Another School Shooting - Washington State

[Money82]

Does this happen in other countries, Europe for example? Damnit I am sick of hearing about this sh!t.

*** is going on in this country? I don't ever want to hear someone tell me the U.S. is the greatest country in the world. That is so far from the truth it's not even funny.

 

[bimshire]

It has come out that the shooter is an experienced hunter. No wonder he was able to do such pinpoint shooting hitting the victims in the head.

 

[okeydokey]

In America we believe that more guns make us safer. Unfortunately there are consequences......

Isn't this the 74th school shooting since Sandy Hook?

I read that too. 74 school shootings in 18 months. That's about one a week.

 

[PrincessBelle39]

This has just been on the news here in Australia. They announced that it was the 80th school shooting since Sandy Hook. Even if it 74, that's an incredible number. Not saying it couldn't happen here, but I don't ever recall it happening.

 

[cjbcam]

As I was driving with my two youngest (4&6) and my two Nieces (5&7) I overheard them talking with each other about what they are supposed to do if someone comes into the school shooting at them. It was hard to listen to but even harder realizing that it's necessary they learn these things.
My heart goes out to the families this guy has done this too. It's so awful.

 

[declansdad]

It has come out that the shooter is an experienced hunter. No wonder he was able to do such pinpoint shooting hitting the victims in the head.

Wasn't he standing right behind them? It would be pretty hard to miss from that range.

 

[Geoff_M]

I read that too. 74 school shootings in 18 months. That's about one a week.

When you back out gang, drug related, and other crime related shootings, what's it bring that number down to? And to the conventional wisdom that such shootings are becoming more common, as expressed even here, they aren't: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/13/school-violence-security-sandy-hook/3446023/

 

[luvsJack]

When you back out gang, drug related, and other crime related shootings, what's it bring that number down to? And to the conventional wisdom that such shootings are becoming more common, as expressed even here, they aren't: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/13/school-violence-security-sandy-hook/3446023/

Would you not count any shooting in a school as a school shooting regardless of the reason? Gangs are in every school. Drugs are in every high school and most middle schools.

I agree with the poster who said its a result of the loss of respecting and valuing human life.

 

[Acklander]

The problem is, there isn't any one reason. So you just can't change one thing and then all the school shootings stop. Instead of blaming one thing (easy access to weapons, mental illness, bullying etc) and then drawing a line in the sand with people lining up on either side we really have to tackle it from many angles in the hopes of reducing and accept that eliminating the problem is unrealistic.
Look at the problem just like you would look at the problem of vehicular deaths. People die in car accidents. That's a fact. There is not one thing that we can do (beyond eliminating cars) that will eliminate vehicular deaths completely but there are many different things that have been done to reduce the number of deaths. Statistics showed that many died from being thrown from the vehicles so they made seat belts mandatory equipment in all cars. It reduced the numbers, but didn't eliminate. They then made wearing seatbelts the law. Again, it reduced deaths but didn't eliminate. Drinking and driving caused many deaths. In the old days drunk driving was coincidered an excuse for the accident, not the cause. I remember watching an old movie where a man wanted to kill his wife, so he staged an accident, and quickly drank from a bottle so when the cops arrived they just brushed it off as an accident since the man was obviously drunk - the poor husband, so heartbroken. MADD worked aggressively on changing the attitudes about that and the statistics were amazing. Vehicular deaths plummeted when alcohol was involved (reduced, but not eliminated). Safety equipment, training classes, new laws, speed limits, all things that have evolved over time to reduce the number of deaths.
We need to do the same thing with guns. I'm not saying eliminate guns, just like I wouldn't want to eliminate cars - but why can't we all work together to put some safe guards in place to reduce the number of incidents? It doesn't have to be an all or nothing campaign from either side.

 

[MrsPete]

Forget "School Resource Officers"....

I think the "time has come" SADLY that there needs to be an armed police presence in EVERY SCHOOL who can swiftly deal with crisis!
Perhaps if these students knew that, they wouldn't be bringing weapons in so FREELY! SO DEVASTATING!

The School Resource Officer DOES carry a gun. And we have multiple officers at football games, etc.

Here's another thing that's concerning: These school shootings used to occur ONLY in late April -- early May. That is, they were connected to the academic calendar -- kids "broke" and did these things at the most stressful time of year, when it became evident that they weren't going to graduate (or similar). Likewise, that used to be the time of year kids committed suicide.

Now these things can happen at any time of year.

Another teacher made a comment to me a week or so ago: Our students today are so much more "fragile" than they were in the past. They aren't able to deal with trouble, they don't have the resilience to bounce back or see that they will live through whatever trouble is going on in their lives.

 

[Gumbo4x4]

Would you not count any shooting in a school as a school shooting regardless of the reason? Gangs are in every school. Drugs are in every high school and most middle schools.

I agree with the poster who said its a result of the loss of respecting and valuing human life.

Some of the incidents included in that count of 74 didn't even take place during school hours/events though. Some not even on school grounds, but within the 500' "gun free zone" off school property. A drug deal gone bad at 2:00 am in the parking lot next door isn't what most of us think of when we think "school shooting".

Thing is, the real number is too high. 1 is too high. But padding the stats to make the number look higher than it is will not help solve the problem. If anything, it just makes many dismiss the issue altogether.

 

[MrsPete]

Guns are not the problem. The lack of value of life is the problem. Take away the gun, they build a bomb, use a knife, a car etc....We need to fix the problem which is these kids (and a lot of adults) have no hope, see no future and have no regard for life. Same reason these people are joining ISIS and going crazy in Mo. As someone in a movie once said "When the center doesn't hold, it all falls apart".

Agree. Guns are neither good nor bad -- they're just the method that kids tend to use.

Another thing that's REALLY BAD in these situations is cell phones:

My school was put on "lockdown" recently -- no real problem, just a dangerous person was loose in our area, and the police were swarming all around our area. We were never in any danger, and they announced that over the intercom, BUT our administration -- wisely -- put us on lockdown so that we KNEW he wouldn't get into our building. Thing is, LOADS of kids immediately got onto their phones, and texted their parents, "OMG, something horrible is happening here, we're all going to die!" and their parents called the school, came to the school, etc. This took what was only a minor crisis . . . and made it into a major waste of the administrator's time. It detracted from the things they really needed to do to cooperate with the police.

 

[MrsPete]

Would you not count any shooting in a school as a school shooting regardless of the reason? Gangs are in every school. Drugs are in every high school and most middle schools.

I agree with the poster who said its a result of the loss of respecting and valuing human life.

Gangs are a complicated topic.

In a workshop we had some time back, the presenters told us that 7th grade is PRIME TIME for recruiting kids into gangs.

And gangs are about belonging. So many kids simply aren't being parented these days -- their parents are either so busy working or so busy with their own social lives that they don't interact with their parents . . . so those kids seek out other surrogate families. And gangs are ready to step in and give those kids a place.

Keep in mind, too, that the gangs aren't simply the gang members. Yes, those hard-core kids "are" the gang, but there are also the girls who are attracted to them, and the slightly unacceptable kids who "want to be bad" and are hangers-on -- they're the kids whom the gang members "use" for this or that purpose but don't actually accept. These kids like to wear the gang colors and hope that they'll be invited in. And ALL of these kids are inclined to be in trouble in numerous ways.

However, these gang kids tend to keep their violent behavior within the gang world. They might steal your middle-class honor student's new iPhone, but they aren't going to shoot him. They aren't the ones instigating school shootings. If they're shooting, it's mostly likely after school and off-campus. And probably over drugs or some perceived insult.

 

[skylizard]

It has come out that the shooter is an experienced hunter. No wonder he was able to do such pinpoint shooting hitting the victims in the head.

They're now saying that the victims were his cousins. I'm sure we'll hear more details in the coming days. So sad.

 

[MrsPete]

The problem is, there isn't any one reason. So you just can't change one thing and then all the school shootings stop. Instead of blaming one thing (easy access to weapons, mental illness, bullying etc) and then drawing a line in the sand with people lining up on either side we really have to tackle it from many angles in the hopes of reducing and accept that eliminating the problem is unrealistic.

Agreed. It's a multi-fauceted issue.

Bullying is kind of the topic of the moment, and it is real -- but it's also being overblown these days. Anytime any kid is upset, it seems that everyone automatically goes to, "What? Was he bullied? How? Where? Who was involved?" Sometimes it's a serious issue -- other times it's an excuse. And, oddly enough, some of the parents of bullies are 100% unaware that their kids are little monsters . . . and even claim that their kids are victims.

One thing you didn't mention is lack of parenting. Too many kids aren't being supported and guided as they grow up.

 

[luvsJack]

Gangs are a complicated topic.

In a workshop we had some time back, the presenters told us that 7th grade is PRIME TIME for recruiting kids into gangs.

And gangs are about belonging. So many kids simply aren't being parented these days -- their parents are either so busy working or so busy with their own social lives that they don't interact with their parents . . . so those kids seek out other surrogate families. And gangs are ready to step in and give those kids a place.

Keep in mind, too, that the gangs aren't simply the gang members. Yes, those hard-core kids "are" the gang, but there are also the girls who are attracted to them, and the slightly unacceptable kids who "want to be bad" and are hangers-on -- they're the kids whom the gang members "use" for this or that purpose but don't actually accept. These kids like to wear the gang colors and hope that they'll be invited in. And ALL of these kids are inclined to be in trouble in numerous ways.

However, these gang kids tend to keep their violent behavior within the gang world. They might steal your middle-class honor student's new iPhone, but they aren't going to shoot him. They aren't the ones instigating school shootings. If they're shooting, it's mostly likely after school and off-campus. And probably over drugs or some perceived insult.

I don't know about that. Two local schools have had gang problems and the violence has gone on during the school day. No shootings but beatings and scared kids getting caught bringing guns because they were threatened by the gang members. If not caught they could have been one of the statistics.

Another school caught a kid with a weapon at school. His reason was that he planned to get the guy who cheated him on a drug deal.

I see what gumbo is saying about incidents being counted that didn't happen during the scool day or actually on the campus. Those would have to be taken out of the count to have an accurate number of school shootings.

 

[Acklander]

Agreed. It's a multi-fauceted issue.

Bullying is kind of the topic of the moment, and it is real -- but it's also being overblown these days. Anytime any kid is upset, it seems that everyone automatically goes to, "What? Was he bullied? How? Where? Who was involved?" Sometimes it's a serious issue -- other times it's an excuse. And, oddly enough, some of the parents of bullies are 100% unaware that their kids are little monsters . . . and even claim that their kids are victims.

One thing you didn't mention is lack of parenting. Too many kids aren't being supported and guided as they grow up.

There have always been a percent of kids that haven't been supported and guided as they grow up. That's not a new thing -I know when I was growing up (way back in the 60s and 70s) there were about a dozen kids in my small town that seemed to run wild without any apparent supervision. I'm sure they weren't the first. Now, hellicopter parenting. - that seems to be a fairly new phenomenon, but the parents who probably shouldn't be parents have been around forever. i haven't looked into the specifics of the kids involved in many of the school shootings - has that been mentioned as an ongoing problem that they have in common?

 

[mcd531]

http://hollywoodlife.com/2014/10/24/jaylen-fryberg-marysville-shooter-tweets-high-school-shooting/

I think guns and bad parenting have been around forever. What hasn't is social media. We all know that adolescents can be impulsive and heavily influenced by their peers. Social media provides teens with thousands of "peers". In the past, this boy may have had some friends tell him things like "it's okay, dude, you can do better than her anyway" or "let's just go do (whatever), don't worry about her", etc. But if you read the article, this kid is getting hundreds, even thousands, of "retweets" and "favorites" on his foretelling and angry twitter posts. I've never been on twitter and I've never been a 14 year old boy but I can imagine that from his perspective, all of that social media "support" fueled and validated his anger and violent choices.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

http://hollywoodlife.com/2014/10/24/jaylen-fryberg-marysville-shooter-tweets-high-school-shooting/

I think guns and bad parenting have been around forever. What hasn't is social media. We all know that adolescents can be impulsive and heavily influenced by their peers. Social media provides teens with thousands of "peers". In the past, this boy may have had some friends tell him things like "it's okay, dude, you can do better than her anyway" or "let's just go do (whatever), don't worry about her", etc. But if you read the article, this kid is getting hundreds, even thousands, of "retweets" and "favorites" on his foretelling and angry twitter posts. I've never been on twitter and I've never been a 14 year old boy but I can imagine that from his perspective, all of that social media "support" fueled and validated his anger and violent choices.

I was just going to bring up the social media aspect. I'm glad you did.

What you say is intriguing. I don't know if it affected him in that way, but it will be interesting to see what authorities think once they have studied the case. There were allegations of "bullying" and a report that he was suspended from the football team for fighting. There are also reports of heartbreak over a girl. I don't know if this girl is the one who was killed. Many of these elements, as others have pointed out, have been involved inn crimes of passion since time began. But the social media piece is relatively new. His tweets are very transparent already. Some reports have them labeled as "aggressive and sex fueled". (I haven't studied them that closely to agree or not.) This may go down as a case study on the influence of social media on school violence. We shall see.

Many of these issues that teens face are addressed by schools in health classes and presentations by counselors and state police on social media. But health classes are though of by many as a "joke" and warnings about social media are largely ignored. Unless accounts are locked, Twitter feeds are open to anyone and everyone for viewing. If you haven't already, take a look at what your kids and their friends are posting. If you see something there that's concerning, it may be a cry for help. We also need to help boys, especially, know it's safe to discuss their feelings without fear of being put down or labeled. A pp mentioned it, but teens need to understand that things that happen in HS, even though they seem completely earth shattering then, will wind up being just a flicker on their radar of life later on.

 

[Lisa loves Pooh]

Some of the incidents included in that count of 74 didn't even take place during school hours/events though. Some not even on school grounds, but within the 500' "gun free zone" off school property. A drug deal gone bad at 2:00 am in the parking lot next door isn't what most of us think of when we think "school shooting".

Thing is, the real number is too high. 1 is too high. But padding the stats to make the number look higher than it is will not help solve the problem. If anything, it just makes many dismiss the issue altogether.

One is too many. Inflating statistics to suit an agenda is and always will be unacceptable.

As this kid was a Hunter, he had access to guns. Question is, how easy was that access. Holding the family responsible for a crime committed due to an insecure weapon is fair. If the secure system was broken into, I don't think they are as responsible and of they are is dependent upon circumstances.

But I'm not in favor of an agenda that will do nothing to stop these crimes especially if inflated statistics were utilized.


*****

Social Media didn't exist with Columbine and nothing shows that Sandy Hook was influenced by Social Media. Social media may shed light, but I don't think it has all that much impact.

*****

But I'm over blaming bullying. As awful as it is, the bullies shouldn't be a scapegoat for the murderers actions. The murderer always owns their decision.