Immigration
...Colorado.
These are names of American cities and towns where violence has usurped deep into the
American heartland where families settle to raise families away from the violent big
cities. Andy Williams, Jason Hoffman, Eric Harris, and Dylan Klebold; names of
students who came to their schools with weapons to kill those students and staff whom
they felt were responsible for their melancholy. What are the motivating factors behind
these suicidal attempts?
Society is trying to convince itself that it must be Hollywood with its violent
entertainment and glorification of violence. Another scapegoat is videogames with all the
gore and realistic killing or maybe even music that has lyrics considered by the majority
to be riddled with suicidal or homicidal messages to today's youth. Politicians, parents,
law enforcement, and society are asking themselves, "What are the factors leading to the
increase in violence among our children?". The most convincing causes for
violence in our children lies not in the entertainment industry but in us. The main
source is depression of the killers due to rejection by their peers, the breakdown of the
cohesive family unit due to divorce and the easy accessibility to weapons.
The major cause of violence believed by some researchers is the age-old traditions of bullying and the clique system in high schools. Jerry Adler states in his 1999 article The Truth About High School that these are so called "rights of passages" that all American students have been exposed too. "These factors have been around since the invention of high school and adolescents have been forming cliques and mentally ranking them just as in an adult society [which are] dominated by hierarchies" (Adler 56).
As in most high schools across the country the athletes dominate the social scale and enforce the hierarchy, which explains why...
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