Another one. Another school shooting. It seems like we have one every week. Wait, we DO have one every week. More students have been killed so far this year then active duty Service Members in war zones.  It’s less safe to be a student in an American school then it is to be a Marine. Let that soak in. Your child is more likely to go to school and never come back than from the Army.  Yet, there are no Gold Stars for these families. These mothers live with the reality that there was no noble sacrifice by their child. Their children died for no other reason than someone was angry and had access to guns.

So, let’s talk about empathy. What is empathy?  Here’s a definition that’s easy to understand. “Empathy is the experience of understanding another person’s thoughts, feelings, and condition from their point of view, rather than from your own. You try to imagine yourself in their place in order to understand what they are feeling or experiencing” Empathy is putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.  It’s trying to get to an answer of why someone may do something by imagining yourself as them. It a valuable way to deal with people as it keeps you from demonizing people who may act in ways you find unacceptable. It is by its very nature an analytical exercise.  It’s a way of finding understanding for the actions of another.

Empathy is NOT sympathy. They are often confused by people. Sympathy is an emotion. When you feel sorry or bad for someone that’s a sympathetic feeling. You’re not trying to find meaning, you’re feeling bad for someone’s misfortune. Sympathy is a reaction to another’s plight. They can be very much interrelated, one can lead to another. However, they are different. Sympathy is an implied reassurance of emotional support.  We send sympathy cards when people die, for example. It’s validating someone’s emotional experience as important enough to be shared by you.

 

Why the gobblygook about empathy and sympathy?  What does that have to do with mass shootings?  Well, I’m online reading news, as I do.  I see a couple stories about the young man who shot his classmates.  Seems he was a “quiet, but not in a creepy way” kid. He was in a dance group at his Greek Orthodox Church.  He played football, and was “instrumental in the win against their rivals”.  Why he was an All American boy!  An All American boy who walked into his school with loaded weapons and killed 10 people.

Nicholas Cruz, the Parkland FL shooter, was portrayed in the press as a poor troubled soul.  There were multiple lists of the incidents that had happened to him and how the schools and authorities had failed to react to any of them.  The overall theme was that this poor mentally ill boy never had a chance. All the red flags that were missed could have prevented this tragedy.  Feel bad for the victims, but also feel bad for this abandoned young man. We have failed him as a society, and this was the result.

On and on.  What made Dyan Roof become a killer?  Stephen Braddock went from successful businessman to mass killer, what changed him? We’re asked to understand the reasons behind what are incomprehensible acts.  I get that the more we know, the better we can predict and prevent mass shootings. Empathy is an important part of understanding what could make a person do this. Putting yourself in the shoes of someone who saw gun violence as an acceptable method of dealing with their issues is vital for prevention.

My problem is when we veer into having sympathy for them.  Nothing excuses their actions. I do not feel bad that poor Nicholas Cruz is in jail. Was he failed multiple times by the system.? Yes.  Should his very obvious emotional issues have been dealt with? Yes. Does any of that excuse what he’s done? No.  I’m troubled by the humanizing that occurs when the perpetrators of mass murder are talked about in the media. The TX shooter being rejected by a girl as an explanation for the shooting, like that explains it all.  We want a reason, especially when the killer is white.  We want an explanation as too why this person veered away from what our understanding of normal white behavior.

Now let’s compare.  Victims of white violence are treated very differently by the media. Trayvon Martin was “thug”.  The media never showed his pictures in his ROTC uniform but we all have seen him in a hoodie.  Mike Brown, shot unarmed by a white police officer, was “no angel” and the pictures used of him were unsmiling and menacing.  Eric Garner, unarmed and choked to death by a police officer, was a “career criminal”.  I could go on and on.  There is no attempt at empathy and zero attempts to garner sympathy…for VICTIMS.  In fact, they were presented in specific ways to do the opposite.  These men were shown and talked about in ways that reinforced the views of African American criminality.

We are supposed to feel bad for the white perpetrators of violence, but at the same time feel that black victims did something to deserve their treatment. The blood and mayhem caused by white mass shooters are viewed as an anomaly. We dig and dig for reasons to explain. It’s deviant. There has to be some rational explanation. If we, as white people, are morally superior, how can this happen?  This is why when we have mass shootings we talk about mental health. “They must be crazy.”  White supremacy is why when an unarmed African American is shot by police for holding a cell phone we ask “What did   he do?”  

I have empathy for mass shooters.  White supremacy, toxic masculinity and easy access to guns can be an irresistible cocktail for people who feel powerless.  I know that happy well-adjusted people do not shoot up worshipers at a Bible Study class. Something happened to make someone that, well, evil.  I understand that mass murder doesn’t occur out of the blue…something happened to make that person see that as a viable option.  I may understand the why. But they get not one bit of sympathy from me. I’m saving all my sympathy for the victims, of mass shootings and the police.