It is too early to understand the details or motivation in the tragic shooting at Umpqua Community College. What we can be sure of is that there will be the usual rhetoric about mental illness and gun control. What there will not be is any solution to the growing problem of violence on campus.
It is clear that campus shootings are always related to childhood abuse and trauma. Why are colleges often targeted? It’s primarily because people who have been subjected to abuse, and who have lost hope tend to see college students as representing the hope they never had or had lost. These shootings represent rage at our society, and target those who the shooters see as benefiting from a society that has abandoned them.
We need to address the issues of social fragility, poverty, and child abuse if we want these shootings to stop. Unfortunately, this is unlikely to happen