What can prevent men from committing mass killings?

To state the blindingly obvious another thing they all have in common is a gun.

@flutherother That’s not an argument for this thread and only gets people worked up, thus not productive. Please, we’ve had plenty of threads like that.

“The vast majority of crime that is gun related is committed by people who illegally are possessing that firearm,” Faso said in an interview on C-SPAN.

http://www.politifact.com/new-york/statements/2018/mar/12/john-faso/do-illegal-gun-owners-commit-most-gun-crime-rep-fa/

They are not only born as males, but are also raised with that in mind.
So clearly, all males must be raised as girls, and have their testosterone production nerfed.

I just want to hear more of YOUR theories before posting my own socio-economic theory.

@Ragingloli Interesting thought! Testosterone can do some weird things, kind of like hormonal women….hmmmm

To prevent 100% of these killings you mention, and be 100% effective, 100% of the time, you must eliminate 100% of people. (Killing each other is something people do, and have done, for their entire existence, and nothing short of 100% eradication of the species will stop it. To ignore this fact is to foolishly believe anything else can be done to stop it completely.)
And, yes, the truth hurts.

@kritiper But the question is about why they are so mad that it turns to violence so often.

Maybe it’s something in the water we all drink that makes them nutzoid.
Maybe it’s because the world is so overcrowded. (The rats-in-the-box story: Put two rats in a box, feed them and they will multiply. When the box becomes full of rats they will turn on each other and kill each other.)
Maybe it’s because of the media that we are all just so much more aware of it.
It’s not just an anger or violence issue as much as an insanity issue: is there something in the environment that sets them up, chemically, that sets them off. And men are so much more visual in our violence. But, if women were equal in this, I think they would be just as violent, just as graphic.

They were raised in anger? But if they were, then so were their sisters, but the sisters aren’t going out and gunning people down. It’s testosterone, plain and simple. The one shooting that killed a 16 year old girl and injured her new boyfriend was committed by her old boyfriend.

This is worth posting again. The biggest factor in determining regional homicide rates is income inequality. Link Other factors, like racism, feed on the income inequality. Someone whose life is not going anywhere can use group hatred to justify his position.

I don’t know if you can totally prevent it; some people are just broken, but a change in the societal attitude toward violence coupled with a more matriarchal political system might help. I mean, let’s face it, mass killings are just American Foreign Policy on a more personal scale and we will have such a policy as long as the majority of our politicians are males who have the present mindset.

So here’s my theory. I believe Trump tapped into this white male anger in both red and blue states, which is why he won.

Five mass shootings were in California (blue), three were in Colorado (blue), two were in Washington (blue), and one each were in Nevada, Maryland and Oregon (blue) for a total of 13 in blue states, or 46%.

Two were in Texas (red), and one each was in Louisiana, Kansas, Tennessee and South Carolina (all red), for a total of 6, or 21%. (Does not add up to 100% due to rounding.)

You could go through the whole spreadsheet and run the calculations, but at a glance, it looked like there were plenty, and possibly a majority, of blue states listed. Of the most populous red and blue states, Texas was represented twice, California was represented 17 times. Among the very reddest states, Utah, Idaho, Wyoming, the Dakotas, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, there were two. Among the very bluest states, New York, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, there were ten.

https://www.quora.com/Are-US-mass-shootings-disproportionately-concentrated-in-either-red-or-blue-states

https://www.citylab.com/life/2017/10/geography-of-mass-shootings/541821/

@KNOWITALL , Don’t forget the recent bombings in the blue enclave of Austin.

You have to ask where the anger is coming from. Do you think that it might have something to do with the loss of manufacturing jobs, maybe having similar causes to the opioid crisis?

I think our culture produces a set of emotions and ideas in some people that is intolerable and lacks apparent options for expression, listening and acceptance.

The real solution which would address this core problem would be to stop creating that intolerable experience, and start providing available options that are visible to such people, to express their authentic selves and be heard and accepted.

For people who go on killing sprees, that looks to them like their best and only way to express their anger and hopelessness in their social context as they see it.

Note that the opposite of what I think is needed, would be to not try to understand and relate to what they were thinking and feeling that led them to take those actions. We need to understand that, and then to correct the conditions that create that.

@LostInParadise I do, and I think it’s been a long time coming. From illegal immigration to the ‘new’ trend in college degrees being a requirement, the white male is no longer seen as the perfect candidate because our country is becoming less racially focused by people my age (45 yrs.) We just weren’t raised to discriminate.

I think we’ll see more of this over the next few decades as these older males feel more and more left out, passed over and angry. As someone else mentioned, this country has been ran by the white male for a very long time, and women and minorities are viable candidates for ‘their’ jobs now, often more qualified and less offensive in their belief systems and values.

Basically Trump is their last hope to save the American Dream of the 1950’s. Some women choose to work instead of have babies, often making more than their husbands (me as a case in point.) We are not subservient, we do not iron and cook every night. Of course it’s discombobulating.

Then you have tons of liberals wanting immigrants and Dreamers allowed to stay with no repercussions, when the older white guys are being told they need a college degree to do any job!

With BLM, you have people marching for their rights, and proclaiming racism and discrimination by cops.

Everyone’s getting all the attention except the poor angry white guys. Sitting home, being the mom, cleaning house, bodies broke down from manual labor, just losing their self esteem and getting more and more upset.

Personally, I don’t believe the solution is to eliminate these men’s problems. How are we going to solve the problems of a man like Elliot Rodger, who killed because he was bitter that no woman would fuck him? How are we going to solve the problems of someone who’s pissed that women get to have jobs now, or that brown people are allowed to live in America? Yes, the progress we have made in the name of equality has made some white men angry – that doesn’t mean we should regress on any of that progress to placate them.

I DO think we should change the narrative around what it means to have emotions when you’re a man. I think we as a society should normalize male emotional expression outside of acts of anger and violence. I think we should make therapy and other mental health resources more accessible.

It’s a distracted sense of depression, something they feel they can’t control, the minorities are getting all the good jobs, women seem to have more power than they do.
And they feel their world is going nowhere and they are going to make a statement about that and have their name all over the country if they do a good enough job maybe all over the world.
NOW what can be done to prevent these types of violence,it has to start early, teach them the world doesn’t revolve around them, teach them bullying is very wrong, and maybe just maybe cut down on the violent entertainment, shooting everybody that pisses you off doesn’t solve the worlds problems.
And it isn’t a bad thing to seek mental help.

@SQUEEKY2 Well think about it, they can’t protest women, they have moms, wives, daughters, etc…

They can’t protest BLM or minorities, because then you’re a racist or greedy.

They can’t protest for job equality because they’ve had it so good at the top of the food chain for so long.

What can they legitimately do besides sink into depression with zero self esteem and try to punish the world? In a way it’s very sad, they weren’t raised to be out of control.

I’m telling you, Trump isn’t dumb, he figured this out and motivated an entire generation of people, pretty smart tactic.

Teach men how to chill out and grow from mistakes and to let go of focus on status and work. I was raised that if I didn’t have a Ph.D. and a 6 figure income that I was a failure. Talk about a mind f*ck. I was threatened that if I didn’t accomplish lots early that I might end up being a manager of McDonald’s for the rest of my life. Too much pressure. No wonder I cracked.

I think it is the new minority.
People of various ethnic backgrounds see white men as aggressive, powerful, and dominating. Women are angry at men and their superior wages, better opportunities, and sexual promiscuity.
Meanwhile, there are white men who are deeply frustrated because they are none of those things, but get lumped together with all white men, and get hated without ever being seen as who they truly are.
Some of those men get to the point they want to speak, shout, say something to be understood, but hold back, because who would feel empathy for an American white dude?
How many times can a guy hear women on TV, or around them say all men are dogs, before something snaps?
When people are wanting to be treated equally, they should think about who/what do they want to be equal to, and remember that all individuals want to be treated as individuals, including white men.

You are making a false dichotomy here.

To equate the anarchist, isolated, disturbed and YOUNG school shooters who are still focused on the problems of their youth and high school—with the American populists who elected Trump to bring back manufacturing jobs (most of whom are NOT white) and who support law enforcement and oppose illegal immigration (who are majority white but fairly mainstream) makes no sense.

I think your real motive for this discussion is you are trying to say that the school shooters are Trump supporters. NRA members, or that Trump supporters are angry gun-wielding crazed nuts. In reality, most Trump supporters from formerly blue states were workers, business owners, people of all ethnicities including many Hispanics in Florida and Texas—who played by the rules and were punished by Obama-era policies That is why Trump won.

The school shooters and serial bombers are isolated, anti-social ANARCHISTS who, as far as we can tell, blame their former high-school peers or society in general for their problems.

Dig around the darkest corners of reddit and 4chan. There is a lot of angst that they can’t get laid. No fucking shit people don’t want to fuck you. The MRA people are bonkers. They seriously don’t think you can rape your wife.

@Yellowdog, the discussion is shooters, not just school shooters. This would include the elderly man who shot up the concert in Vegas, mall shooters, and other postals. The men targeting theaters tend to be twenty-five to thirty-five.
Schoolshooters tend to be fourteen to twenty-two.
Maybe there is something to look at, what targets are chosen by what age groups.

Bitter angry men generally resort to physical violence.
On the flip side bitter, angry women generally resort to emotional violence. Shooting up a school is a whole new level though. Why are they mostly young and white? My guess is that white middle class families are more likely to medicate their kids rather than discipline them or provide guidance and proper support. The other common thread here is these shooters are universally on psych meds. People don’t seem to want to hear or acknowledge that. It’s not as much mental health IMO it’s the fucking drugs.

@reddeer You’re probably closer to this subject than many based on your story. Can you tell us how you feel your situation could have been avoided? What did you need for mental health that you didnt get?

@KNOWITALL Yes make university admissions less competitive. A 50% average or high school diploma good enough to get into post secondary schools. Fund university for the same way that high school is funded. Have dating and how to cope with breakups standard for high school students. Also classes with dealing with life that isn’t normally covered in school. I got zero mental health help from the school. My mom is the only one who helped me before Fluther.

Makes sense, definately update life skills-health class and counseling. Good start, thanks.

It’s a wrong focus. While “disease prevention” is something that each of us can do as individuals to avoid contracting or spreading illness, and vaccinations and other public health issues are common to all, “violence prevention” (except that each of us can certainly tend his own garden and maintain – as much as possible – his own mental health) is pretty much outside of our scope as individuals. And the only way for government to “prevent violence” is to be exceptionally violent in modifying society in ways that would paradoxically probably make us more prone to violence. (I am never so generally outraged as when I pass through the various “security systems” maintained by the state: TSA at airports and other transportation hubs, courthouse security scans and other areas where crowd control and access is “controlled”.)

The answer to the problem is NOT going to be “to increase security forces applied”. That is, to take the failed route that the UK has been taking for decades to limit more and more access to weapons (which, generally speaking, level the playing field for those who need additional protection), to add “security cameras” on every hundred meters of paved roadway, and to limit speech to the extreme and ridiculous extents that they have. UK society may have fewer “gun murders” than we do, but in general their society is far more violent than ours.

It would be helpful, I think, if we admit that fatherlessness is a major contributing factor to the outbreaks of mass violence that frequently plague us – but it’s not politically correct to admit that family breakdown, single-mother families and other family structures that exclude fathers are problems. After all, it’s been recognized for years, but no one seems willing to admit it. Instead we blather on about nonsensical issues such as “toxic masculinity” without considering where that might come from (if it really is a thing).

It would also help – greatly – if we permitted and encouraged more “actual play” in young children, and especially boys. These days “outdoor play activities” are so rigorously structured, controlled, managed and circumscribed (when they happen at all) that boys hardly ever seem to just run around any more, to burn off their excess energy, to test themselves in safe ways against boys their own age and to learn their limits – and about pain, too.

So, yes, there are things we can do that might help to address the problem, but… the problem you see is not “the problem”; it’s just one of many symptoms. And as long as all we do is address symptoms, the problems will get worse.

I wonder how many of them had mothers who worked outside the home ? I believe children need full time supervision.

@RedDeerGuy1, I like your suggestions very much. I have long thought that relationship lessons should be mandatory in high schools.
There has been lots of controversy over sex ed in schools, but nothing gets said about dealing with the basic relationship issues which actually could result in fewer pregnancies and other unwanted issues, including hateful retaliations.
I had a girl want to beat me up in the EIGHTH grade because she thought I was flirting with the love of her life. This was way back during covered wagon times.
As our species flounders forward in commerce and technology, we are stepping all over the basic aspects of growing up.
When I was in the Navy, I prompted two changes. One was outfitting our base with safety gear which will fit women, and a course for the men to help them understand the differences to be expected when working with women. It was a very progressive move for an old boys’ club like the USN.
Schools need to follow such an example, and help kids with understanding relationships, what they want, what is unreasonable to expect, and such.
It should involve more than just dating, but also friend, parent, and other relationships.

I have said for years that women have not achieved true equality until they do the same heinous crimes that men do.

That includes killing and crimes of passion. Until women are just as craven as men, they are not equal.

Isn’t that sad? It is true, and sad, that women want to be equal with people more sinister than us.
I used to be heavily behind women’s rights efforts, but as time goes on, and I look over those years, I feel we are giving up more than we can gain.
It used to be we could influence men, in discrete ways so they were unaware, and if things went south we bore no blame.
I have emasculated men, under the intent of proving the superiority of women. I realize now how sad it was, and how I hurt someone without making gain for anyone anywhere.
It is such which drive men to extremes.
Men are people too, and a bit clumsy. We should make allowances for that, and try to be more accepting, all of each other.

How to prevent men from committing mass killings?

Movies, toys, entertainment—should start promoting guns and mass killings as a “girly” thing. More Strawberry Shortcake cartoon characters as the rival of Batman.

More nine-year-old Pipi Longstockings Scandinavian girls with freckles bombing the festival. More fourteen year old girls dressing as Disney princesses shooting the theatre crowds. More toy guns that look like they should be in the hands of Tinkerbell. More frilly package bombs from female elves at Christmas, blowing up the bad kids and miserly Christmas scrooges.

No man who wants to be manly or macho would touch a gun or commit a such a juvenile female act as package bombs.

I’m not sure why people shoot others. And I’m not sure there is one reason for mass shootings. I believe that mass shootings are really just symptoms of some underlying attitude of the shooter. What we perceive as anger may or may not be anger. Maybe they are seeking to be noticed. Maybe they are one step from suicide and want to go out with a bang. Maybe they are depressed and are trying to lash out at whatever they see as the source of that depression. And let’s not forget the ones that do it because they believe their god wants them too.
BONUS answer: I’m a little disturbed by the question. Are you saying that only angry white men care about job creation or family values? If that really is what you are saying, then we might be seeing why they are angry. Because they are seeing the attitude of the nation going to hell in a handbasket and all morals and values are shot.

“morals and values”
No, they see their kind losing their status of supremacy and self-proclaimed superiority among and over the lesser races, genders, and sexualities.
It is twisted tribalism, nothing more.

^^^ Another good reason to bear arms, keeping Loli from visiting.

I would just melt you all from orbit with my giant alien laser.

You do that.

Noo the planet is where I store all of my stuff.

Maybe someone can invent “fuck stations” which would be virtual dick sucking stations for all of the angry white men who can’t get laid. They could spend their days and nights in these dick stations getting sucked and playing video games, instead of shooting up schools and movie theaters.

Meanwhile, all the women would continue to work, and cook, and clean, and take care of the children (like always) but at least we wouldn’t all have to worry so much about mass shootings.

@Kardamom But I want tits with my dick sucking station!

@Kardamom what an awful burden it must be on you, to hate men so much

I think that post was sarcasm

@kritiper the stations can be customized with boobs, and if you want faces of supermodels, or whoever else, they can be changed out to suit the mood.

@Kardamom
Already exists

Most of them are not only white, they’re middle class. Middle class white men are the most entitled sector, but the ground is shifting under their feet.
Some damn laws and regulations would help a lot.

Actually…
Middle class white females are the most entitled sector.
White males have been the focus of “privilege pushback” for a long time. It’s been ok to shit on them for at least a couple of decades. Middle class white females have been able to maintain all of the privileges of being white, middle class and they get to claim many of the new privileges that come with being a minority as well.

What makes the shooters white, male and middle-class is not so much their privilege eroding, but a lot of converging factors that we are just beginning to figure out. Many mass shooters are young enough to where they never really knew a world where they were able to get ahead simply for being male and white. Schools certainly are not set up that way now.

There is some good insight into the psychology of it. The bottom line is that men do not have good support systems nor is it socially acceptable for men to show weakness and go after treatment. Throw psych meds haphazardly prescribed on top of someone who is falling down in a house of cards build on some idealized self-image and suicidal ideation and you have a recipe for disaster.