The Chaos of School Violence

In April of 2008 the parents of Ryan Scallenberger, age 18, of Ruby South Carolina, called police on their son. They had discovered bomb making materials along with instructions on how to explode his school, “Chesterfield High.” His parents became concerned when they picked up a package mailed to their son. It was 10 pounds of ammonium nitrate, an explosive commonly used as a fertilizer. His parents searched his room and found a journal with plans for a suicide attack on the high school. Ryan was an honor student, and was in contention to be valedictorian in his class.

This type of plan of action has become a pattern of major concern in this country. Killings of students. These “suicide missions” are being plotted mainly by individuals. Many of these young men are academically intelligent. They often are loners or anti-social.

What triggers them to commit such horrific acts of evil? These cases are not much different than those acts of suicide bombings going on in the war zones around the world. Could there be a connection with the personal reasons that young people choose to end their lives, and that of others, is such a violent way?

We have all sorts of educated experts who can not figure out the reasons why this is happening at such an alarming rate. We are so pre-occupied in believing that education is the answer to everything, we fail to investigate what  is bothering our youth to the point of wanting to destroy themselves and others. There has to be a logical reason this keeps happening.

When a disgruntled employee looses his job and commits the same act at his work place, we can understand where his state of mind was. We can relate to his depression and the anger he must had endured to reach that breaking point. But when a young man just starting out his life, becomes so burdened with problems, that he can no longer cope, where have we , as a society gone wrong? Are we so arrogant in the pursuits to compete with the world through our young people, that we don’t have the time to simply LISTEN to what they are worried about?

We have become so focused with academic success, that we fail to see the pressure we force onto some of these bright young people. We only hear of those who commit suicide after shooting up a school. We never hear of the ones who commit suicide alone. Their problems are no different than those who choose to take others along with them. Educational experts are narrow minded when it comes to understanding situations such as poverty, abuse, or family problems. They seem to think that education will correct any problem.