Originally Posted by
Arpy
My brother called me last evening. He is a retired military officer with 30 years of service. Highly decorated, combat experienced, CW5 Combat Engineer. He was almost in tears about the shooting in Texas. I am a retired College Professor/Police Chief with 40 years of experience. He has 3 grand children the same age as the victims.
He wants to volunteer to patrol an area grade school. No pay, his own equipment, waivers of liability. He is a warrior and wants to move toward the sound of the guns like all righteous warriors do. We talked a long time about why this approach, although noble, will not work. It has to do, bottom line, with liability. So, our conversation drifted to why these things happen. I told him that my opinion is based on what I have learned, observed, studied and taught throughout the years. As with most complicated questions, it does not come with a quick and simple answer. The school shooting situation has a historical basis. It looks something like this.
Back in the late 60s and early 70s the psychiatric community came up with the argument that people with mental health disorders have rights to. When the debate, and there was a lot of it, was done State supported mental health facilities started to close down and ambulatory patients were released into communities under new medications and medication guidelines. They were sedated to be easier to control. Proponents pointed to a saving in tax dollars and the development of "inclusion" into our daily vocabulary. It was the beginning of homeless people.
At the same time this was going on, society decided that 2 incomes were now necessary and moms went to work. Gradually, day care centers were introduced and elementary schools were asked to take on more parental type responsibilities. It's worth noting that at this time schools employed teachers, custodians and a Principal. That's it. The focus was on education. Today, it is not unusual for a school to employ teachers, custodians, a Principal, 2 or 3 vice-principals, a nurse, counselors, dieticians and a kitchen staff, and a school resource officer. Schools now are focused on "Child Development". Slowly and steadily parents abdicated their responsibilities as parents and gave, sometimes forced, the care of their kids on a school. Schools, being bureaucracies, developed protocols and procedures to deal with raising kids. They had to be fair. Since maintaining order was in everybody's best interest the schools diagnosed kids with a variety of disorders that resulted in children being required to take drugs intended to control the child's behavior.
Society was now facing a generation of children raised by institutions, not family's. In the follow up investigations it is common to find out that the shooters recently stopped taking their medication. When this happens, the person being treated often acts out in rage and frustration. The focus of this anger is the placed that raised, frustrated, and treated them like clients in a protocol instead of like kids.
So, who is to blame for school shootings? None of us. All of us.
Guns are not the problem. They are just easy to blame. They do not cause people to be violent and more than forks cause people to be over weight.
Schools are not the problem. They are trying to deal with situations they are not structured to confront. It's not reasonable to ask them either. They need to stop trying to be all things to all people.
The answer is simple and complex. Children need to be raised by parents. Two parents is the ideal number. One can do it, but it is really difficult. Every grade school secretary in the country can tell you by the end of the first week of classes which kids come from homes with a parent in them, and homes with both parents working.
Politicians will now start shouting about our need to "act". An average of 15 gun laws are violated at every school shooting situation. More laws won't stop the carnage.
The shooters at Columbine planned their assault for months. Lots of their peers knew they qere talking about doing something. Nobody told a responsible adult. The two boys spent a week making bombs in a garage. Not one adult bothered to ask what they were doing.
I am reminded of an old comic strip called Pogo. He is talking about the problems in his world and tells is friend, "We have met the enemy, and he is us."
Peace.
Arpy
