What drives people to do such horrible things, like the Virginia Tech shooting?

Despair, abuse & the anger it causes....hopelessness, emotional isolation...

this boy has already given the answers in his English papers where he wrote about wanting to kill a teacher that molested students...

our entertainment (sick) glorifies revenge as a virtuous way of addressing injustice & abuse.....violence as entertainment (video games where Erik practiced shooting people).

the belief that there were no other solutions; Kip said "I had no choice." This guy wrote "They made me do it."

where were the gun laws ? isn't there supposed to be a 3-week waiting period? Not in Virginia (instant background check!) oh, you're OK, you've got the money -

Erik Cleabold (Columbine) had an abusive alcoholic father that didn't know he had guns & explosives in his room ! He was underage to own weapons; the young man who bought them for him got 10 years in prison.

Kip Kinkle (Oregon) had a VERY abusive alcoholic father who hated Kip & bought him the guns & ammo. No one in Kip's life defended him; he was persecuted by his father; his father was quoted by an acquaintance as saying " I dont think I will live through Kip's adolescence." (well, he bought him the guns ! which is something only an alcoholic would do.)

Why do we need assault weapons in our population ?

It wasn't too long when this occurred

When a mouse had turned into a bird

-a mockingbird was hit and shot

Taken from this earth by a Glock

Some hate him with fury in their eyes

Some depise him and wished he'd take his own life

Before raging rampant on a killing spree

He said he had no choice: "you did this to me"

This quote brought upon a violent surge

This loner was said to be on the verge

"Why did he do this? I don't understand."

Asked the kids with the upper hand.

I know what he did was wrong

He should have never wanted to kill a throng

But a sin is caused by sin done to thee

It's a sin nobody reached to to he

Who took his own life on April 16th

But not before taking 32 lives beneath

The Hall and dorms in which the kids

Of Virginia Tech studied and lived.

Now the country will go on another spree

To stop the guns before the bullets fly free

But the country does not understand

That this is not a matter of guns at hand

The man who did this was the same boy that wrote

In his dorm room, a fatal note

Telling the world 'you did this to me'

In fact, that note was his last plea

He talks about the rich kids and deceitful charlatans

Seven pages of this, disturbing and startling

The new Columbine, but instead of high school

This boy lasted till his dorm room

This boy was not the only case

Of a teenager using weapons to erase

The memories that he had to face

Growing up, passing by school with haste

And this struggle will continue

Teenagers will shoot at any venue

It's because he was the outcast;

He was the person who finished last

And was never let into the pack

He was joked upon, till he fired back

But not with the pen, but with the gun

Making all his past nightmares run

The plays he submitted were filled with crime,

Horror, violence, nothing sublime.

Some say it's the media; it's the video games

Some say it's the rappers and music's to blame

But it's none of the above; it's exclusion from society

And it's only when they roar back and break out of their piety

That we stand back, with pale faces

Since he's not white, it's an excuse to hate races

But all of this drama has only occurred

Because of bullies and the power of words

Or lack of them. I'm not saying what he did was right

But my heart reaches out to his last fight

It wasn't his fault; it was the way he was raised

It's the system who deserves the blame

It's the system of kids; the system of caste

Of middle school upwards, and he finished last

I know, it's unbelievable to think that this happened. Some people just snap I guess. Who knows, maybe he was failing, or had problems with other students. It doesn't justify anything because people can get help. Some people have underlying mental conditions that they are not aware of and something may trigger a response. Look at the guy who shot those little Amish girls in the school. The Oklahoma City bombing, the stories we hear about postal workers. We all know that life can be hard on people and it's tough out there. Many people don't make enough money, they can't find a good place to live, bad family life. The list goes on. It doesn't give them the right to do what they did but sometimes you have to stop and think about what could have happened to them that they had to resort to violence to make a statement or get revenge perhaps. It's something that we can speculate about, but we'll never know the real truth.

Well, I've scanned a few of the answers so far. I see some sane, and some utterly ridiculous - blaming Bush, blaming the NRA, blaming "brainless people with guns."

Shootings are just the tip of the iceberg. Think about the rest of our culture's erosion: explicit sex on TV, drug use, rap lyrics that portray being a stupid drop-out loser as being "cool." What we have here is an all-out decline in civility and respect for law. This guy may have been mentally ill, but maybe not. The two kids who shot up Columbine weren't what I'd call mentally ill. They were brooding losers who grew up not valuing human life and not feeling any sense of responsibility, nor any fear of punishment for their actions. THAT is the real core of incidents like this.

It begins when children are little, and our whole model of parenting and education avoids punishing them because it might "hurt their self esteem." It continues as they grow and our day-care culture ignores them and shuts them up with Ritalin. When they are young teens caught with drugs at school, or caught vandalizing property, they get slaps on the wrist. Voila! By age 17, you have a monster who has learned that nobody cares about him, nobody deserves his respect, and he is free to act any way he pleases.

I know what you mean and it is truly horrible.

Usually serial killers have what is called in psychiatry "antisocial personality disorder". They tend to find fulfillment and pleasure in the hurt and suffering they cause in people around them. They do not have any empathy or emotions towards their fellow human beings aside from hate and a purpose to gain control through others.

This can be pretty much a combination of genetics and environment. When looking at cases like this one the abuser has been brought up by a very dysfunctional family that did not practice love and empathy.

Regardless of what may bring people to act in such a horrible way does not excuse in any way the tragedies they raise in their existance.

I myself thought the same thing when i got home from school and was witnessing the horrific scenes on TV.I kept asking myself why would a human being do this to others.Why would someone cause so much pain and hurt on others he never knew.I personally think he was going through difficult things in his life.Maybe he felt left out and thought he didn't fit in or maybe he was just a plain psycho!!!However we will never know the real reason behind this terrible shooting.Its really sad and i pray for the innocent people who were killed and wounded in this terrible massacre.

Thankyou for many popular us in prayer. the main we are in a position to do for friends and familys of those poor scholar sufferers is prayer. Thankyou for this prayer. Now there is investigations and to be taught of who this person became into to reason so poor a tragedy. i think of all of us have intense doubts approximately how the guy who already killed 2 human beings became into allowed to proceed to be on campus and kill 33 pupils in yet another construction bulding 2hours later. i'm outraged. A warning had to be further to each lecture room that a intense threat to the protection of the pupils. The professionals say oh nicely the campus has a superb type of scholars comming and stepping into and out all day long how can we be answerable for absolutely everyone.? perhaps a warning for the pupils and instructors? The police concept oh nicely it incredibly is in ordinary terms those 2 poor ineffective human beings we could see who they are linked with right here on campus? meanwhile the shooter became into having a cup of espresso on the scholar center cafeteria and somebody would desire to have warned the entire campus. that they had 2 hours to close down the campus and get the little ones in there dorms the place thy can lock themselves in till the police understand the killer. to discover the killer,... rather they only lollygag around the only little room the place the 1st killing surpassed off no longer even a concept the guy became into in all danger having a cup of espresso in the scholar center cafeteria. i'm sorry for the ineptitude of authoritys to think of previous what's already there. i'm sorry that prayer is the main we are in a position to do for the sufferers friends and kinfolk. In Columbine the cops have been indecisive approximately what to do next so as that they stood around outdoors the construction for 2 hours jointly as the killing went on interior. right here the cops stood around 2 corpses for 2hours no longer a concept some killer sitting precise there of their midst having a cup of cofee.

i heard that it was because his girlfriend broke up with him and refused to get back together with him. Also, it said that he was depressed and took medications to treat the depression at some point. He also wrote a letter and left it in his dorm room. the letter was filled with grievances about rich people and the "fake", people pretending to be something they're not from his school, VT. they say he was a "loner" who never talked to anybody, so, the investigators are still having a hard time finding more information about him.

From what we all know, he was definitely CRAZY!

R.I.P. to all the victims and may GOD bless them all. :'(

I have been asking myself the same question. I don't understand WHY anyone would do such a horrific thing. Obviously they aren't thinking clearly. They don't think about what they are doing to people, to their families or their OWN family!

A deranged mind. Hatred, paranoia, depression - any of these underlying motives - people with sound minds simply do not act out.