Why are School shooters always white teenage guys?

[hayley2003]

Mass school shooters are not girls, not minorities, not gang members. It's always a white teenage guy who acts alone.

and he is not trying to kill specific individuals, he is just trying to kill as many people as possible, and doesn't care who they are.

Why don't girls do it to?
Why not other ethnic types?
Gangs seem like they would be the most likely, but they don't.

[Moriya]

NOBODY should be shooting up any establishment yet here the fuck we are.

[Jinglebottom]

The VT Daily Chronicle :arrow: Ramblings of the Wise

[Ace.]

No offence but females are very bad at guns. Some people like Brenda Spencer killed some, but usually they fail like the Youtube HQ shooter.

[Dalcourt]

No offence but females are very bad at guns. Some people like Brenda Spencer killed some, but usually they fail like the Youtube HQ shooter.

Well I dunno if that is true. I mean you don't have to be a brilliant shot to kill someone if you shoot into a group of unarmed people. Those people shoot at random and don't need a special aim.
So I don't really think that better shooting skills in males are the reason.

[ShineintheDark]

I feel different groups act out and get violent in different ways. Bullied and lonely Muslim kids are more likely to be radicalized (the examples being many of the young terrorists and ISIS recruits). Young, disillusioned black boys in impoverished conditions appear more likely to join gang violence. Even most disadvantaged white kids tend to commit more violent crimes as opposed to shooting up schools. As for the boy/girl disparity, I guess it can be caused by the difference in bullying: boys tend to be the victims of more physical, rough bullying whilst with girls it tends to be more psychological. That;s why young girls have a higher reported mental illness rate whilst young boys tend to act out more violently.

[Jinglebottom]

Guys are more violent than girls, as far as I know.

[Ace.]

Well I dunno if that is true. I mean you don't have to be a brilliant shot to kill someone if you shoot into a group of unarmed people. Those people shoot at random and don't need a special aim.
So I don't really think that better shooting skills in males are the reason.

Males have better strength to use against recoil so less recoil == good aim == more kills.

[Dalcourt]

Males have better strength to use against recoil so less recoil == good aim == more kills.

Yeah sure but girls could at least try to kill others when they are pissed off, right. I don't think the hight of the death toll matters that much.

Question is why do females not react same as males as I see it and why the lonely wolf school shooters is more likely to be white than black.

It's more a question of profiling and psychology than of physical strength.

[mattsmith48]

Well boys are just more likely to use violence then girls and the majority of people in the US are white so statistically it makes sense that when a mass shooting happens it is more likely the suspect will be a white male, which is the case, the majority of mass killings in the US are done by white male.

[Uniquemind]

Mass school shooters are not girls, not minorities, not gang members. It's always a white teenage guy who acts alone.

and he is not trying to kill specific individuals, he is just trying to kill as many people as possible, and doesn't care who they are.

Why don't girls do it to?
Why not other ethnic types?
Gangs seem like they would be the most likely, but they don't.

Girls express their ego differently, than guys do. Having to feel powerful
Comes from a sense of cooperation and social cohesion for girls and when socially ostracized and isolated, like a cat THEN as a last resort girls get into physical fights, but it’s not the go to method typically. If force is needed it’s safer for girls to manipulate a guy friend to fight for them, and this serves as protection from damaging their looks or beauty, which itself holds power more so than muscles for women.


Guys communication is facilitated more through actions and physical social functions like construction or sports or battlefields of war. Physicality solves disputes, and that’s ingrained since a young age.

So for a guy who feels bullied, to feel empowered again, the context of revenge is often through physical violence and revenge through physical harm, versus females whose context solution is through social manipulation to isolate from the group, find another social group that does accept them, or be a shrinking violet and keep to oneself albeit depressed possibly other mental illness stressors.

Criminologist know these patterns too; they are quite significant. If a women does decide to procure the power of death, they use poisons or non-direct methods of harm. Research female serial killers and you’ll see this pattern too.


For the record:

1. the Virginia tech college shooting was male but : Asian with a higher victim count than Texas.

2. The YouTube headquarters shooting was a minority women; who felt persecuted on how monetization policies on her YouTube channel got restrictive.

So not ALWAYS male and not always white.

I’m sure testosterone levels and certain tendencies of brain wiring that allow for fixation of thoughts is a more common variable we’ll discover in all violent-prone individuals but I don’t know of any studies that have looked at those variables yet.

I’ll add that to commit an act so terrible, I bet a common mental scenario is all these shooters or all violence crime committers have been stuck on a grudge or violent hunger urge that doesn’t allow them to calm down or truely vent emotional rage. Whatever occurs is brain wiring specific called perseveration and I really do wonder if that’s a core feature in all psychopaths.

Most people get angry, calm down and move on, but something deeper at a psychic level is happening here. It’s not perceptible to outward appearances either, so it’s not race or even gender....


I think it is both brain-wiring and hormonal level balances as well as environment social factors that when mixed together create scenarios like this. That’s my educated guess; so any new law or policies need to approach the topic using this knowledge base in mind.


—-

As for gangs, gangs are different because you are looking at psychology of group identity versus other group identities (rival gangs, cops) and not just a singular person’s identity relative to society at large.

So anger and ego are expressed differently, rival gangs want control, want to live and yet feel powerful or respected. They’ll kill other rival gang members, or make strategic moves for power and control, but their aim isn’t purely to express a moment of revenge or rage.

Shooters however have a moment of uncontrolled rage, repressed anger and a sense of victimhood, revenge is their goal, the bloodshed and scream of their victims give them a psychological power orgasm to make a metaphor here.

When they’re done they are kind of emotionally dumb from the high, their brain processes the fact they got their revenge now, now what? They’re confused emotionally numb from the wrathful energies they engaged in their mind. The high (like a drug) is gone, and they are no less happy with who they turned out to be in the long run. Violence is not the answer never was.

[InternetTeen]

Not all shooters are male.
Ever heard of: 'I don't like mondays'. It was a song written after a girl shot up an elementary school across the street from her house. When asked why she did it she said "I don't like Mondays" and was bored and wanted to liven things up.

However violent crimes are much more common in men

Males constituted 98.9% of those arrested for forcible rape
Males constituted 87.9% of those arrested for robbery
Males constituted 85.0% of those arrested for burglary
Males constituted 83.0% of those arrested for arson.
Males constituted 81.7% of those arrested for vandalism.
Males constituted 81.5% of those arrested for motor-vehicle theft.
Males constituted 79.7% of those arrested for offenses against family and children.
Males constituted 77.8% of those arrested for aggravated assault
Males constituted 58.7% of those arrested for fraud.

[Uniquemind]

https://mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKCN1IL0D9

^

That article just proves my point, in the shooter’s mind, he felt he was challenged or victimized by that Shana girl who in her point of view was standing up to him, but that’s not how he took it, so he responded with a doubled-down commitment to aggression.

The subjective perception of what constitutes being bullied seems to be a variable in a lot of these cases and how sensitive someone of these behavior profiles seem to be.

[hayley2003]

OK, its 99% of the time, if that helps people. I shall rephrase

Why are school shooters 99% of the time white teenage guys?

[Stronk Serb]

OK, its 99% of the time, if that helps people. I shall rephrase

Why are school shooters 99% of the time white teenage guys?

The Santa Fe shooter was a bisexual Greek. I don't know, to be honest. I also think that no two school shooters are the same, regarding motives and such.

[hayley2003]

The Santa Fe shooter was a bisexual Greek. I don't know, to be honest. I also think that no two school shooters are the same, regarding motives and such.

hi, your perception is that there is no similarities or pattern between the shooters?

It is ok if that that is your perception.

my perception is that there is a pattern of white teenage boys who are the ones into public schools and start killing people.



hi.... Criminologist know these patterns too; they are quite significant. If a women does decide to procure the power of death, they use poisons or non-direct methods of harm. Research female serial killers and you’ll see this pattern too.

i am surprised you decided to focus on the word "always" as if that is was the most most important part of the question, then feel the need to spend the rest of your comments focused on why its not always true by going off on unrelated tangents such as women who are serial killers.

My question has nothing to do with women who are serial killers because we are not seeing women going into schools and killing people.

Please limited your comments to public school mass shootings, not make the discussion about all serial killers or who knows what simply to prove that my question is not true 100% of the time in the wider perspective of murders and serial killers.

however, since did i used the word "always" incorrectly, I will make a correction so there is less confusion:

Why are nearly all the mass shooting in public schools committed by one white boy?


double posts merged ~ Val

[Uniquemind]

i am surprised you decided to focus on the word "always" as if that is was the most most important part of the question, then feel the need to spend the rest of your comments focused on why its not always true by going off on unrelated tangents such as women who are serial killers.

My question has nothing to do with women who are serial killers because we are not seeing women going into schools and killing people.

Please limited your comments to public school mass shootings, not make the discussion about all serial killers or who knows what simply to prove that my question is not true 100% of the time in the wider perspective of murders and serial killers.

however, since did i used the word "always" incorrectly, I will make a correction so there is less confusion:

Why are nearly all the mass shooting in public schools committed by one white boy?


Sorry, I only did that to compare contrast a point; I shouldn’t have used all caps.

I also talked about gangs behavior and compared it to the criminal behavior of mass shootings.

My post was quite large and aimed to address a lot of different questions you gave in the OP.


Also we now know from recent media reports, this Texas shooter did target people he didn’t like. He did spare people he liked enough.

One of his first victims was a girl who rejected him repeatedly over the time period of 4 months, until she publically embarrassed him in an attempt to stand up for herself.

—

As to the question of why the profile of mass shooters tends to be white versus males of other races? I have no idea but I think a clue for research would be to look at social expectations we have in society for members of each race and see if that’s a contributing factor.

People for political correctness reasons seem not to want to mention the Caucasian male correlation of this specific crime behavior, because you’re right it is predominantly white male culprits.

[Dev.]

NOBODY should be shooting up any establishment yet here the fuck we are.

Preach

[Stronk Serb]

hi, your perception is that there is no similarities or pattern between the shooters?

It is ok if that that is your perception.

my perception is that there is a pattern of white teenage boys who are the ones into public schools and start killing people.

What I said is that there is no similarities between motives, not school shooters.

https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/shooters_not_white_males_1.19.pdf

Also this is interesting, it shows like 50 or so people who shot up a school and are not white males.

[scott2002]

Well boys are just more likely to use violence than girls
Think about it. At school, when one boy gets really angry with another boy, what do they do? They get in a physical fight and try to physically hurt each other. But when a girl gets really angry at another girl, what does she do? Usually she'll go after her emotionally. Ostracizing her, trying to get nobody to be friends with her, telling others mean things about her, etc. It's much less likely for two girls to get into a physical fight. But for guys we seem to turn first to violence.

[Dalcourt]

What I said is that there is no similarities between motives, not school shooters.

https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/shooters_not_white_males_1.19.pdf

Also this is interesting, it shows like 50 or so people who shot up a school and are not white males.

Even the original poster worded her question new and we all agree that it is not the case that 100 per cent of the school shootings are done by white males.
So yeah your list of female and non white school shooters may be interesting but end of the day we can't deny the fact that the vast majority of the shooters is male and that among the males the majority is white.

Why do we have such a problem with even acknowledging this fact? Is it cuz the majority of us VT members is part of this group or what?

People are quick to jump to a conclusion when it comes to Muslims or Black people for example.
They have no problem with pointing out that since so many Muslims radicalise themselves we should be wary of all of them. They always defend actions of police brutality against black people with the fact that they are more likely to commit a crime than white people and therefore they are potentially more dangerous and police are right to shoot first and ask later.
We never seem to have a problem with prejudices and ethnical profiling here.

So instead of defending the white male and pointing out female and non white shooters I guess hayley2003 is more interested in a discussion on the motives and not just plain numbers.

One big motif in my opinion is hurt pride and rejection. And why is it that our main group deals so badly with it?
Is it due to certain expectations society has that this group reacts so badly to it?

I feel this question that is asked here would be very interesting to answer. And if we would be prepared to admit that there is a certain group or pattern behind most of those shootings I feel we could also make a huge step towards avoiding those tragedies in future.
Banning guns alone won't stop a pattern of behaviour and action that is stamped in our minds from our birth.

Why do males react so different than females? They learnt that it is important to be in charge/ to be the boss...and if you get rejected how should you deal with it? Violence?
These are the real questions that could help us here not the denial of a fact everyone can see.

[TheMagicPotato]

Most school shooters are seriously mental people. They have serious problem in their homes. They are bullied in school. They simply don't have good lives. If you look at the motivation that we know about it does seem to be that men handle their catastrophic loss and self esteem worse than women.

Mental Illness, Abuse, Grievance. These are key factors in a shooter. Now, the most important thing here is: America's Gun Laws.

Men all around the world suffer from these problems. But, almost every shooting occurs in the USA.

Women tend to see violence as a last resort, as a self-defence mechanism. You use violence if you have to, if there's no other way out. Men are different, they use violence as a form of intimidation and as synonym of masculinity.

That's pretty much it. But, the biggest reason school shootings happen, it's because USA's loose gun laws.

[Snowfox]

Mass school shooters are not girls, not minorities, not gang members. It's always a white teenage guy who acts alone.

and he is not trying to kill specific individuals, he is just trying to kill as many people as possible, and doesn't care who they are.

Why don't girls do it to?
Why not other ethnic types?
Gangs seem like they would be the most likely, but they don't.

Maybe it is because that group is most persecuted group in USA and in most of west.

[Tim the Enchanter]

Maybe it is because that group is most persecuted group in USA and in most of west.

Persecuted? Nah, definitely not in America

[Hermes]

Why are school shooters 99% of the time white teenage guys?

The important thing to consider is how the proportion compares to proportion of the population. That means the fact that 99% are male and yet the population at large is more like 50% means there has to be something highly significant about being male here and other people have already gone into theories about that.

The question mentions age and I am not sure anyone else has addresses that. Again age is much more evenly distributed in the population as a whole than within the perpetrators. One possibility is the teenage years are a time of intense emotion and that people get better at managing their emotions with age.

One thing the question did not ask, but seems pertinent is why that particular kind of shooting seems to always happen in the USA. Partly that may be because the available of guns in general, and automatic or semi-automatic weapons in particular, makes using a gun a practical way to kill multiple people in the USA whereas, for example in the UK, if you want to do the same you have to resort to bombs or driving cars at people which have both happened here. But, when you include the bombings and motor vehicle incidents in the UK the "white majority" trait disappears because many of the perpetrators of those incidents are ethnic.

So, we're left to speculate about whether there is something about the social environment in the USA that tends to provoke these shootings - perhaps some kind of stress - or whether it is fundamentally caused by deprivation and it just so happens that in the USA deprivation is a reality even for many of the white majority whereas here in the UK it is biased towards ethnic minorities.

[Dalcourt]

Persecuted? Nah, definitely not in America

But I often get the impression that white males feel somehow persecuted in America.
Like they assume for historical reasons they are the dominant and superior group of people in society and liberalism is scratching at this position.
They see other groups catch up to them or even overtake them and this has very negative effects on how they perceive themselves. So I guess feeling persecuted is not so wrong as a description for how they feel.

[conradpjones]

I don't know if that is a completely true, but you are right it is mainly guys. My question would be what are their motives? they kill people and then kill themself! doesnt make sense

[azurzg]

doesnt make sense

I don't think it's supposed to make sense.

I am not sure we can understand insanity without going (at least a little) insane ourselves.

[Uniquemind]

I don't think it's supposed to make sense.

I am not sure we can understand insanity without going (at least a little) insane ourselves.

The thing about insanity though, is that person A’s version of insanity is not the same as person B’s version of insanity. Both have lost it, but they can’t be looked at with the same lens.


I think what others have said since I last posted makes sense too, especially with what Dalcourt’s brought up as talking points.


The other question implied here is why is it always a school?

And my attempt at an answer is that these perpetrators always return to commit the crime in a place that holds a significant place or origin to whatever triggered them emotionally.

These school shootings involving teen white males sound eerily familiar to some cases of adult men who have gone on to shoot up their coworkers and bosses or family members. It’s like the same psychological dynamic at play.

It suggests that such crimes are semi-targeted, and if they can’t find the exact people they want to take out, they’ll take out anybody symbolically significant enough to whatever power structure they feel oppressed them.

[hayley2003]

Even the original poster worded her question new and we all agree that it is not the case that 100 per cent of the school shootings are done by white males.
So yeah your list of female and non white school shooters may be interesting but end of the day we can't deny the fact that the vast majority of the shooters is male and that among the males the majority is white.

yeah, i did find that list interesting and it was something i did not know about. it is my impression that the list includes people who specifically targeted just 1-2 individuals and the shooter's intent was not a mass shooting. My original question is focused on "Mass Shootings" that occur in public schools, not so much shootings where a person targets a specific person(s) while at a school, nor shootings where a person has a gun at school and ends up using it when a fight breaks out; something that was not planned. These are bad things too, just not the focus of what i am trying to understand better "Mass shootings in a public schools".

[Dmaxd123]

i've said it before maybe on VT maybe not, I can't remember:

the problem is our mental states:
- i see too many parents that try to be their kids "friend" when that isn't what we need... i'm glad my parents are my parents and my friends are my friends.
- our society is so hell bent on inclusion that we have gone too far and everyone gets a trophy so as we get older some people can't handle not getting a proverbial trophy
- respect isn't in every household anymore, when you learn to respect your parents then you learn to respect other adults and then the others around us but if you can't learn respect in a household you won't respect your teachers or fellow students and won't value them


I would guess that a majority of those that resort to shooting others in a manner other than self defense come from a home where they weren't cared about.

We all have shit in our lives but it's a matter of how we were taught to deal with it that makes the difference.

[Hermes]

- our society is so hell bent on inclusion that we have gone too far and everyone gets a trophy so as we get older some people can't handle not getting a proverbial trophy.

So instead some people should realise what a failure they are, not just now but how much of a failure they must have been since early childhood by virtue of never had been given any kind of trophy or award?

The principle behind awards and trophies is it builds the connection between making an effort, that effort leading to improvement and that improvement having a reward. That can't be done through competition alone because there would be too few winners for the encouragement to work so rewards need to be for relative improvement, i.e. that child doing better than they have previously.

As for these shootings being connected to parenting style and issues around respect I don't think it is as simple as that. I think by the time someone does something like that, knowing that it is wrong and having respect for authority will make no difference. While I haven't checked out exactly how many of each the gunmen sometimes kill themselves and other times they are shot by police. Anyone who was thinking rationally about such an attack would therefore be expecting to factor in their own death and therefore would have no fear of the consequences.

Given the concentration of these attacks in the USA I think there are at least three contributing factors:

1. Some vulnerability in the person concerned whether a diagnosable mental illness or similar condition or not.
2. Some pressure exerted on that person by the social environment which interacts with that vulnerability.
3. Easily available guns with which to carry out the attack.

There is a separate debate about guns so it is the first two that I want to look at here. Clearly many people grow up in American society and the vast majority do not go on to shoot up schools so the general influence of society cannot be working alone.

People also suffer genetic conditions that affect their brain development and suffer from mental heath issues in many parts of the world and most of these don't go on to do this either.

So the fact there is a concentration of these attacks in the USA suggests it must be the combination of the two.

[NewLeafsFan]

White teens are the most common demographic group in high schools. Boys are usually raised closer to guns. So there you go.

[Stronk Serb]

Even the original poster worded her question new and we all agree that it is not the case that 100 per cent of the school shootings are done by white males.
So yeah your list of female and non white school shooters may be interesting but end of the day we can't deny the fact that the vast majority of the shooters is male and that among the males the majority is white.

Why do we have such a problem with even acknowledging this fact? Is it cuz the majority of us VT members is part of this group or what?

People are quick to jump to a conclusion when it comes to Muslims or Black people for example.
They have no problem with pointing out that since so many Muslims radicalise themselves we should be wary of all of them. They always defend actions of police brutality against black people with the fact that they are more likely to commit a crime than white people and therefore they are potentially more dangerous and police are right to shoot first and ask later.
We never seem to have a problem with prejudices and ethnical profiling here.

So instead of defending the white male and pointing out female and non white shooters I guess hayley2003 is more interested in a discussion on the motives and not just plain numbers.

One big motif in my opinion is hurt pride and rejection. And why is it that our main group deals so badly with it?
Is it due to certain expectations society has that this group reacts so badly to it?

I feel this question that is asked here would be very interesting to answer. And if we would be prepared to admit that there is a certain group or pattern behind most of those shootings I feel we could also make a huge step towards avoiding those tragedies in future.
Banning guns alone won't stop a pattern of behaviour and action that is stamped in our minds from our birth.

Why do males react so different than females? They learnt that it is important to be in charge/ to be the boss...and if you get rejected how should you deal with it? Violence?
These are the real questions that could help us here not the denial of a fact everyone can see.

The part from where I would start regarding school shootings is:
-The family of the shooter, how did he live there, the stuff home etc.
-How the shooter was treated in school, was he bullied or not, some studies shown that bullying is not present in all cases of school shootings
-How the hell he obtained the weapons
-Why the hell wasn't he put in an asylum before if he displayed symptoms of any disorder
-Because most of them are teens, I think their enviroment is to blame for not helping them, teens are always influenced by enviroment

What I see as kind of a pattern is that most of them felt that they were not accepted or pushed away. The Santa Fe shooter's first victim or one of his victims was a girl who refused to date him.

[Dmaxd123]

Hermes check out the last sentence of Stronk Serb's post.

I'm not saying it needs to be 100% in your face you lost the game but our society has become so politically correct, pat everyone on the back and tell them they are a winner that when LIFE HAPPENS people don't know how to deal with it



In reply to Stronk Serb's comment about why they weren't in an asylum I'm going with a 2 fold answer
1. goes directly hand-in-hand with your first comment about family/home... or lack of
2. even when the family does say "jr has a problem" it's hard for the family to outwardly say it, then the mental health system is backed up where the professionals are probably saying "well jr. hasn't done anything yet so he isn't top priority"

[Dalcourt]

Stronk Serb Dmaxd123 I kinda understand what you are trying to say. But on the other hand it sounds like a way to find apologies and justifications for mass murderers.

The poor guy was rejected by a girl so he can snap and shoot up a school? How many people in the world do you think get rejected in one way or other by anyone? So it kinda sounds it was the girls fault.

So mental instability, rejection, family problems...this can be factors that play a part in it but I don't see it as the main cause. One of the main causes is that white males always have been told by society they are better than anyone else and that's why they deal so much worse with those problems.

NewLeafsFan sure white teens are the most common demographic group in most high schools but not in all high schools. Furthermore if you look at crime stats in general people love to point out how blacks dominate the statistics and how they have more potential to do a crime so why should this pattern be broken here? What do you think is the explanation?

[trackinglife]

Mass school shooters are not girls, not minorities, not gang members. It's always a white teenage guy who acts alone.

and he is not trying to kill specific individuals, he is just trying to kill as many people as possible, and doesn't care who they are.

Why don't girls do it to?
Why not other ethnic types?
Gangs seem like they would be the most likely, but they don't.


https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/shooters_not_white_males_1.19.pdf

Not all of those in the list qualify as mass shootings by the Federal governments standard of 4 or more dead. But that is not for lack of trying on the killers part. For example Tyrone Mitchell in 1984 killed 2 but injured 12 the injured just happened to survive. So with school shootings I don't think it is necessarily helpful to frame the conversation around whether or not it was really a mass shooting or not.

[trackinglife]

Even the original poster worded her question new and we all agree that it is not the case that 100 per cent of the school shootings are done by white males.
So yeah your list of female and non white school shooters may be interesting but end of the day we can't deny the fact that the vast majority of the shooters is male and that among the males the majority is white.

Why do we have such a problem with even acknowledging this fact? Is it cuz the majority of us VT members is part of this group or what?

People are quick to jump to a conclusion when it comes to Muslims or Black people for example.
They have no problem with pointing out that since so many Muslims radicalise themselves we should be wary of all of them. They always defend actions of police brutality against black people with the fact that they are more likely to commit a crime than white people and therefore they are potentially more dangerous and police are right to shoot first and ask later.
We never seem to have a problem with prejudices and ethnical profiling here.

So instead of defending the white male and pointing out female and non white shooters I guess hayley2003 is more interested in a discussion on the motives and not just plain numbers.

One big motif in my opinion is hurt pride and rejection. And why is it that our main group deals so badly with it?
Is it due to certain expectations society has that this group reacts so badly to it?

I feel this question that is asked here would be very interesting to answer. And if we would be prepared to admit that there is a certain group or pattern behind most of those shootings I feel we could also make a huge step towards avoiding those tragedies in future.
Banning guns alone won't stop a pattern of behaviour and action that is stamped in our minds from our birth.

Why do males react so different than females? They learnt that it is important to be in charge/ to be the boss...and if you get rejected how should you deal with it? Violence?
These are the real questions that could help us here not the denial of a fact everyone can see.


But the majority of the population is also white so it sort of makes sense that more of the shooters would be white. As for why more are males well I mean more males end up in prison in general does that mean prisons are sexist? Or is it possible men are more aggressive?

[Ace.]

I don't really know why but there are many shooters that aren't white teenaged dudes but they get more attention because Columbine is being compared again. the Virginia Tech didn't get as much attention, proably because the shooter isn't similar to Columbine. Columbine had the most long-lasting effect because of the shock it created to the public. because of this, people compare shooters to them. and the ones who don't remind them of Columbine are eventually forgotten (Seung-Hui Cho and Adam Lanza).

[Uniquemind]

I don't really know why but there are many shooters that aren't white teenaged dudes but they get more attention because Columbine is being compared again. the Virginia Tech didn't get as much attention, proably because the shooter isn't similar to Columbine. Columbine had the most long-lasting effect because of the shock it created to the public. because of this, people compare shooters to them. and the ones who don't remind them of Columbine are eventually forgotten (Seung-Hui Cho and Adam Lanza).

But there was also that one guy from University of California Santa Barbara in 2014 who went on a misogynistic rant, and then killed 6 people and injured more in Isla Vista (neighboring town to the campus).

So misogynistic beliefs also seem to be a common thought-pattern in people who do these kinds of crimes.

I don’t want to go off on a tangent here but is this worth discussion too? I’ll await the OP’s guidance; this threads getting popular.

[hayley2003]

https://schoolshooters.info/sites/default/files/shooters_not_white_males_1.19.pdf

Not all of those in the list qualify as mass shootings by the Federal governments standard of 4 or more dead. But that is not for lack of trying on the killers part. For example Tyrone Mitchell in 1984 killed 2 but injured 12 the injured just happened to survive. So with school shootings I don't think it is necessarily helpful to frame the conversation around whether or not it was really a mass shooting or not.

we disagree, and that is ok :)

i think there is a signficant difference between mass shootings and shootings where the victims were selected in advance of the shooting.

[hayley2003]

I don’t want to go off on a tangent here but is this worth discussion too? I’ll await the OP’s guidance; this threads getting popular.

i think it OK to talk about broader issues that are related to mass shootings.

i mostly wanted to get a better understanding on mass school shooting in public schools. not so much individual shootings where one person wants to harm a limited number of individuals, such as a specific teacher, or x-gf, or a specific bully. more like why does a single person, which IMHO appear to be primarily single white teenage boy, goes into a public school and attempts to kill as many people as possible?

[Uniquemind]

i think it OK to talk about broader issues that are related to mass shootings.

i mostly wanted to get a better understanding on mass school shooting in public schools. not so much individual shootings where one person wants to harm a limited number of individuals, such as a specific teacher, or x-gf, or a specific bully. more like why does a single person, which IMHO appear to be primarily single white teenage boy, goes into a public school and attempts to kill as many people as possible?

Which now that you’ve mentioned it, how often does this same profile of a person also have rants or anger towards a failing sex and love life? Misogynistic attitudes and beliefs?

I think male sexual angst is maybe part of stressors of why this happens? I just don’t know.

[Stronk Serb]

Stronk Serb Dmaxd123 I kinda understand what you are trying to say. But on the other hand it sounds like a way to find apologies and justifications for mass murderers.

The poor guy was rejected by a girl so he can snap and shoot up a school? How many people in the world do you think get rejected in one way or other by anyone? So it kinda sounds it was the girls fault.

So mental instability, rejection, family problems...this can be factors that play a part in it but I don't see it as the main cause. One of the main causes is that white males always have been told by society they are better than anyone else and that's why they deal so much worse with those problems.

NewLeafsFan sure white teens are the most common demographic group in most high schools but not in all high schools. Furthermore if you look at crime stats in general people love to point out how blacks dominate the statistics and how they have more potential to do a crime so why should this pattern be broken here? What do you think is the explanation?

You did not understand me, I am not trying to justify school shootings, it's equally horrible if a guy shot up a school because a girl rejected him or if a guy shot up a school just because he felt like it one morning. Neither have any justification. If it was societal, trust me, there would be so many more white school shooters. The problem is the inability to cope with problems, yes, but not because "oh, we whiteys are better than anyone else, how dare she refuse me", but because they weren't taught to deal with them, that and I guess because white people on average have it easier, they tend to make a drama out of everything, which literally happens in every a bit richer enviroment.

[Dmaxd123]

You did not understand me, I am not trying to justify school shootings, it's equally horrible if a guy shot up a school because a girl rejected him or if a guy shot up a school just because he felt like it one morning. Neither have any justification. If it was societal, trust me, there would be so many more white school shooters. The problem is the inability to cope with problems, yes, but not because "oh, we whiteys are better than anyone else, how dare she refuse me", but because they weren't taught to deal with them, that and I guess because white people on average have it easier, they tend to make a drama out of everything, which literally happens in every a bit richer enviroment.

I agree with your statementand will add a bit

I would go one step farther and say that some of the drama goes back to the news & "reality" tv shows both showing people (any color/gender) that don't get their way raising a big stink and if they still don't get their way they increase the drama

[Stronk Serb]

I agree with your statementand will add a bit

I would go one step farther and say that some of the drama goes back to the news & "reality" tv shows both showing people (any color/gender) that don't get their way raising a big stink and if they still don't get their way they increase the drama

Yeah, me and my sister, having gone to schools with richer students, have seen and heard all kinds of drama, for the pettiest of reasons. Kids just don't realize there are people who have it worse than them, and are unwilling to acknowledge and solve their problems.

I mean if I shot up a school every time I had a problem with myself, or was in pain, there would be no students left.

[trackinglife]

we disagree, and that is ok :)

i think there is a signficant difference between mass shootings and shootings where the victims were selected in advance of the shooting.

Okay and yet Santa Fe he had certain targets in mind cause reports have said that he didn't shoot students he did like because he wanted his story told. As to the that list its a long list I really kind of doubt you checked out every name on the list to see which ones were targeted and which ones weren't. The first name on the list it wasn't targeted when asked why she (yes she a girl) did what she did her response was "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day."

[Hermes]

I'm not saying it needs to be 100% in your face you lost the game but our society has become so politically correct, pat everyone on the back and tell them they are a winner that when LIFE HAPPENS people don't know how to deal with it.

You said "lost the game" but winning/losing is not the same as success/failure, though obviously there can be a link, and if American society equates the two this could be part of the problem.

Take, for example, a man who trains as a surgeon and becomes the resident orthopaedic surgeon at some small town hospital. He doesn't win any prizes for being the best orthopaedic surgeon in the country and he doesn't ever get to be the head of department at the national centre of excellence for his specialism so in that sense he has not "won the game" but by most people's standard he is a success. He has secured a place in a profession that requires you both to be bright and work hard in order to qualify and by doing so he has assured himself a a very comfortable living. He can also take great satisfaction in helping others.

There is, absolutely, a case for being honest with people about where their level of attainment sits in absolute terms, i.e. no point in encouraging someone who has just mastered grade school maths to apply for jobs that need a maths degree even if that person is of an age where others have indeed got maths degrees. But that is not the same as not rewarding progress.

Your line of reasoning is that someone who is not used to rejection is more likely to snap when rejected for the first time whereas I believe, and I think educationalists generally do to, that it is a background of success that enables people to take occasional rejection. If someone is rejected in everything he attempts to do it is possible that one specific rejection does indeed cause him to snap and this is the straw that breaks the camel's back.

Another part of this is that rewards should be for success that comes from effort. The idea is to encourage people to believe that trying is what leads to success and that success is not a right.

[NewLeafsFan]

Stronk Serb Dmaxd123 I kinda understand what you are trying to say. But on the other hand it sounds like a way to find apologies and justifications for mass murderers.

The poor guy was rejected by a girl so he can snap and shoot up a school? How many people in the world do you think get rejected in one way or other by anyone? So it kinda sounds it was the girls fault.

So mental instability, rejection, family problems...this can be factors that play a part in it but I don't see it as the main cause. One of the main causes is that white males always have been told by society they are better than anyone else and that's why they deal so much worse with those problems.

NewLeafsFan sure white teens are the most common demographic group in most high schools but not in all high schools. Furthermore if you look at crime stats in general people love to point out how blacks dominate the statistics and how they have more potential to do a crime so why should this pattern be broken here? What do you think is the explanation?

Tbh, these are mainly guesses but unfortunately African Americans tend to make less money so maybe they are less likely to keep guns in their homes for these reason but after they leave school, they can buy decide to buy their own?

[HeyCameron]

Which now that you’ve mentioned it, how often does this same profile of a person also have rants or anger towards a failing sex and love life? Misogynistic attitudes and beliefs?

I think male sexual angst is maybe part of stressors of why this happens? I just don’t know.

Also don't forget the situations like that guy in Toronto who identified as an "incel" and killed 10 people by plowing into a crowd, and of course Elliot Roger. Sometimes sexual angst does seem to be the main motivator. For others it's less clear, but it's not usually the guys who are on top of the world who carry out these shootings, it's guys who've been bullied, rejected, that kind of thing. Not making excuses for them, just looking at possible reasons.

[Uniquemind]

Also don't forget the situations like that guy in Toronto who identified as an "incel" and killed 10 people by plowing into a crowd, and of course Elliot Roger. Sometimes sexual angst does seem to be the main motivator. For others it's less clear, but it's not usually the guys who are on top of the world who carry out these shootings, it's guys who've been bullied, rejected, that kind of thing. Not making excuses for them, just looking at possible reasons.

Which is why the Vegas guy, is interesting. From a society standpoint he was “successful “ yet he had an internal hunger to hurt people.


His existence and choice of actions suggest internal motivations for crimes of this nature outside of external motivations and circumstances.

One must wonder if the circumstances are just triggers but all of them have something different about their brains emotional processing.

[Gvanni]

what type of answer do you expect to receive asking that question? it almost sounds rhetorical, it's like asking "Why are so many convenience store owners of Asian heritage?". Would you expect an in-depth answer to that?

Most people on this thread are really talking out of there ass and pulling up false statistics, I'm usually on the other side when it comes to political things and white males in today's society, seeing as a lot of white men are woefully ignorant to how us PoC live and want to be victims, but this topic is really just attacking them.

[JustHaveFun]

ffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffffThey are not all white, this type of thing happens all over the world and many races have done this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting#Mexico

If you read the entire article you can get a pretty in depth understanding as to why this occurs, the data is based on actual studies.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting

It does occur in America more often than other countries due to the fact that Americans have easier access to firearms, in the UK firearms are illegal to posess which is why shootings in general rarely occur. If other countries had the population to firearms ratio that America has, school shootings would certainly occur just as often among other races. Also, American mainstream media loves to over sensationalize these stories which is another reason you hear about it happening more in America than other countries. Caucasions happen to make up a large portion of the population in America which is why they are the largest offenders.

[Bamf_Girl]

Because that’s all the media posts on

They are not all white, this type of thing happens all over the world and many races have done this.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting#Mexico

If you read the entire article you can get a pretty in depth understanding as to why this occurs, the data is based on actual studies.


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting

It does occur in America more often than other countries due to the fact that Americans have easier access to firearms, in the UK firearms are illegal to posess which is why shootings in general rarely occur. If other countries had the population to firearms ratio the America school shootings would certainly occur more often among other races. Also, American mainstream media loves to over sensationalize these stories which is another reason you hear about it happening more in America than other countries. Caucasions happen to make up a large portion of the population in America which is why they are the largest offenders.
If they wouldn’t share it the shooters wouldn’t be glorified

Double posts merged. Please edit your first post next time. ~Jinglebottom

[ShineintheDark]

It does occur in America more often than other countries due to the fact that Americans have easier access to firearms, in the UK firearms are illegal to posses which is why shootings in general rarely occur.
Quick fact check, guns are legal in the UK, we just have a very strict and rigorous system of background checks and licensing that ensure that only responsible owners who can guarantee correct usage and storage of the guns are permitted to carry one. It sounds pedantic to correct this but it becomes essential when discussing more successful systems alternate to the US one that we are accurate with the information.

[JustHaveFun]

Quick fact check, guns are legal in the UK, we just have a very strict and rigorous system of background checks and licensing that ensure that only responsible owners who can guarantee correct usage and storage of the guns are permitted to carry one. It sounds pedantic to correct this but it becomes essential when discussing more successful systems alternate to the US one that we are accurate with the information.

Thanks fo the fact check! I had no idea, I just knew that gun crimes are extremely low over there, I wish it was like in the USA.

[Some Kid]

Being a white teenage guy, I have no idea why someone would ever do something like that. Gangs seem to kill people the most (not in school shooting, just in general) and sometimes rob establishments, but usually it does seem to be the white teenage guys that shoot up schools (I don’t know why)

[Uniquemind]

what type of answer do you expect to receive asking that question? it almost sounds rhetorical, it's like asking "Why are so many convenience store owners of Asian heritage?". Would you expect an in-depth answer to that?

I actually have an answer to that last question there; or at least a very well-thoughtout hypothesis.