#9 What are the causes of mental illness to school shooters?

           “We all have something in common”, this is a famous quote that we can all relate to. In connection to school shooting incidents they also have something in common such as: the shooter is mentally challenged. Some people may believe it, but who do you think can kill people randomly if he’s normal?

            An article by Pat Risser entitled “What is “Mental Illness”? Not What Caused Newton" at the website of Mad in America, helped me on this research. Every school shooter experienced neglect, abuse or/and even trauma in their lives, these things also made them common when it comes to their traits. Mr. Risser also stated that, “they all had taken psychiatric drugs that are known to sometimes cause heightened homicidal or suicidal feelings.”

             Mr. Risser was also able to provide his own feelings toward this problem. One example is this “There are no excuses to justify the sad and unfortunate taking of life in Newtown, but I can’t help but wonder if there might not have been a different course if Adam had something to balance and mitigate some of the despair.”

              Like what Mr. Risser said, What if there’d have been a system that had trauma sensitive peers who knew what it’s like and made a caring connection? I can only imagine that this tragedy could have been avoided and Adam would have chosen another path that wouldn’t have been so full of despair and violence. Perhaps in a life with choices and options and hope and not a life of trauma, psych drugs and despair, force and coercion, Adam would have chosen a different path and this tragedy could have been avoided. We have to change for a better future.

We can reduce their feeling of despair; the change must start in us.

               During their despair and hardships, we are all a part of it. We may be the bully, the cause of their trauma or even the one who abused them. This only means that we may be the reason why school shooters exists, maybe we are really the problem not them. We just have to make sure that we create good relationship towards them to avoid such unwanted behavior from them.

                

                We may have something in common but this particular thing differs on how we treat mentally challenged people because we should always treat them right.