15 Years After Columbine, How "Never Again" Became "Oh Well"

[Eleanors38]

1. The phenomenon of mass murder is quite rare,

but started well before most of us were born. Perhaps there is a pathological streak in American culture (which could possibly be part of an American Exceptionalism) that has combined with our celebrity culture whereby psychopaths see a remaining means of mass legitimacy, of mass recognition, even as the old mass media model continues to crumble, leaving fewer avenues of purposefulness.

Sociologists have noted the alienating, even atomizing, quality of modern society well before the Inet & social media era, but such was little noted before the era of mass media. Perhaps the shift in how we view ourselves in this society makes little difference to a Texas Tower shooter, or college student knifer in Calgary. But there remains the craving for recognition and celebrity which transcends the old and new media, and how both forms confer legitimacy.

Celebrity and recognition may be the place to start in trying to understand the peculiar practice of mass murder.