What in the hell is going on with all the school shootings?

[napi21]

I just heard about another one in MO. where a student who was wearing a coat and ski mask aimeda gun at two other students and a teacher, said "Dont make me do this!"then fired a shot into the ceiling and his gun jammed.

I know all about copy cats, but this is getting very serious! You can't even blame it onkids! The worst one was that milk man who shot those girls in the Amish Country last week.

What is going on????

[ThoughtCriminal]

1. Collective Behavior

Certain personality types will imitate highly publicized behavior.

[hijinx87]

2. the country is buried beneath a mountain of guns

for one thing.

[napi21]

5. I don't buy that excuse. We've had LOTS of guns for well over 45 years

we raised two boys, and they both have their own families now. There has NEVER been a problem, and I don't expect there will be.

Nooo. There has to be something else!

One thing that does occur to me is that we have a President who is constantly saying his way of curing problems is WARFARE! Attack your enemies! Bomb them into the last century! I wouldn't be too surprised if THAT isn't partly influencing the American culture!

[lvx35]

8. I think the handling of 9/11 plays in too.

Movies, songs, drama, the "world forever changed that day". We've over-emphasized the power of flying planes into buildings, and its carried through to other stupid anti-social acts of violence.

[elocs]

14. It sure makes it easier.

When it is a kid or kids who shoot up a school or bring a gun, junior usually gets the weapon from home rather than buying it on the street. Why should we be surprised? Then some moron legislator here in Wisconsin comes up with the idea that teachers should carry guns. Yeah, adding more guns will really help the problem. Some responsibility from home certainly would not hurt the problem in regards to kids who get guns from home.

[hijinx87]

17. I don't see how you can separate the lack of effective gun control

in this country, and any gun related violence.

[elocs]

19. Parents who are responsible

and keep guns out of the hands of their children is a form of gun control and often the only form available.

[spoony]

24. The question is...

If guns are always too easily available to nutters, why aren't there constant school shootings? Why do they seem to come in clumps every few years? If the availability of guns was the cause, this recent string of shootings would not be at all unusual. Yet it is.

[proud2BlibKansan]

3. Copy cat shootings

I don't know what the answer is but I wish I did.

[elocs]

11. There may be some merit in that idea.

Ever notice when a young person commits suicide how frequently there are additional suicides in the following weeks. I have noticed that where I live and there will be a suicide and then more shortly after, but then no more for many months. They seem to come in clusters.

[blonndee]

4. This time it was a freaking AK-47!!!

Why the F**K should ANY citizen be able to get their hands on that kind of gun?

[mmonk]

7. They shouldn't.

[HarukaTheTrophyWife]

21. It was most likely a knockoff AK-47.

Also, most gun violence comes from handguns, not "assault rifles," which is really just a name for a gun that looks "scary," compared to a more traditional gun styling.

[proud2BlibKansan]

30. The TV report I saw here in KC called it

an assault rifle. Is that the same thing as an AK 47?

[lcordero2]

6. maybe?

People aren't being afforded the opportunity to get the help that they need.

Parents aren't being held accountable for what spills out of their home.

[proud2BlibKansan]

29. Bingo! We have a winner!!

[boolean]

9. Too many guns. No social safety net. Poverty. Idiotic interpretation...

...of the second amendment. The power of the NRA lobby. A warmongering gun culture.

It's a combination of ALL these things.

Gun control is part of the answer and it should not be ignored.

To me this is the ultimate litmus test. Anybody (including most of those DUers in the gun forum) who is against government regulation of firearms is not a true liberal and should probably go over to freerepublic.com.

[lcordero2]

31. I'm not accepting that and I'm NOT going to support that

[madmusic]

10. The punitive society.

Condemnation is the rule. To picture it in the extreme, what if everyone could enact capital punishment laws and enforce them by personal execution?

We would snap out of it and see how self destructive it is. But our punitive society doesn't take it far enough to see that logical conclusion. The atmosphere is there, however, so many sit on the edge, and go over.

Or maybe not.

[Emit]

12. Reflection of stressors in our society? n/t

[Phredicles]

13. It's Clinton's fault.

At least that's what I'm sure all the usual suspects are getting ready to tell us.

[skids]

15. Here's the explanation that nobody will listen to.

It's a pretty well studied phenomina, but people do not want to hear the answer:

Increasingly repressive social control causes increasingly violent response. Kids, and even adults to a lesser extent (though these days I question...) have an innate need to "act out" against what their id views as infringements on freedom. The less freedom they have, the more this urge goes unsatisfied, and the more severe an act is needed to fulfill it.

This and many other factors are dealt with in an interesting paper here:

http://web.mit.edu/gtmarx/www/ironies.html

As an analogy, the tighter you squeeze an orange, the faster the juice squirts out. The sensible thing to do is squeeze gently so the juice falls into the bowl. What we do here in modern days is more like a Gallagher show.

I still live nearby the college I attended and can see it firsthand -- the police and administration have become steadily more repressive. There are more and more rules and restrictions and security devices like cards and cameras. As a result, we now have a regularly scheduled annual riot where cars get flipped over and houses wrecked in town, and whenever there's a blackout or sometimes even just a sporting event, we get riots in the dorms. A few years ago a cop was sitting outside a twenty-story dormitory and a vending machine from the roof landed on his hood.

But tell the complaining townspeople or the administrators themselves that they are unwittingly causing this situation by gripping their wards too tightly, and their eyes glaze over. They just cannot grasp the idea. Nor do they seem to understand that unless a person learns what having their own home and their full range of civil rights actually feels like in college, they are going to enter the world as a social cripple that craves both an overbearing authority figure and rebellion against that very same authority.

BTW, it doesn't really tackle this subject, but the movie "The Colony" is a must-see.

[sam sarrha]

18. combine that with rampant Bullying.. allowing Bullying is a crime, it is

child abuse.. i was bullied all through public school i am autistic very tall and skinny, quiet, i constantly fantasized about how the kill them.. i really thought they would eventually kill me.. they did kill someone the year after i graduated.. i am scared to this day from regular beating and public humiliation.. they would spit in my face passing between classes.. hit me in the kidneys form behind or punched me in the stomach passing the other direction in a crowded hallways passing to classes-schools were over crowded then and hall were just a mass of slow moving people, trip me and kick the shit out of me, they broke my ribs and stomped on my fingers.. it was constant and relentless.. the administration was aware of it, my parents complained, that made it worse.

[Rocknrule]

22. This is the kind of shit that most of these shooters had to deal with

And people have the nerve to say they did it because of videogames. Anyone who says that, as far as I'm concerned, supports bullying.

[sam sarrha]

28. the teachers also tormented me and allowed and encouraged abuse

[sam sarrha]

16. No child left behind is driving them Postal... no child left Unarmed

[barb162]

20. copycats

and crazies

[and-justice-for-all]

23. The 'Right to bare Arms' has out lived it means...

...That is one civil liberty I would be happy to disolve, make a real bitch if your not in Law Enforcement to get ANY type of Gun. The US has the highest gun fatility rate on the planet, why? because of the 'right to bare arms'.

Guns really can not kill people until they are in the hand of the killer. But, the Gun also has to be availiable and wasy to aquire, which they are.

[zonmoy]

25. multiple problems

including the pushing of religion as a cure all rather than actual treating or proper diagnosis of mental and social problems. the exposure of people to news broadcasts that publicize such forms of violence. the large number of guns and pushing of fear to justify more guns and violent solutions to our problems. undoubtedly other problems other people could kindly put in replies to this post.

[Golden Raisin]

26. Ask the NRA.

[Irreverend IX]

27. Video games.

And rock music. And Clinton's penis.