I can buy the explanation that mistakes were made in the race to be first, and now we don't get any information about it without the utmost caution regarding accuracy. But people are eager to know what went wrong so they can start thinking about future prevention.
Have you seen this theory.....
- Thread starter mom2many
- Start date
Post #15 sums up my big questions really well. It's an odd set of circumstances, and it doesn't seem to fit the profile of matricide, as Singledad points out. Some things that really stood out to me from what little has been reported, is that 1) Adam Lanza seems to have had no support network beyond his mother, and 2) their family arrangements are very unusual.
So onto some baseless speculation in the meantime. My first observation specifically, is he was reported to be shy and had no friends, and his mother home-schooled him for several years until adulthood. Although he was 20, there is no information suggesting he had a job, or any regular activites or hobbies besides target practice (with his mother). Some college courses were mentioned, but they didn't seem to be part of any specific study program, and may have just been a way to meet district educational requirements. Singledad mentioned that abuse was a prevailing motive in these types of murders. Well it was certainly the perfect setting for his mother to abuse him - having no regular contact with anyone. I don't know, but the big red flag for me here was the homeschooling. (Please don't interpret that as a bash on homeschooling; I know many wonderful, well-adjusted families who homeschool, and my own parents did so for a short time too. But in the context of what we know, I think homeschooling may have been part of a scheme to isolate him.)
Now onto family arrangements. His mother had some kind of financial position, so we can assume she was probably educated and made a decent income. Fast forward to Adam Lanza in high school, and suddenly she's not working and she's homeschooling him. Not outrageous on its own, but an unusual change. And the fact that this arrangement was generously funded by the ex-husband in what court records suggest was an uncontested divorce... red flag. Why would the ex-husband/father agree to pay over $400K per year to his ex-wife after the divorce, when she worked during their marriage? I mean, it's usually the other way around, where a woman might stay at home if her husband has a good salary, but ends up getting a job if they separate. Some articles noted that it was uncontested, so I have to wonder if she was getting paid off. Perhaps the father was the abuser, and this lavish alimony was "hush money." The father's subsequent estrangement and the son's isolation would support this possibility. Perhaps it was the mother's way of preventing further abuse, and also preventing her son from confiding it in any one. That might also explain her rather extreme fascination with guns (self defense?) and eagerness to involve her son. Did she feel he had a serious need to learn self-defense, and why?
Perhaps the first murder was revenge for what his mother had done all those years (or not prevented), and the mass shooting was retaliation at the school for not having given him the help he needed at the time. Yes, this is very speculative at this point. But can you imagine how angry you might be if you were abused and confided in a teacher or school counselor, and in the end your mom just pulls you out of the school entirely and no one intervenes? He might feel pretty betrayed. Who knows? There aren't a lot of competing explanations. "Mental illness" is pretty vague and I have trouble swallowing the suggestion that every element of his crime was completely random.
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Yup. I really don't want to slander a murder victim. She might also have been a loving mother who selflessly gave up her career to take care of her mentally ill son. It's just that - like I said - the dots are there, begging to be connected. And until I read a better explanation, that thought will be going through my head...
I would tend to go along with you on that too.akmom said:
You know, technically, only a very small proportion of mental illness is purely genetic or purely biological. Since the brain is a plastic organ that literally shapes up and grows differently depending on your past experiences in your youth and across the years, most mental illness can found their sources from trauma, bad experiences, neglect or other various terrible experiences lived in the past.
Mental illness, to my knowledge, does not mean it is random.
The cultural component that makes it so different in US is that, in USA, anger is solved with violence and mass murder more than anywhere on the planet amongst first world countries - both from the standpoint of<I> constitutional rights</I>, easy access to mass murder weapons, and individually-centered society.
Exactly. Mental illness is rarely random. Sometimes it's purely biochemical, but much more often it's a combination of biochemistry and life experiences.parentastic said:
Actually, this whole "Oh, he was mentally ill. That explains everything" attitude pisses me off. Society needs to learn to ask "what happened to him? Why was he the way he was?" What if he was abused, and no one at the school wanted to listen? I can imagine him thinking well, perhaps if the kids actually died, maybe then somebody would pay attention... but chances are these questions will only ever be asked on obscure forums and blogs, because they're inconvenient and scary. The sad truth is, child abuse is still an inconvenience that no one wants to believe happens in their community. And when it does, they'd much rather just have it go away so they can get back to their perfect lives, than actually deal with it...
/rant over
Yeah, I can accept that mental illness sometimes prompts violence. But I just doubt his victims were random, or unconnected to his life experiences. I don't think he woke up one morning with bloodlust and thought, "Who should I kill? Oh, how about Mom, she's nearby. What next? How about that elementary school I used to attend, it's not that far away. Shall I pick off a few neighbors on the way? Nah."
Since it was indeed a suicide at the end, I wonder if he left a note. How common is it for people to commit suicide without a note? I mean, if he was seeking attention - which I think is a fair assumption, given the monstrosity of his crimes - then you'd think he'd also want to tell his story. Right?
Another question - IF he left a note, would we ever find out?akmom said:
What if he did leave a note, and it detailed information that would "inconvenience" some people in power, such as how something terrible had been covered up...
I imagine that someone of his age and social isolation wouldn't have much to cover up, except wrongdoings within his own family. And unless they're some kind of powerful diplomats, I can't imagine why authorities would find it convenient to cover this up. We hear about abuse all the time. What motive would they have for keeping this one secret?
I don't know, but think Paterno. I'm sure he and his family would have preferred for the Sandusky scandal to remain buried...akmom said: