Why Do People Shoot Up Schools? Essay

Emotional wellness issues have been frequently shown another big cause of these shootings. Most school shooters were mentally sick or demonstrated side effects of psychological wellness issues. An opportunity for mental and psychiatric help could help stop these shootings. According to newyorker.com, ¨, from 2011 and 2013, more people believe that mass shootings result from a failure of the mental-health system than from easy access to guns. Eighty per cent of the population believes that mental illness is at least partially to

Guns and mental illness are merely attributes of these shootings, they are not the reason why numerous kids are killing people. It is time we stopped fooling ourselves and started asking why our youth are so disaffected that they’re lashing out, murderously, at the world we’ve given them.

It is noted that many mass shooters have been diagnosed with some type of mental illness following their massacre.The most common diagnostic from mass shooters is schizophrenia, schizophrenia is defined as a long term mental disorder involving breakdowns with thoughts, emotions, leading to inappropriate actions or feelings (Metzel and MacLeish). Mass shooters such as Adam Lanza, the gunmen of the Sandy Hook shooting was diagnosed with schizophrenia, and James Holmes, Colorado movie theater shooting, was being treated for schizophrenia (Metzel and Macleish). Based on the statistics involving mass shooters and schizophrenia, mental illnesses should be more in consideration when solving for a solution than just the lack of gun control. The rise of mass shootings comes primarily from this last decade, and at the same time the rise of mental illnesses occurred too (Metzel and Macleish). With the rise of mental illnesses and mass shootings, one might believe psychiatrist should be able to predict gun violence with a patient. Schizophrenia does involve violent outbreaks and it can be treated. However with the 120,000 gun related deaths from 2001-2010, five percent of those were caused by a mentally ill patient. This leaves psychiatrists the inability to predict gun violence from mentally ill patients, regardless of the treatment. Over half of the mass shooters

The shooter is typically labeled mentally ill or psychotic without actually having been diagnosed. Americans use this label when no other explanation is visible or when they can’t provide a logical explanation for someone’s actions. The same label is commonly used in children that tend to fidget during class. Adults do not blame the class, or the teacher but just assume that the child has ADHD. “ Sixty-three percent of respondents blamed a deficient mental health care system as the prime reason for America's incessant gun massacres. .” ( Follman 1 ). It is assumed that a psychiatric diagnosis can predict a gun crime. With this bias towards a shooter's mentality, fear could be instilled into the minds of the younger generation to fear mentally ill patients, and could lead to the exclusion and segregation of any mentally ill patient because of the fear of that person committing mass

Horror filled events capture the eyes of television viewers across America each day. Many of these tragic incidents broadcasted involve the use of guns. Something seen on the news instantly after occurring are the massacres of students and faculty in school shootings. A student walked on to the campus of Virginia Tech where he created the worst shooting done by a single gun-man. In California, a student entered Santana High school where he continued his day by shooting multiple people.The infamous Columbine High School shooting exemplifies the terror that can erupt when students get their hands on a gun. The easy availability of guns in the United States cause these malicious people to be able to accomplish their sickest fantasies. Mental illness

On December 14, 2012, a gunman by the name of Adam Lanza, shot and killed twenty children between the ages of six and seven, in Newtown, Connecticut (Wikipedia, 2016). Science then, there have been more than 239 school shootings nationwide, 438 people have been injured in a school shooting, and 138 people have been killed (Patel, 2018). School Shootings are a massive problem in America, and we need to find a solution to the problem. School shootings need to be eliminated in America because over 400 people a year are affected directly, and millions more people are affected indirectly. In an effort to eliminate school shootings America needs to begin educating the public about school shootings, Americans could ensure our future generations of students would be safer, the public could potentially become interested in becoming more informed, and there would be a greater amount of mental health resources such as psychologist, sociologist, social workers, and other mental health professionals

If you look at the news or any sort of social media you will see all the headlines of the most recent shooting, the Las Vegas massacre. This was by far the biggest mass shooting we have seen in a while, with about 50 dead and hundreds injured. Some of the most famous mass shootings are Columbine and Virginia Tech, both of which had mentally ill gunman. All of these shootings have one thing in common, besides the fact that they are all mass shootings, that is that all of the gunman in these situations had a mental illness are had threatened violence previously. For example, when analyzing the two Columbine shooters, Eric Harris and Dylan Kelbold, conclusions have been made that both shooters had some sort of mental illness. Dave Cullen states in his article about the mental states of the Columbine shooters, “Klebold is easier to comprehend, a more familiar type. He was hotheaded, but depressive and suicidal. He blamed himself for his problems. Harris is the challenge. He was sweet-faced and well-spoken. Adults, and even some other kids, described him as "nice." But Harris was cold, calculating, and homicidal. ‘Klebold was hurting inside while Harris wanted to hurt people,’ Fuselier says. Harris was not merely a troubled kid, the psychiatrists say, he was a psychopath.” I think that people with mental illnesses should not have the right to bear arms regardless of the Second Amendment right, because they do not have the mental capacity to stop themselves from doing something, especially if they do not think they are mentally

School safety is something that people think of all the time. People are bullied and kicked out of school, and it’s just the “cherry on top” when they have a mental illness. That illness will tell them that everyone in the school is against them, even if they’ve never met before. They will pull that trigger because their mind told them to. A gun doesn’t shoot someone on its own. It needs someone to assist the process. The number of mental health records in the system has grown rapidly, to 5.2 million in 2018 from 234,628 in 2005 (Mueller). That number is scary, but it also means that more people are aware of their problem. I’m not going to say that everyone who has a mental illness will want to kill people, but there is a big number of people where their mental illness pushed them over the edge a little.

One of the causal explanations for a mass shooting is mental illness. Many of the recent mass shootings that have occurred have partially been caused by the unstableness of the person’s mind. For example, James Holmes, the mass shooter who killed twelve people in a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado was said to have a schizophrenic disorder. Although the disorder does not blur the lines between right and wrong, it definitely has an impact as to why he was motivated to carry out this shooting. This mental illness problem also occurred with Columbine shooter, Eric Harris. Harris had a psychotic disorder and was even made to be a psychopath, according to the FBI report which was released five years after the shooting. Both shooters had notebooks, in which they expressed their severe hatred for the world and many humans around them. They also seemed to have an obsession with fame to some extent and were even a bit insecure about their own self-worth. These men had psychotic disorders, which shifted their thinking and made them think in abnormal ways, causing them to lose touch with reality. At the same time, mental illness may not be the cause of all mass shootings. In fact, many people will stereotype mass shooters as being mentally ill even though that may not be true. This is one fallacy which is seen today within our society after a mass shooting occurs, and can even be characterized as scapegoating. According to the US Department of Health and Human Services, only 3-5% of violent acts are carried out by mentally ill people. Also, the mentally ill are more likely to be victimized and harassed rather than the other way around. In fact, even if a shooter did have a mental problem, there is a very small chance that they would go to a therapist or

School rampage shootings, also referred to as mass school shootings, involve one or a small number of perpetrators whose goal is to inflict as much harm as possible on as many people as possible within a school setting. It is a violent act. There is a distinction made between violence and aggression on the continuum of severity . As noted by Bushman and Huesmann (2010), while aggression is an intent to harm another person who does not want to be harmed, violence is aggression with the goal of extreme physical harm which would be severe injury or death. Using this frame of reference, mass shootings in schools are clearly acts of violence whereas school bullying, and depending on the context, school

The earliest known school shooting in the United States took place in 1764 and was known as the Pontiac Rebellion School Massacre; out of 13 children enrolled in the school, only three survived (Dixon, 2005). Since then early 2000’s there has been 186 active shooters nationwide. People are now asking the question what is making these kids become school shooters. The question seems pretty straight forward, but no one knows a straightforward answer. Scientists and mental health professional have found there to be three main afflictions to cause people to become school shooters. The causes are being bullied, side effects of prescribed drugs, and abusive/neglective households.

This review of literature examined four different research studies on perpetrators of school shootings. These studies reveal school shooter share common characteristics and identified some risk factors that may influence an individual to become a school shooter. Scholars agree that perpetrators of school shootings mainly share an uniform demographic. Environmental risk factors such as rejection increase the likelihood of becoming a perpetrator of school shooting. Having a mental illness is another factor that increases the chances an individual of becoming a school

I know that most school shooters have something in common. “These commercially manufactured psychotic drugs (Prozac, Ritalin, Paxil, Luvox, etc.) are probably triggering psychotic behavior in already unstable individuals, and this potential connection needs to be officially investigated immediately.” (Freydis, pg. 2) However, most school shootings happen in the first few hours of school, and males ages 13 to 20 are the most common school shooters. What this means is they have a mental illness, although they can’t control it all the time. They often dwell about their life. School shootings occur within 6 months today; most shootings are with pistols, and the shooter ends up passing up his life in the end. (1b: SV; SV, and SV.) The shooter is generally a loner, or he doesn’t have many

One of the main causes of a school shooting is because of mental illness. For instance, the article states, “80% of mentally ill students may not be receiving the help that they need” (1). Which can as well lead to school violence? Also, mentally ill kids is able to buy a gun underage and without a background check. Additionally,

Children who have mental disorders are more likely to become violent and unable of channeling anger and depression in the right way. Heller’s research says “A 2002 study conducted by the Secret Service determined that most school shooters engaged in some behavior prior to the incident that caused others concern or indicated a need for help” (2014). Although, not all children who have a mental disorder will become violent, studies have shown previous shooters did have a history of mental illness