April 20, 1999
Oct 2, 2024 — 4/20. 1999.
Columbine High School, Jefferson County, Colorado.
I was teaching 12-year-olds in a public middle school.
Some moments of that day are crystal clear. The rest is a blur.
That was the day the world changed for students, teachers, and parents in the United States. The doors of the horrific and unthinkable were opened and there seems to be no closing them—children killing children with guns in schools.
The Columbine High School massacre shook the nation, and every school shooting since then has caused quakes in the psyche of Americans. You will have to forgive my bitter tone here, the parts I speak from rather than for. Actually, I hope that you will join my bitterness and grief as we continue to try and find a way to create change.
The statistics are nightmarish and bitter. Since April 20, 1999 there have been over 1800 reported gun incidents in schools in the United States. These include incidents with and without active shooters.
As of 2023 there were 118 active shooter events in our schools.
As of September 4, 2024, when 2 students and 2 teachers were killed in Apalachee, GA, there have been over 200 reported active gun incidents in 2024 in our schools. These incidents include associations with gang violence, domestic disputes, and active school shootings.
200+ incidents in 248 days.
From January 1, 2024 through September 4, 2024, 18 children under the age of 18 yrs have died at school because of gun violence.
With these statistics there is more than an 80% chance that every day going forward this year there will be an active gun incident in the places where we send our children, where teachers and staff show up to work, the people we know and love.
I have teachers in my family. I have children in my family. And there are my young clients. Every day there is some part of me holding my breath. And I keep thinking, What in the world are we doing?
This is insanity.
Yes, I am bitter.
Yes, this is a diatribe against gun violence and the sick and sickening culture of gun worship in this country.
Now there is a new twist since Apalachee in this already twisted tale. Children as young as 10 yrs of age are being arrested across the country in the midst of a proliferation of school shooting threats. According to New York Times report, over 700 children have been arrested in at least 45 states, with over 70 of those children aged 12 yrs and under since September 4, 2024. I have clients who are directly affected by these numbers. Law enforcement showing up at their doors in the wee hours of the morning. Homecoming events canceled. Evacuation drills canceled. Children being kept home out of caution.
Trauma. Trauma. Trauma.
What in the world are we doing?
Behavior is language
Let’s make one thing very clear here. Children and adolescents speak the loudest through their behavior. And we are not listening. When our children communicate their distress, tell us through their actions that we are failing to meet their most basic emotional needs, and we as adults are unresponsive, then they must speak louder and louder and yet louder. And yes, for some, more violently. Since September 4, our children have been screaming at the top of their lungs.
If we don’t listen when they’re killing each other, are we going to listen when 10 year old children are arrested and spend 10 days in a detention center? When a child of 14 years will be tried as an adult?
Actually, since 1999 every child who has made a threat, brought a gun to school, fired the gun, and/or wounded or killed someone, those children are screaming with everything in them that something is wrong.
They’ve been crying desperately for help for 25 years now.
We have continuously refused to listen. What are we not hearing? Why do we refuse to listen?
Our children are murdered, commit violence, and are treated like adult criminals because we don’t listen and we don’t respond. We react as if children are at fault when it is we, the adults — the ones who vote, make the laws, have the power, can make choices, who have agency who create the environments in which children, who have no power, suffer and act out — we who are at fault. From this perspective, our children’s literal lives, their safety, their sense of safety, and their future are sacrificed because adults do not take responsibility and continue to pass the blame to the children.
I understand knee jerk reactions to respond to the proliferation of threats coming across the country. I understand that they must be investigated and that we need to prevent more harm. The alarm and outrage, the visceral fear for our children and toward our children are real and valid. However, our reactions often perpetuate the very things we are trying to prevent. The adults continue to promote violent speech, model violence as an answer to problems, and make it easy to acquire guns that children then use to kill children.
In Internal Family Systems, we see protector parts working hard to prevent negative outcomes only to find that these parts either undermine our success or perpetuate the very thing they are trying to prevent or extinguish. For example, the Inner Critic desperately tries to shame us into being good or better or prevent failure and more shame—by shaming us. The intention of the critic is positive, however, its impact is not. It rarely works and often makes it worse.
So that’s my knee jerk reaction to all of this.
Let me turn to something more measured and hopefully more responsive.
We Need a Paradigm Shift
The question, “Why are kids threatening to shoot up schools, teachers, and classmates? Why do our kids commit mass murder?” will generate a long list of answers and theories. You may want to check out this thorough 2021 presentation from the Office of Justice Programs on the forming of and conclusions from The American School Shooting Study (TASSS). The list of questions they asked in their study are comprehensive and cover a wide gamut of factors. Of all the studies I came across in my research, this one seemed to have the most merit.
Other theories out there include:
violent speech in our politics;
guns in the homes;
gun accessibility;
gun culture;
social media and smart phones;
lack of parent oversight;
bullying and being bullied;
mental health and illness;
desensitization to violence and violent images;
ripple effects of the pandemic;
etc.
All have merit.
Changing the paradigm
Here are some new questions we need to be asking:
What paradigm are we operating within? Are we even aware of the ocean we swim in?
What keeps us from being curious about the “Other”? The ones who stand on the other side of the aisle? The ones who worship guns and won’t let go of them in spite of the mounting bodies of children? The ones who continue to stand fervently and oh so righteously against guns and on the side of children?
What is moving in us and through us—as individuals, communities, and a nation—that lays the fertile ground for violent political speech and a culture of gun worship?
What are we longing for in this bizarre house of mirrors of misinformation and lies and doublespeak and threats? What are we longing for or afraid of with the continued stockpiling of weapons?
Do we really understand the inner and secret worlds of children and adolescents? Do we truly understand the enormous and crucial value of those worlds?
What do we need to let be the beliefs and narratives we hold onto so fiercely and open our hearts and minds?
What courage is needed to look into the dark mirrors that our children are holding up for us and to see clearly?
Where can we find meaning in this?
Spending some time with these larger questions may be part of what’s needed to keep our children from being murdered at school. It’s one place to start anyway.
Photo by: Wipark