I was asked to speak about the recent school shooting at Uvalde, Texas, where 17 children and two teachers died. It is extremely difficult to comprehend how someone could do this, and so the question I was asked is why?
People generally want to look for easy answers, but it is a difficult subject. While sensible gun controls may help, this may not be the “solution”.
Research shows that K-12 students who engaged in mass shootings were found to be suicidal in 92% of instances and college/university students who engaged in mass shootings were suicidal 100% of the time.
Aggression, social rejection, narcissism, fame-seeking, low self-esteem, and depression are commonalities with mass killers, specifically mass shooters. Also Identification or idolizing antisocial fictional characters is also a common behavior within these types of offenders.
Among the 25 most-cited school shooters since Columbine, 75 percent were reared in broken homes. Psychologist Dr. Peter Langman, a pre-eminent expert on school shooters, found that most came from incredibly broken homes of not just divorce and separation, but also infidelity, substance abuse, criminal behavior, domestic violence, and child abuse.
These are issues which could be addressed by fostering a more spiritual outlook on life along with promoting the qualities of compassion, kindness, resilience, etc.
