Another School Shooting because???

The families of twenty children and six adults killed in Sandy Hook Connecticut on the 14th December will now remember this Christmas for ever and mostly for all the wrong reasons…

Obviously my heartfelt condolences go out to all those who have been bereaved by the actions of a young man who was clearly disturbed in some way. The events in Connecticut (see here) have also had something of a personal impact; I’m saddened by the irony connecting this incident to my previous post on the emotional pains that Christmas brings for so many people (see here).

Unfortunately Adam Lanza, the perpetrator of this hideous crime, now joins the annals of tragic history as one of the world’s worst rampage killers. Perhaps that was his aim? In addition Sandy Hook School will be added to the list of violent USA school massacres and once again society looks for answers.

Portrait of a killer: What drove Lanza to embark on his murderous spree? Attempts to make sense of events will hinge on an understanding of the killer’s psychology. So what do those who knew the 20-year-old think drove him to mass murder? (independent.co.uk)

It’s a sad fact that Sandy Hook elementary school, like Columbine High School, the Dunblane shooting in the UK and to an extent the 2011 Norway attacks, will remain for ever famous simply because of violence and tragedy. None of these previous incidents or the current one will ever be noted as the end of similar incidents in the future. Possibly the only good thing that will come from this latest tragedy is the increased impetus for debate around causation factors.

Columbine massacre: …The shooting resulted in an increased emphasis on school security, and a moral panic aimed at goth culture, social outcasts, gun culture, the use of pharmaceutical anti-depressants by teenagers, teenage Internet use and violent video games…(wikipedia.org)

How long that debate continues is another factor but that said, the usual knee jerk reactions to the tragedy will undoubtedly abound. Calls for tighter gun control must be expected, that’s always a prevalent and predominant theme (not least in Europe) however; despite the USA being armed to the teeth, are greater gun control measures in the USA ever likely to be more than just part of the answer?

I doubt it but I would agree with the fact; many states in the USA could do with being more stringent with their legislation around gun permits and the ownership and storeage of weapons.

That said, tightening gun controls in the USA will always be problematical. If you look at the situation as if our Government were trying to ban car ownership, simply because of one drunken driver who ploughed through a school playground, than you get some idea about the gravity of difficulties legislators face in the USA.

At least one (British) journalist who I’ve read stuff from since Friday, and there will no doubt be many more, seems to think the time for change is now.

“Today is not the day to engage in a policy debate about gun control”, said White House press secretary Jay Carney on the events at Sandy Hook. To which I say, yes it bloody well is…(Libby Plummer)

No matter what the USA do about their gun laws in the future, the vast majority of similar incidents in the past have proved; it is impossible to legislate against the actions of clearly unhinged individuals. That said, whether or not the perpetrator of this latest massacre was suffering from any mental disorder prior to the event, or indeed during, is somewhat open to conjecture.

The public debate, if we can call it that, which has followed the utterly tragic events in Newtown, Connecticut has been predictably disappointing… Here’s my recurring point: even if he had a personality disorder and autism or Asperger’s – and we are far from knowing anything of the kind, for certain – did this cause the incident? (Mental Health Cop)

It’s hard to believe that any stable minded individual could commit such a horrific act but, like other incidents where the killer has finished by turning the gun on him/herself, we will never know. Thankfully and despite any knee jerk theories and action, another suggestion as to causation has finally been put forward, it’s currently circulating via social media portals and it’s also one which I subscribe to.

You can help by forgetting you ever read this man’s name, and remembering the name of at least one victim. You can help by donating to mental health research instead of pointing to gun control as the problem. You can help by turning off the news…(Morgan Freeman)

Morgan Freeman has hit the nail on the head; once and for all we need to remove the conduit that promotes the notoriety and infamy craved for by so many of these sad individuals. The time has come for our media machinery to finally drop their predominantly macabre melodramatic opinionated and emotive clap-trap methods of reporting.

Police can probe the killer’s relationship with the school (see here). ‘Experts’ may also analyse what turned a high school loner into cold-blooded “Goth killer” (see here) but none of that will ever prevent a similar occurrence in the future.

These post event enquiries, although admirable and partly useful, have taken place after every like incident in the past and none of that work ever prevented the events of Friday. Why therefore should this time prove to be any different?

Related articles

• Evidence of gunman’s motives found in Connecticut school shooting investigation (independent.co.uk)
• Who was Adam Lanza? Connecticut school shooting suspect was ‘a genius and a computer geek’ (mirror.co.uk)
• Morgan Freeman Blames “Sensationalist Media” for Connecticut Shooting, Coverage of National Tragedies (thehollywoodgossip.com)
• Sandy Hook massacre: killer’s mother was a ‘big, big gun fan’ (theweek.co.uk)