Sandy Hook Shooting Research Paper

The Sandy Hook massacre also, described as one of the deadliest shooting in all U.S history. 20 children and 6 adults were killed on December of 2012 in Newtown, Connecticut. (Connecticut) This massacre was the earliest memory I could recall on gun violence, not just learning about it but also watching it unfold and be told on news outlets all over television and social media. The Sandy Hook massacre shaped my generation by creating a more debatable topic on gun control in the United States. Through the Sociological point of view, gun violence can be understood by the functionalism, conflict, and symbolic theoretical approach. While trying to understand such event with such theories, we begin to unfold how society has shifted and changed over time, how we as a society view gun violence today and what we have done to prevent such act to happen again.

The Sandy Hook shooting in Newtown, Massachusetts was one of the worst school shootings in recent memory and there were changes and precautions in security in the U.S., in schools and out. After the shooting, not just the Newtown School District changed their security, but so did most of the country. Vice President of the NRA Wayne LePierre started a movement so that there could be trained and armed volunteers in 100,000 schools.

Friday, December 14, 2012 will forever be a date not necessarily marked on our calendars, but in our hearts. While millions of Americans continued their normal routines, innocent children’s lives, as well as a handful of heroic teachers, were taken away in a matter of seconds, since “each victim was shot three to eleven times,” according to medical examiner, H. Wayne Carver (Circa Part 4). Superintendent Janet Robinson commented, “A lot of children are alive today because of actions the teachers took.” (Circa Part 10) A total of twenty-six individuals were tragically murdered because why? That answer will never be answered since Lanza committed suicide at the scene as police were on their way, which leaves no closure for the victims’ family and friends. The Newtown, Connecticut shooting caused an increased in protection at schools by implementing new gun laws and changing America’s views about the

To be afraid is no less an innate behavior than to be hungry. To find relief we look to fill ourselves with comfort and content, but there will always be hunger, and there will always be fear. We as human beings cannot control our surroundings, and with them the fear that hides underneath and in-between. We cannot escape the feeling of fear or its constant pestering, but we may control how we react to it. Those affected by the unspeakable events at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December of 2012 have come face to face with terror, many sweet and innocent souls coming so close as to shake hands with death. Closely following responses of differing viewpoint and opinion ensued, regarding what had happened and what is to be done in the future.

Mass shootings are a common tragedy in the United States, and they have been for years. With school shootings being rather prominent, several persons in the public eye choose to speak out against such behavior. Barack Obama’s speech titled, “Interfaith Prayer Vigil Address at Newtown High School” was delivered in Newtown, Connecticut on December 16, 2012 and addressed the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. He uses modes of emotional appeals, including ethos, pathos, and logos to attain the trust of American citizens; as well as pacify those affected.

When parents dropped off their kids at Sandy Hook Elementary School they had no idea that they would never see their children ever again. On that day, Adam Lanza burst into the school that day killing 26 innocent people, 20 of which were children. None of those families had any idea that that day their lives would change forever. Sandy Hook Shooting has changed the way people lived and the way people sees the world.

On December 14, 2012, almost a month after Obama’s re-election, the Sandy Hook shooting occurred. In this terrible tragedy, twenty children and six adults were murdered at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newton, Connecticut. Two days after the incident, Barack Obama delivered a speech at an interfaith vigil to those who lost their loved ones. In this speech, Obama discussed the need for change and stricter gun laws in order to keep schools safe. He stated, “These tragedies must end….. We can’t accept events like these as routine.”

This shooting was the worst in United States history, and it left families speechless and people in disarray. Two teens committed the treacherous actions of that day. The speculations were that they did this because of bullying, goth culture, or music or video games; these though were all just theories and were never proven(history). After this event, schools, venues, and events have endured grand security increases in the danger of shooters or other violence. Throughout my school days, I have wondered why we do the silly lock down drills at school, but in reality, lives could be saved in the event of an actual attack on my school. I realized this my eight grade year at Guntown Middle School. There was an unidentified man on campus, a code red lock down would amerce. I still remember sitting under my desk, shaking, and almost to tears. I did not want to be remembered as just another statistic if it was a shooter. But it had been our lucky day, the man who had stirred up all the commotion was just looking for the school’s office. Those fears I experienced however, would stay with me. We all believe that we are invincible and that it would never be us. However, with the world as it is today, no one is safe. I have been affected by the Columbine shooting through security changes in schools that I

“The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, when 20-year-old Adam Lanza shot twenty children and six adult staff members” ("Sandy Hook Elementary School Shooting"). “It was the deadliest mass shooting at a high school or grade school in U.S. history and the second-deadliest mass shooting by a single person in America”("Screening Sandy Hook"). Several families lost a loved one all due to someone 's selfishness to provoke harm to many innocent lives. “At some point before he went to the school, investigators believe Adam Lanza, killed his mother, Nancy Lanza” ("Sandy Hook Shooting:

Thirteen people were killed at Columbine High School in 1999, thirty-three died during the Virginia Tech shooting in 2007, and twenty-seven people, twenty of whom were children no older than seven, were killed at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012 (Kirk). These name only a few of the larger and most well-known school shooting incidences. In total, 297 people have lost their lives due to school-based shootings since 1980 (Kirk). Although this number may be small in comparison to death by guns overall, these instances are completely unwarranted and it is likely that they could have been avoided or at the very least reduced. These people, college and high school students, teachers, and even children, might still be alive today if our

On December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, twenty-year-old Adam Lanza (just barely out of his teens) shot and killed six adults and twenty children at Sandy Hook Elementary School after murdering his own mother at home. He then turned the gun on himself bringing the morning’s fatalities to twenty-eight. As horrible as this crime was, it is only one in a growing number of similar shootings in other schools across our country. Two of the worst examples occurred in the late 90’s. In Springfield, Oregon, fifteen-year-old Kipland Kinkel killed two students and wounded twenty-two others when he opened fire in a crowded cafeteria in his high school on May 21, 1998. This was after he killed both his parents the night before (Grapes 6). In

School shootings have been happening all over the country for the past four decades, but it wasn’t until the 1990’s what the impact from experiencing a trauma of this magnitude can do both psychological and psychically started coming to light as well as creating more national attention for the arising problem in our nation. In 1998 in small town in Oregon, Kip Kinkel walked into Thurston High School killing four and wounded twenty-three students and in 1999 in Colorado at Columbine High School Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold walked into school killing fifteen and wounded twenty-one, making it the worst school shooting of the decade. Fast forward to 2007 and we’re in Virginia at the small college campus of Virginia Tech, were Seung-Hui Cho opened fire killing thirty two and wounding many more while then in 2008 at Northern Illinois University Steven Kazmierczak walked into Cole Hall killing five and injuring twenty one.

There has been an average of one school shooting every week in America since the Sandy Hook shooting. On the fourteenth of December, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut, 20-year-old Adam Lanza not only killed his mother in her home, but also twenty children and six members of staff at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. This was to be the third deadliest mass shooting in U.S. history. The Huffington Post reports that as of 2014, there have been over 200 school shootings. These have resulted in at least 94 deaths and over 156 serious and minor injuries. And, with an issue as emotive and contentious as the murder of school children, the question has been frequently asked: why do school shootings happen?

The occurence of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting of December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut. The gunman, was 20-year-old Adam Lana, who first shot and killed his mother at their Newtown home. He then drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School where he fatally shot 20 children and 6 adult staff members. As first responders arrived, Lana committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. The shooting began at approximately 9:30 a.m. Sandy Hook was the deadliest mass shooting at a high school or grade school in U.S. history and the second-deadliest mass shooting by a single person in U.S. history, after the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre. This shooting yet again assured the nation that gun violence is still as big of a problem as it was back in the late 90’s when 27 teenagers got killed in another mass killing in Columbine, Colorado. We as a nation must stand up and oppose mass murdering because these actions are not only unjust but inhuman as well.  The increase in gun violence can be decreased by, identifying the regions in the country where the most gun violence occurs and restricting their access to limiting or monitoring the availability of guns and ammunition.

Unfortunately, the notion of schools being a safe place is no longer a trend across American schools. Disturbing mass shootings in the U.S continue to shock the media. A school shooting is when someone attacks a school using a gun. The Secret Service says these shootings are "deliberately selected as the location for the attack". The reasons massacres occur in schools is because of poor security, violence in video games/media, and bullying. Shockingly the U.S. has the most school shootings than any other country in the world. According to the FBI, mass shootings occur, on average, every 2 weeks in the U.S. While the cause of school shootings are sometimes unpredictable, it is a growing issue and they need to be prevented. Most shooters don’t have mental issues, they have a plan to kill, so there is no singular cause that creates violent people. On April 16th, 2007, the most deadly school massacre occurred. Seung-Hui Cho killed thirty-two students at Virginia-Tech. As Americans, we no longer should turn on the news and witness these gruesome murders. We try to make sense of these murders, but it’s ineffectual. There are measures we can take as a society to help. The number one question in a school massacre is, "why would a person that has a capable sense of mind even do that?” It is our moral responsibility to fix these issues. In order to stop this problem, we need to find its roots.