What is the disconnect that is happening to cause these shootings?

This isn't happening in a vaccuum. What is going on in society that such incidents are occurring with alarming frequency?

Also, why are the shooters predominantly white males?

Anyone have any theories they care to offer?

I've always thought that part of it is these people are narcissistic jackasses with a need to become famous. This, unfortunately, is how they seem to have tried to achieve it. They get on TV.

As to the predominately white? The press pretty much ignores murders by black men.

on note: I'm still waiting for the NRA to blame the Amish Communities anti-violence and anti-gun stance on this tragedy.
"If they were armed," the nra could whine, "those children would be alive today."

I've always thought that these things escalate primarily due to the excessive coverage they are given by the tabloid MSM. The wackos are just encouraged when they see wall to wall coverage of a shooting, they think they can be just as famous.

They're very much into subsistence hunting, etc. They don't have guns like Dick Cheney's, but they have guns.


BTW--What goes clip-clop-clip-clop-Bang! clip-clop-clip-clop-Bang! clip-clop-clip-clop-Bang!

Answer: An Amish drive-by shooting.

With the exception of Malvo, I don't recall any African-American men being involved in these types of shootings. The media would not have ignored it -- as they often do with gang and inner-city violence.

They only pay attention when a black man shoots a white man or woman.

but that's not what I'm talking about here.

I am referring to gunment who go into schools or courthouses or work places and shoot them up and kill the people there because of some sort of rage that drives them.

Come to think of it, aren't the majority of serial killers white males as well?

Although, now that you mention it, we did have an incident here in CO a few months ago - an African American went postal at a Safeway warehouse - killed his boss and shot up some other people. But I see a difference in "going postal" and the totally random shootings like the Bailey incident. The one has at least a spark of a reason (he fired me) versus the other (something happened 20 years ago . . . which both school incidents seem to be related to.)

Muhammad was the mastermind, yet whenever anyone talks about the Washington sniper, it's always "Malvo, Malvo, Malvo." Malvo would be unknown today without John Allen Mohummed. He's one of the most prolific black killers this country has seen, and yet everybody distrespects him by talking about Malvo all the time. Malvo is just a kid. Mohummed was a killer to take seriously.

Anyway, it probably is true that the press underreports black-on-black crime. Whenever people bring up the "there's no black serial killers" meme, everybody forgets about Wayne Williams, the Atlanta killer. No, I'm not sure he did it either, but I don't think it was the Klan, as some have suggested. I think it was a fairly typical sexual killer, and these sorts stay within their own ethnic groups, mostly.

Anyway, my wife works in the correctional field, and she knows several black multiple murderers. One fellow who comes to mind is someone who eradicated his family. I won't give you the details, but they are sick, sick, sick. I do think the press--and the Ann Rule crime writer types--are lazy when it comes to black on black crime. Black people kill lots of black people, many times more than one at a time, but if you want to make the national media you should kill some white people, preferably young, good-looking, and with money, with some twisted sexual or cannibalistic angle, if you can manage it, preferably both.

I only used his name because it was easier to spell. There was no motive.

I wonder if there have been any statistical studies on the race of mass killers. I think it would be interesting.

Many serial killers are never caught, let alone identified. Most mass murderers are identified at least after death, often of a self-inflicted wound.

I would think that the rate of multiple murders by black men (sexist, I know, but it is mainly a man's crime, with the exception of some poisoners and "mercy killing" nurses) would be similar to the other levels of violent crime by this group, and that their share of victims would mirror their share of the population.

A lot of people think that, and it evidently isn't helping any even if true. Worse, in fact.

How long since you've heard just one psychologist state opinions from a view other than the prosecution's? Or a sociologist? If they get air time, it is almost always from the point of view of the executive branch (prosecutor's office).

The neocons by design took them out of the debate. What they have to say doesn't matter because they get in the way of war with things like facts. Facts and studies were once the liberals' strong point, now they are silenced.

Then they went away. Then there were the highway shootings. Then they went away. Now we're back with the school shootings.

These shootings happen in clusters, and I wonder if that's a natural occurrence or a coordinated effort.

I think we have too many men (they are all men so far) who are taught that they are superior. Instead, they face bullying, lack of jobs, education, and lack of a community. They look for an outlet to be superior and attack those more vulnerable than they are. They enjoy taking revenge/being more powerful even if it means causing pain to others. Too many have faced bullying in schools so that becomes the target all too often. I also think these are copycat crimes.

I think we need to teach tolerance, anti-bullying in schools and tolerate none of the name calling and physical attacks that most of us see as normal school behavior. I look back at my HS and there is no way that too many of the actions would ever be tolerated in the adult world. I've never understood why we, as a society, thinks it's OK in schools.

But the fact is, there are 25 or 30 kids for every adult in the building. Even in a school that cares about stopping bullying, without a concerted effort from home and the community, it just can't be stopped. Then there are the schools that don't care . . .

It's not just bullying though - I mean, how many of us were tormented in school (and I grew up gay in a small town in KS, so don't try to match stories with me), and yet - hopefully - none of us grew into mass murderers. Why? There's got to be more to it than just that.

the bullying is a major cause of this along with the culture that teaches men to be superior. Most will be able to go on to lead happy lives but a few will respond with violence.

Guns don't solve anything.

my skin with what's going on in the world and the problems the Neocons and Fundamentalists are causing. I'm not violent though so I'm not about to shoot anyone.

Every single person and I mean every single person that I've seen lately with a Bush bumper sticker is a middle aged to older white man. It's a freaking disease! And they shoot people!

They're the cause of everything from the crucifixion to Hurricane Katrina. Just ask Jack Thompson.

It sure as hell isn't bullying or the example our leaders are setting
:sarcasm:

and males are still more violent than females

which sounds innocuous but is shattering.When there is a difference between what you are told and what you perceive,a sane person becomes agitated and confused, and certain people,already unbalanced,totally lose it.That most of them so imbalanced that appear in these reports are white males is also not surprising as THEY HAVE THE GUNS...A raving black man is shot 68 times early on and a raving female is put in a straight jacket....we are ALL being driven insane-a limited few are more capable of appearing on the news....

Back during the late-90's outbreak, it was observed (perhaps inaccurately) that the media doesn't make a big deal of inner city school violence. That motivated me to look more closely at the politics and culture of the communities where this was happening. It led me to believe that a more formal academic study might yield some interesting correlations (negative or positive) to composition of school broads, ethnic diversity in the student body, and a variety of other demographics. Of the communities with which I'm personally familiar, all were (imho) significantly similar to "Pleasantville."

Do you mean teachers? Or female students?

I might also point out that this is the 21st century, and some of them chicks and dames don't like being called "broads" these days.

:blush: (The ol' spelling checker failed me again. Darn typomalapropisms!)

in this country. Our prisons are our mental health institutions, and you have to commit a crime to get "admitted." Families are left to struggle with members who need medicine, treatment facilities, and monitoring. Take mentally ill untreated individuals, add guns to the mix, and it's a recipe for disaster.

and give it my best shot. You probably know this, but the multiple murderer category has several types--the serial killer (multiple victims at multiple points of time), spree killers, who do the same thing, but usually more intently over a shorter period of time, and the mass murderers, who kill lots of folks (often as many as they can) at once, often in a suicide/suicide by cop scenario.

The perpetrators are white males because most of your mass murderer types are white males, at least historically (the Washington snipers are an exception). Why this is the case psychologically is anyone's guess. I think many spree killers are motivated by failure, and by a desire for revenge against those who they blame for their problems. White males may have higher expectations and a greater sense of entitlement in our nation, and so perhaps the onus of failure is particularly grating for them. Plus, lots of white male types have guns, pretty much a requirement for the mass murderer who takes himself seriously as such. Thus, you see less of this sort of thing in Europe.

There are some who say that the serial killer is a new, modern creature. I say baloney. There have always been serial killers, and violent (mainly) men. The highwaymen throughout European history were multiple murderers, as were the pirates. Mass murderers who try to take as many people out with them are also not new. Perhaps, as a form of suicide, this method has an appeal for a few who deem that it is unlikely that they will be remembered on their own merits, and so seek notoriety, given that fame is impossible. It has been said that, in America, the only people who matter are those who are seen on television. Murder may be an attempt to seek some kind of recognition as human beings who matter. If this is true, then this type of thing has to do with our alienation and atomization.

I doubt it, however. I think these things happen at a fairly constant rate through history, controlling for population (i.e., the incidence per person is about the same, but, given that we today have many more people, there are many more individual incidents). Plus, we have detectives to catch people so that we know that a certain set of killings were done by certain folks, and we have the news media to let us know then these things happen.

Can anything be done to keep them from reaching this pinnacle of notoreity? A media blackout? (Sounds rather "un-free-speech" friendly to me). But what?

Probably no one strategy would work. Bundy was a egomaniac, but probably many of the most "successful" killers would prefer to stay out of the paper. On the other hand, the Harris and Klebold types live (and die) for the posthumous splash they will make. You cannot very well have a mass murder happen and not have it be on the television, now, can you?

Do we need a cottage industry around every assassination, every serial killer, every spree killer? Maybe we could ban the use of their names? Perhaps the adoption of some line about how "these men are little and insignificant and that these killings prove it" might reduce the publicity-fueled killers, I don't know. I see Hannah Arendt's work on the banality of evil as just such an attempt, i.e., she made Eichmann look like an ordinary little bourgeois fellow, concerned with killing on a timetable.

The problem is that this is a lie, Eichmann aside. Real evil is apart from the human experience. It is exceptional, it is interesting. We have to wonder where the line between glorification and description lies.

I wish I could find an excerpt to post. It's a very interesting take on this phenomenon, and not far from yours.

It's far deeper than any of us are willing to face. America as a culture of conquest has a very deeply rooted strain of violence. These are alarm bells that signify a collective disturbance as well as a collective response. These "isolated" incidents are all too frequent, in fact daily depending only on degrees.

America is, perhaps always has been, deeply sick.

laugh now, this will be proven someday. Tin foil hat off now.

And it makes as much sense as anything. Though I doubt the homeless guy living in his car in Bailey had a cell phone.

But maybe he was parked too close to a tower?

by society for so long, we can only expect them to take it for so long...

Do you think it could be a reaction to a diminished sense of power? It's not easy to give up dominance in society.

constant meme in society but white men control the upper echelons of power in all facets of society.

but that they feel their control is threatened.

:eyes:

:eyes:

First, I never used the word *always* in the OP. I said predominantly. If I am wrong, cite an equal number of cases where it wasn't a white male involved in a spree-type shooting situation.

If you think this is about bashing males or whites, it's not. It's about trying to understand a situation. What in society is provoking this increase?

;)

Sorry. I love you.

Life is cheap in the U.S. Look how the govt. treats us, taking our tax dollars & treating citizens like sh*t.

it's really as simple as that

Many people mistake Bowling for an anti-gun movie.

It's an anti-violence movie.

Why do you think he compared America to Canada? We both have lots of guns, we both watch violent movies, and play violent video games.

The big difference is that America glorfies warfare. We are a militaristic country.

It's not suprising that we see a surge in violent crime, in a society that places no value on human life.

America is now an invader nation that tortures people. It shouldn't be suprising tht many of the citizens emulate their leadership.