(1a) The Mental Health Reason
All too often shootings are disregarded as simply the more dire side effect of mental illness and derangement, although this method of deduction often removes all further reasoning and senses of nuance from this profoundly undefinable equation (literally, there is currently no clearly defined profile for a mass shooter, and there never will be). It is the easy answer to one of the most infinitely complex and painful issues that has divided the world to date. Mental health is certainly an important factor as to what leads to said violence, but it is absolutely not the only factor that contributes. And even if it were, environmental factors and realities of life are often the leading contributors to the mental health crisis itself.
I know what you’re about to say. “Guns bad! / Don’t give guns to the mentally unfit! / Ban automatic guns!”, and yes, the leniency of gun distribution among the populace (especially in the USA) can lead someone to easier means of committing mass violence. Then again, as has been said time and time again, just simply owning a gun does not mean you will automatically feel inclined to use it to commit unwarranted violence on others. There is obviously an extra step to be considered before this conclusion. Although guns are often the weapon of choice, guns themselves do not cause violence just as video games also do not. Automatic weapons aren’t the only guns that are used in mass shooting events, so banning them would only change the type of gun used in future events. In other countries where guns are illegal, mass violence is still possible through the use of knives or physical assault, although there is a much lower fatality count, there is still death and suffering for all involved. This again, leads back to the issue of mental health. What criteria would be appropriate to implement in order to lessen gun violence? Most shooters indeed do have some form of mental health issue, but majority are undiagnosed at the time of the violence. Just like many suicide victims, who are undiagnosed at the time of their death, commit suicide to the shock of their friends and family. Mental health is an extremely sensitive and nuanced issue that is very personal to each individual. Someone with depression may have suicidal or homicidal tendencies, but either side of this spectrum is able to be hidden deep beneath the surface. I would be bold enough to say that a good amount of people with mental health issues only want to punish and hurt themselves, but it can easily be concealed and lied about, meaning that evading being disqualified from buying a gun would also, be very easy. Don't you think this energy should be going toward improving mental health institutions as a whole, instead of trying to restrict the rights of mentally unwell people in a certain country? The less mentally ill people, the less violence.. right?
Mental health issues are not only something you can be born predisposed to, but just like anything else, it is something that environmental factors can have a profound impact upon. The phrase “born evil” is one I utterly despise. There is no one on this earth born evil, nor are there any that are born good. Each being has a certain balance of expression, sometimes that balance can be tipped off and attain a degree of re-balance, it is perfectly natural to lean in either direction and it is not simply dumbed-down to ‘good and evil’. I would say it is better defined as a ‘positive and negative’ response, and neither are better than the other. But when the balance has been tipped to such a dramatic degree, it is more than likely due to life factors and the external environment in which that being resides, not some mysterious inherent evil waiting to be awakened. External factors and circumstances have a much higher degree of influence than given credit for in these events, and often when instances of mass violence appear in the public eye, there has been a history of common understanding among similarly affected groups when that underlying context is applied and revealed. Even relatives of victims of a mass shooting event often express sympathy and understanding toward the suspect when there is context. This reflects in the exact same way as in suicides, a person who has been tipped to the furthest degree and sees no other way out, no other form of redemption for their injustice and hatred for the way they have been treated, attracting the same frequency of profound sympathy once their lifelong suffering has been revealed after death. It’s only when the victim has taken others with him, our sympathy seems to become socially unacceptable, even if the people that caused the victims suffering are the targets. If you’re gonna suffer, suffer on your own!
This degree of sympathy among the populace implies that there is more beyond the surface, there is a greater reason for why these tragedies take place, even recognized by those most directly affected. There still isn’t a clearly defined and reliable profile that fits every unique proponent of a mass shooting, because the truth is, anyone who is pushed far enough beyond their limits, who sorrowfully realizes the terrible life circumstances of themselves and others, who gets to a point of total desolation and dejection, has a prime opportunity to become one, and/or commit suicide. And the victims of this wrath suffer and die for it, but the blood is not only on the perpetrator’s hands, it is on the system as a whole. The shooters themselves cannot be profiled, but the workplaces, schools and societal structures at large very well can be.
(1b) The Copycat Reason
Another reason which shooting events are brushed under the rug of is the Copycat. This line of reasoning implies a certain debilitating amnesia that should require a diagnosis. To simply brush off such an outburst of rage and destruction as just another of it’s kind, just part of an unimportant trend for the sake of attention is ignorance of the highest caliber. It at least requires a total denial of the inner nature present in all beings including yourself, and the fact that each of us have our own individual lives that greatly influence our decision making and outcomes. There are so many intricate little details that surround and exceed our entire life, the human soul picks up on everything it is submerged in. To narrow another person down to just being a ‘copycat’ with the goal of attention for the sake of attention (postmortem, shooters usually commit suicide), with no further context does not help anyone. You choose to ignore suffering and be blind to a pattern that will outline a greater context and highlight a major problem.
You would have to be blind to your own past suffering, or to have never suffered at all, to think of a event like this in this way. You would have to be dreadfully apathetic not only to the perpetrator but the victims of the event as well. You take away everything that the event stands for and represents. You reduce lives to nothing and take nothing away from it. It is anti-intellectual and severely misguided. When mass shooting events happen and pick up on similar methods and sentiments of a previous one, does that not indicate a bigger problem than someone copying just to copy? Does that not mean that maybe, just maybe, there is a ‘hidden’ (or ignored) demographic just outside of your perception in which there are others who feel the same way as the previous did? That at any moment anyone, even someone you know, could also become a victim, or even a perpetrator? There is a lot more than meets the eye that just the surface level of a shooting, and taking on the sentiments of a previous shooting does not rid it of it’s meaning or significance. It just further proves that people have been unfairly treated and greatly upset about the same problems for decades upon decades. And excuses like these only further the divide and worsen cultural pain.
(2) The System Bruised but Forever Unbroken
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(3) The People Enslaved but Selflessly Willful
The obvious reason for why these massacres feel so far removed from the instincts of many is because they don’t think violence is the answer to resolve these obvious problems within society. Most reasonable people would rather take what they can get and try to live their lives as peacefully as possible, the path most traveled. Yet the path of revenge and suicide still appeals to some, and it is not beaten or overgrown. In fact, more seem to be walking it each day. And despite the ‘peaceful’ lives of the many, their worlds are still rife with misery under the power they feel they have no choice but to bow to. It is still that of an intense degree of suffering, also at risk of ending in suicide, and they have no idea how they could ever have the power to make change. Yet each are still fighting the others in their own particular ways.
DO NOT BE FOOLED: the peaceful can still have an inherent violence within them. They push and shove each other to climb the never-ending corporate and social ladder toward infinite debt and inevitable loneliness, toward a future in a world where no one is ever truly satisfied or fulfilled. They will manipulate, lie, steal, insult, belittle, purposefully misunderstand, will do anything to get above the rest. The everlasting battle is simultaneously selfless in the eyes of who ever is higher up, and selfish from the eyes within and below. None are immune to the urge to fight, ripping apart others lives and feeding at their flesh. A gun or explosive is only more direct and less socially acceptable. It is not abnormal for people to side with the powerful over the victim in order to get on the higher ups good side, whether to get a promotion, look ‘cooler’ among their peers, gain more power above the others within their environment or to simply save their own ass. And these perceptibly more ‘moral’ and ‘right’ actions ultimately lead to dire consequences for the less fortunate within that environment. Students and workers are pitted against each other constantly, desperately fighting for the next rung up on the hierarchy so they don’t become the next victim at the bottom of the food chain. The peaceful side has arguably been violent for a lot longer than the other side has been attempting to make a violent statement against said violence. Without the peaceful side’s inherent violence, there would be no need for the opposites sides violent resistance and rebellion. Yet, most choose to remain oblivious to this very obvious fact.
Seeing as most people don’t react by grabbing their duffle bag, sawed-off shotgun and a folder stuffed with a hate-infused manifesto (instead preferring to use a more social kind of shotgun), there must be a reason for this general preference and apathetic distancing from the people within their own class. Thus, I come to the pillars of consciousness. One of the only reasons the system has legs to stand on is the total fear and insecurities of the people underneath it, which in turn fosters the hellish environment. This fear and insecurity is perfectly reasonable and explainable. These fears are life-threatening, and these fears are social-risking. The two pillars on which our human consciousness stands and thrives, social life and existence itself. These fears hold power and labor to those who know how to exploit it, and usually the people get the bare minimum out of it, whether it is realized or not. People will willfully put themselves in often dangerous, soul-sucking and humiliating situations to keep their head above the water, to have a place to sleep at night and food to eat each day. To survive socially and have friends to confide in. Without both of these two things, a human understandably has very little chance of surviving or living a wholesome life in this cold, unrelenting world. When either of these things cease to become available, that person can very easily slip underneath the foot of greater society and their situation can become a detriment to their downfall. Not only this, but when a person’s emotional and social needs are left unmet for too long their ability to reason can become greatly fractured, leading to typically unsavory choices becoming the only foreseeable options from their point of view. A major problem which perpetuates victimization is that the victim is often blamed for their own circumstances without any further context, and the cycle continues. Many more victims fall due to loneliness or starvation, of soul or of body. It is purely designed, whether it means to or not, so only the elite and the most willing-to-be-exploited people (and sometimes not even them) can survive. The ones who are forced into the bottom section of society and drown is a much bigger portion than society seems to acknowledge, it’s just ‘a part of life’ to most. The reason why this demographic often remains silent is because their lives end in suicide, still one of the most controversial topics yet to be unbiasedly discussed. Only more pain and more death lie in our path if we continue to stay apathetic, ignorant, selfish and willful to a system that will inevitably destroy our natural world and take our inherently loving human spirit down with it.
(4) The Ones Who Stood Before; The Problem of Misrepresentation
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(5) Disarm with a Smile
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“THE WORLD SAYS: “YOU HAVE NEEDS – SATISFY THEM. YOU HAVE AS MUCH RIGHT AS THE RICH AND THE MIGHTY. DON’T HESITATE TO SATISFY YOUR NEEDS AND DEMAND MORE.” THIS IS THE WORLDLY DOCTRINE OF TODAY. AND THEY BELIEVE THAT THIS IS FREEDOM. THE RESULT FOR THE RICH IS ISOLATION AND SUICIDE, FOR THE POOR ENVY AND MURDER.” - FYODOR DOSTOYEVSKY, THE BROTHERS KARAMAZOV
