Why random shooters kill...

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Everybody is asking how a person could just go into a mall, a cinema, a school, and just fire at random. As somebody who has fantasized about doing this, maybe I can shed some light on the situation.

The most important thing to remember about a random mass killer is that they have a delusion of persecution. They literally believe that the world is out to get them. They view ordinary people going about their lives as conspirators in a massive conspiracy to persecute them. They may view somebody close to them, such as a parent or relative or boss, as a "leader" in the conspiracy. They see ordinary, everyday occurrences as evidence of persecution.

Another thing that separates them is the need to strike back. They feel utterly powerless against the Conspiracy, and fantasize about striking a blow at it, to "punish" it for its crimes. Since the entire world is against them, and everyday people are conspiring against them in their view, it becomes appropriate to lash out at random people to strike a blow at the Conspiracy. One of my favorite mantras during HS was "nobody's innocent". Everybody is guilty of participation in the Conspiracy, therefore everybody must pay.

So, the "intolerable occurrences" build. Finally, they decide that they have had enough, and the Day of Judgement has arrived, when the Conspirators will get what is coming to them. This should not be confused with "snapping", they have likely been planning for months, waiting for the perfect moment. The main emotion felt is anger, rage, frustration, a need to punish people for failing to let up on the shooter. The persecutions simply continued and got worse, in the shooter's mind. People simply didn't listen, and now it's time to PAY! Keep in mind that all this is solely in the killer's head. Mental illness, definitely, but not normal mental illness. Most mentally ill would never hurt random people. The shooters believe they're persecuted, feel powerless to stop it, and fantasize about revenge.

I'd imagine most people with this sort of delusion are schizophrenic. Most people would never harm anybody regardless but unfortunately the are a small amount of people that have that capacity when you combine that with these delusions of persecution as you put it, there can be disastrous results.

How far can a delusion go?

Could someone actually believe children in the school are something else? Maybe demons or aliens?

Should we also look at whether a killer spared a particular person for no reason? Maybe they think a one person is a normal human and another is a "Reptilian" or something equally outlandish?

I'm just wondering if a shooter is always indiscriminate, or would they put 11 bullets in one person while sparing another person right next to them.

As for common suicides after the fact, they may imagine themselves captured by Demonic forces or worse.

I suspect that a shooter could believe that the children in the school are somehow conspiring against them, or that there is a "reptilian conspiracy" and that the kids are "reptilians" or something. From my personal experience with these sort of delusions, a shooter may specifically target somebody, then simply shoot randomly. The "leader of the conspiracy" has been killed, now it's time for the "followers" to feel the pain. This killer may have believed that his mother was conspiring against him, and leading the kids and officials at the school where she once worked in the conspiracy.

It doesn't have to require psychotic symptoms, it can take as little as a single wrong turn in one's logic. This is addressed in Cognitive Behavioral Therapy.

I can't imagine why that shooter did what they did (they weren't a student being bullied or a parent of a mistreated child there) but I'd have enjoyed the idea of doing a school shooting when I was in school. I was bullied a lot and hated school. I dealt with it by not going which also had consequences.

It's anger, feelings of alienation and separation, hopelessness and powerlessness. Depression and dejection and yes, a sense of persecution and inability to see a way out of the situation at hand. A feeling the world is completely against them. There's also a sense of wanting revenge on an evil society that does them wrong at every turn and must be shown that it does not pay to do them that way. These turbulent emotions can cause someone to go on a shooting spree.

Not everyone reacts to alienation, hopelessness and seeing no way out of it in an aggressive manner, nor does everyone who dislikes this society....it can certainly be a factor in these types of situations I wont doubt that, but its not the only reaction. Nothing like being the outcast that everyone assumes might bring a gun to school because its the alienated, hopeless ones that commit such acts..then of course that individual only gets alienated further which either makes that more likely.......or maybe that person will instead commit suicide without homicide or have a mental breakdown.

I just don't get it...sometimes in the effort to identify likely mass shooters, more people are even further alienated for accidentally fitting a certain profile. Seems like a weird cycle.

Sweetleaf, yes, there are many different reactions. Shooting spree is just one possible outcome. Depression could be another, or suicide. Also, it can be a trigger that spurs someone onto great achievements or it can lead them to people who can help them through a crisis safely.

I will tell you why they kill. They aim straight. That is due to lots of practice on the firing range.

ruveyn

^^^^^^yeah,where are they becoming such good shots? You can't just pick up a gun and hit the target on the first time,somebody had to teach them..They would have had to be practicing somewhere and not in their backyards.People in the burbs would notice that and call the law.

You go to a shooting range?

Anyway, I do find the kill rate of this case very suspicious, along with the initial reports of a second shooter, someone killed in NJ, etc. Not just a run of the mill shooting here.

^^^^^^^I live in the rural South,it's a shooting range all around me.I heard four or five shots from the neighbors yesterday.It's pretty constant.

This might not be relevant but from experience I think some can actually believe that. I remember an aunt was in hospital and believed everyone else was an alien one day. She was screaming and lashing out, decrying everyone due to them being "imposters wearing human skin", she was sedated shortly after this and woke up not remembering it. Quite disturbing but it seems people can actually believe others are aliens/demons, whatever the reason behind the belief.

Yep. Delusions and hallucinations can and often are perfectly real to the person experiencing them.

Ive never seen evidence presented that the more high profile mass shooters (like columbine and VT) were in anyway delusional. The Columbine and VT shooters believed that no one liked them- which lead to depression-which lead to thoughts of suicide-which lead to thoughts of homocide. The reason they believed that no one liked them was because in reality no one liked them (there was nothing delusional about it). But in the long diaries by Cho, though he spewed his rage at the world for mistreating him- he did not claim that he thought that there was a literal conspiracy against him by everyone in the campus being lead by some ring leader. Atleast Ive never heard of that.

So most of the high profile shooters were not shooting imaginary demons.

I do recall one lesser known mass murderer who was something akin to what you're saying, and who told his story on TV (maybe 60 minutes). He walked through a public place and shot as many passerbyers as he could. He said was "convinced that everyone was out to get me" but he occasionally spared black people (he was white himself) because "for some reason I felt that black people were less against me than whites". But this guy flipped out one day and did it on the spur of the moment. He did not plan it months in advance like the columbine killers.