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[Hank Chinaski]

Originally Posted by sebastian_dangerfield

What I'd like to know is why so many people on FB (my wife has an account) are pontificating about how some broader trend in society ("breakdown of the family," materialism, kids doing too much online gaming, etc.) is the real cause.

The evidence is clear. The kid was mentally ill. There may have been contributing stressors at work, but ultimately, a deranged mind, which none of us could ever hope to understand, pulled the trigger. Why is that an insufficient explanation? Why can't it be what we logically recognize: An unpredictable act of an aberrantly functioning brain? An outlier so unfathomable no amount of vigilance could have prevented it?

I guess people want to feel there's some way they can understand every bit of our world, all the way down to things as disturbing as this. That however unexplainable something is, it can nevertheless be shoehorned into some sort of pattern, or is part of some bigger phenomenon. It can't be. It isn't. There will never be an explanation other than "Madman kills 20 children." And thank God for that. If this were in any way connectable to some broader social or cultural shift, or trend, or neglect, it would be even more horrifying.

I don't remember any mass murders in schools when I was growing up. My kids heard of several. If nothing else, why are there more deranged now?