SCHOOL VIOLENCE AND TOXIC BELIEF

It is the measure of the world we live in that my poor wife is always worried that some comment of mine will provoke an unstable student to shoot me, and periodically she tells me to be careful. Shootings on campuses were nearly unheard of forty-odd years ago when the notorious Charles Whitman killed 14 people from the University of Texas bell tower back in 1966. Since that time, there have been a growing number of such cases on high school campuses, with the Columbine shootings having perhaps the most impact in the popular culture. The severity of the problem is greatly exaggerated, however, by what one researcher has termed the Rashomon Effect: high-profile cases have been recounted by so many witnesses in so much detail that it reinforces an impression that such cases are common, or even a growing problem. The evidence suggests otherwise.

Without regard to that, however, much has been made of the fact that some shooters have expressed disbelief in God or hatred of Christians, and the latest such incident (directed at a church) is discussed by conservative Vox Day here, while PZ Mwahaha clearly wants to disassociate himself and his fellow atheists from any culpability, as discussed here.

My view, as one who participates in school lockdown drills and who knows what it's like to be a social misfit, is as follows: yes, the kind of kid who goes ballistic with his classmates or his congregation is likely to express hostility/rejection of religion--but belief systems themselves, even the absence of belief, are not the culprit. The killers in mass shootings are less defined by their beliefs than they are by their targets: they are typically filled with rage over the imagined rejection and humiliation they experienced in their failed attempts to gain acceptance with whatever group, an acceptance to which they felt entitled.

That is why school gun violence is predominantly committed by alienated white males of relatively-high socioeconomic status within their communities, rather than members of minority groups. Don't believe me? Profile the kids who commit these crimes, and you'll see. It's a striking trend, especially when you consider that statistically poor people of color are much more likely to be charged with a firearms-related crime than rich white males---and yet virtually all of the Columbine-type incidents are the latter.

Given these facts, it seems that the role of theism vs. atheism is probably secondary at best. Human beings are social organisms, and traumatic social failure can lead to pathological responses, especially during adolescence. One pathological response is to develop a private belief system defined in terms of one's enemies. This is, of course, toxic belief. Or, in the case of a few (not most) atheists, toxic unbelief. But let's not make the mistake of thinking that latching onto anti-God, anti-church sentiments causes events like Columbine. At worst, all such things do is to provide a secondary justification in the shooter's mind for their rage. Which, ultimately, is really directed at themselves and people like themselves....