We don’t prevent terrorists or murderers by pretending they are anomalous monsters. We need to know what made them what they are. Because then we can help prevent them occurring in the first place. That is NOT NOT NOT “it wasn’t his fault.” It is identifying an opportunity to intervene.I don’t prefer the NRA approach of waiting until they kill a zillion people and then punishing them for it.We have learned a lot about CTE in the last few years — getting your brain bounced around your skill, in brief — and have seen it has many detrimental effects, as many football players can attest. If he had been diagnosed with this, could we have made sure he didn’t go down this path, and take his brother with him?Condemn the action, but find out why.Violence may not always beget violence, but the evidence that it does all the time is very, very strong.
We don’t prevent terrorists or murderers by pretending they are anomalous monsters. We need to know what made them what they are. Because then we can help prevent them occurring in the first place. That is NOT NOT NOT “it wasn’t his fault.” It is identifying an opportunity to intervene.I don’t prefer the NRA approach of waiting until they kill a zillion people and then punishing them for it.We have learned a lot about CTE in the last few years — getting your brain bounced around your skill, in brief — and have seen it has many detrimental effects, as many football players can attest. If he had been diagnosed with this, could we have made sure he didn’t go down this path, and take his brother with him?Condemn the action, but find out why.Violence may not always beget violence, but the evidence that it does all the time is very, very strong.