NEWS: The Return of the School Shooting

First the Montreal incident, now a foiled Columbine in my hometown, Green Bay. Why is this coming back now?

I think one possibility is that memories fade, and a certain subset of high school jocks lose their fear of retaliation from the less popular. I went to high school in the immediate wake of Columbine, and though I had long hair, listened to Marilyn Manson and hunted every year, in all honesty I didn't get picked on much. There's only one particularly egregious incident I can recall, and I suppose I'm lucky few people overheard me contemplate putting "a bullet in his head."

However, I think it's important to note that kids getting picked on doesn't explain the totality of the issue. Something had to make school shootings start in the first place in the mid-to-late '90s -- bullying has been going on for ages -- and analyses of Columbine showed the shooters did not concentrate on those who'd picked on them. I remember reading six or seven years ago a comment by one of the killers, to the effect that "yeah, we want to get back, but this is more than that. It will be like 'Doom' come to life."

My preferred explanation -- one that ruffles feathers -- is parenting. Many of these kids had plenty of time in their houses (Harris and Klebold made pipe bombs), and in most cases I can recall, the parents could easily have afforded quitting one job. It's also a parent's job to monitor their children's mental health issues, and keep guns away from their offspring if need be.

I think it's the only explanation that stands up to scrutiny, as it's one of the few explanations that changed markedly between my parents attending high school in the '70s (much bullying, lots of access to guns, no shootings) and now. Other factors can make it wax and wane, but as long as home supervision doesn't exist, the violence won't disappear.

Finally, we should be sure not to blow the issue out of proportion. Though violence in the media escalated and big stories like Columbine broke, crime overall dropped in the '90s.