"Think more about other human beings and be more open. More tolerant too."
The usual gaggle of feminist harpies (and a few castrati) will march in quasi-solemn procession from the campus women's centre, waving banners and chanting slogans as they proceed to the campus memorial for a weepy candlelight vigil, accompanied by soft guitar dirges.
There will be the usual speeches, eulogizing the deceased as martyrs for the feminist cause, from women's studies professors and lesbian activists. One of the castrati may plead for forgiveness for millennia of crimes committed against women by his sex.
The campus newspaper will cover the event with a special edition full of badly-written, illogical screeds, tepid poetry and amateurish artwork.
And of course, there will be women's studies symposia to mark the Holy Week of Canadian feminism.
I can't help but think that this is the post-modern manifestation of a medieval virgin-martyr cult, not unlike that of St. Ursula and her 11,000 fellow virgin-martyrs.
Which would never have prevented this crime from being committed.
So is Marc on parole yet?
I always thought it would be a lot of fun to launch a bunch of water balloons at a candlelight vigil.
An interesting side note to this story: Marc Lepine was born Gamil Gharbi, the son of an Algerian Muslim immigrant. When he was a teenager, he took his mother's name.
Pretty difficult to get paroled from death.
Very interesting indeed. I had never heard that before, and I followed the story.
---and otherwise came from a very twisted home and background. This was not public knowledge at the time of the event--
---not knowing what anyone (especially oneself) will do under extreme circumstances, I still thought at the time it was rather pitiful as the males in the area were herded out by the perp that none of them made any attempt to intervene---
I have always been puzzled by this, too. No report that I recall give a count of the number of male students who were released, but I cannot conceive of the mentality that would allow them to just leave and do nothing. Pitiful, indeed.
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