I feel for the kids who do the shootings too. We, as a society, let them down and left them no where to turn for help.
As a teacher, and as a mother, I find what is happening in US schools (because it does overwhelmingly occur primarily in US schools) terrifying and saddening, but logical and telling in some ways.
In the past year, in a community I used to live in of under 100,000 people, there have been two incidences of kids entering schools with guns. One held a teacher friend of mine and another student hostage in a classroom after school, and one had killed his mother at his home and then went to the school with the gun, but was caught before he actually hurt anyone there. In the same community within the past five years, a l6 year old killed both his parents with his shotgun and then went to his junior prom, a former student of mine was shot in the head and killed, a l4 year old girl shot and killed herself in the girl's bathroom of the middle school, and a l7 year old boy shot himself in the park across the street from the highschool where the kids went to eat lunch everyday because his girlfriend had broken up with him. And that's just in the US community I lived in, which was a very "nice", affluent community, university town, average level of education is a master's degree, the highschool I worked at was ranked 39th in the nation (which was based on how many kids successfully took and completed AP (college level) courses and exams each year). Every single one of the kids involved in these cases was white and middle class, except for the student of mine who was shot in the head - he was poor and black- and his killer has never been apprehended- noone has even been accused yet, and it's been two years. But anyway the majority of these kids were primed for the American dream of success and had all the tools to achieve it- you get the picture...
So what is the solution? I don't know but I think I know why it's happening:
1) We're raising sicker and sicker kids who are unfamiliar with the concepts of empathy and humanity and community- because their parents don't model that behavior for them. It's a "me, my, mine" society - at whatever cost. And these kids aren't buying into the whole American dream of success anymore - so some of them are saying- that's not the "me, my, mine" I want - but they don't see any other alternative - so they say, "I just want this **** to be over" and they make that happen. Unfortunately, they have a lot of models for that kind of behavior- (TV, internet, video games, movies, front pages of newspapers, etc..) so that's the kind of behavior they emulate and imitate.
2) Their whole life is pressure at this point- and for those who are not natural students or athletes - there's no hope of success or even competing adequately to the ridiculous standards that are set for them. And the standards and stakes just keep rising. So they opt out. This is one way they can opt out in a final and memorable way- which is another behavior they see modeled for them. Noone ever does anything quietly or privately anymore - it has to be on tv to be real these days.
I have a friend who's a gifted teacher who's afraid to go back into the school or classroom where she was held for two hours with her face to a wall and a shotgun to the back of her head. She'd had her first baby six months before, she felt responsible for the sixteen year old girl being held with her (whom she could only hear crying and gasping for breath, but couldn't see because she couldn't turn her head because there was a gun against it), and she felt empathy and responsibility for this boy (l6) who was about to ruin his and everyone elses life. She talked him into shooting out the window instead of into her brain, and when he heard people coming, he ran. He's in a psychiatric ward now. And that's one of the happy endings...
Maybe I should start a thread - what kind of empathy and sense of humanity are we communicating to our young people. If they were to read the things we wrote or watched what we did - what kind of lessons would they be learning? We can blame it all on teachers, parents, media - etc. but who are the people that make up a society, and so are responsible for it's success or demise?
Laguna - I think we should get rid of guns. I'm not coming back to the US until my daughter has finished school. This is just a safer place for her - bottom line- in school and out of school - but especially in school. I know she will not be shot in a school over here - and that means a lot to me. If I was in the US, I'd probably be homeschooling her- her life means that much to me.
Our highschool - after the incident with the teacher friend of mine - decided to keep all the doors locked.
But those are both band-aids on a hemorraging wound - and we all know it. We're just too lazy and desensitized to make the real changes that might make a real difference in these kids' lives.
The reason for those horrible acts? Racism. Racism is alive but it is masked. It goes under the headings of--We don't need any more welfare--and -why should there be any reparations--and--Health Insurance for All?-That's Socialism--and--He's black, he doesn't need a good lawyer--
That is why racism is alive and well in the USA!
Marion - I'm onto you - but I just can't leave your assertion unchallenged - because racism has absolutely nothing to do with this issue, in any way whatsoever.
It's a serious issue and should be treated as such, and with as much accuracy as possible.
Although there is certainly valid basis for discussion about how much of behavior is nature and how much nurture, I have a hard time thinking anyone is genetically predisposed to violence.
I agree Snood. Even males who are born with an extra y chromosome, resulting in the xyy chromosomal anomoly, who were initially believed to be more innately prone to violence (because as the theory went, men are inherently more violent than women and these males had twice the male chromosomal material than a typical male), has pretty much been discounted. Here's an interesting link:
http://www.genomicseducation.ca/teacher_resources/question_of_the_week.htm
I mean, think about it- are we willing to admit that Americans as a people are more
genetically prone to violence than people born in other countries? Because our behaviour as a group would certainly seem to indicate some anomoly in and/or tendency to violence. Our nation is certainly one of the most, if not the most violent in the world. Is that genetic? Or could it be the way we are socialized in comparison to other people in different parts of the world?
I don't particularly like Michael Moore aidan, but I think he made a valid point when he suggested (with a lot of pinful satire in Bowling for Columbine) that we as a country are enculturated toward violence.
Saying this makes me feel old (and I do remember wanting a BB gun, and I still love the 'shooter' type computer games), but I think the American culture generally glorifies violence.
I don't particularly like Michael Moore aidan, but I think he made a valid point when he suggested (with a lot of painful satire in Bowling for Columbine) that we as a country are enculturated toward violence.
Saying this makes me feel old (and I do remember wanting a BB gun, and I still love the 'shooter' type computer games), but I think the American culture generally glorifies violence.
By the way - I got the 'joke', earlier. I don't always laugh at the same time everyone else does. Doesn't make them smart, and me stupid - it makes our senses of humor different.
this just in from Santa Fe New Mexico
By JOHN SENA | The New Mexican
October 4, 2006
Santa Fe High School's roughly 1,800 students went home early Wednesday after a teacher discovered a suspected bomb in a boys bathroom.
Police bomb squads destroyed a suspicious package because it contained bomb components, police said. The package was described as a cardboard box with wires sticking out of it and the word ``Boom'' written across it.
Police destroyed the device in the bathroom of the school's visual arts building, where a teacher found it Wednesday morning, police officials said.
Santa Fe Deputy Police Chief Stan Mascarenas would not say what components were found in the box, only that they were consistent with the makings of an explosive device. He said he didn't know if the components could have detonated. He added that police have no suspects.
SACRAMENTO (AP) - California students are abusing prescription pills - often stolen from their parents' medicine cabinets - even as their use of alcohol and illicit drugs such as marijuana has leveled off, according to a state survey released Wednesday.
The study of 10,638 middle and high school students found that 15 percent of 11th graders, 9 percent of ninth graders and 4 percent of seventh graders are using pharmaceutical drugs without a prescription.
Prescription drugs such as painkillers trailed only alcohol and marijuana as students' drug of choice. Inhalants had ranked third previously.
"We will be targeting our research now on the issue of prescription drug use to make certain that this does not continue to increase," said Kathryn Jett, director of the state Department of Alcohol and Drug Programs.
"As a parent, you need to be vigilant as to where those drugs are kept. Or if you have painkillers and don't need them, you need to dispose of them. If you have painkillers and you do need them, count them - know how many are there."
sorry about the duplicate post - didn't get to 'edit' fast enough...
Dys - that whole prescription drug issue is interesting. This is not a statement or indictment against anyone who uses antidepressants in any way - but the fact of the matter is that America as a nation is pretty much dependent on them to make it through the day. And our children, at younger and younger ages- are being socialized to see this as a viable way of getting through life. To me, it's not an idictment of the person who uses the drugs as much as an indictment of the lifestyle. If so many people are so unhappy to the point that they need medicine to make it through the day - maybe there's something wrong with the day they have to make it through.
Kids included. I think people in general and kids especially are much sadder. You see much less spontaneous joy out of children. People of all ages are more sarcastic, less enthusiastic, more jaded and ironic. Talk about sense of humor Snood - if you're not sarcastic or ironic - you're pretty much considered not to have a sense of humor. That's just sad. "Sincere", "earnest" and "sentimental" are seen as insults today. God help anyone who doesn't fit the cool, jaded mold...especially in highschool - unless you're really smart or really athletic and can just kind of rise above it all and do your thing.
But several Europeans I've spoken to have expressed the fact they think Americans are inherently more violent. One woman was surprised when I told her I didn't own a gun - she said, "I thought all Americans had guns." And when I told her I don't drink in front of my parents to this day out of respect for their religious beliefs - she asked, "Are you Amish?"
Why are we so attached to our guns? Why is it one of inalienable rights in this day and age? I think Michael Moore has a point - (but I have to admit - I kind of like him... or at least his ideas).
Aidan-If you don't think racism is one of the main reasons why there is so much violence and shootings in and around our schools, you don't know much about schools in our society. Large cities have large black populations and they have gangs. Many gangs. They fight over turf and the drug trade. If you took all of the gangs out of the cities, crime would be cut by over 75%. Do you know the cause of death of most black young males in the USA? It is homicide.
MarionT wrote:Aidan-If you don't think racism is one of the main reasons why there is so much violence and shootings in and around our schools, you don't know much about schools in our society. Large cities have large black populations and they have gangs. Many gangs. They fight over turf and the drug trade. If you took all of the gangs out of the cities, crime would be cut by over 75%. Do you know the cause of death of most black young males in the USA? It is homicide.
Haven't you noticed that the majority of school shootings are by white folks against mostly white folks?
snood wrote:Although there is certainly valid basis for discussion about how much of behavior is nature and how much nurture, I have a hard time thinking anyone is genetically predisposed to violence.
Ignoring the combination of attributes we get from our parents... is closing our eyes to a huge part of who we are--and for the record, I didn't say
genetically predisposed. That's far too simplistic.
I think nuture is a greater indicator of who will cope and who won't.
Still, interesting insights from everyone.
I'm not intentionally corrdinating my remarks with my opinion about gun control, but they are obviously related.
Re racism. This may be the one social issue that has little or nothing to do with racism.
aside from Possum, this is an excellent thread expressing both concern and problem solving ideas.
dyslexia wrote:aside from Possum, this is an excellent thread expressing both concern and problem solving ideas.
Stop calling me 'Possum'. dammit!
