“Ninety-five percent of mass shootings are committed by men,” James Alan Fox said, referring to the shooting of a 15-year-old woman that claimed two lives.
On Monday, a 15-year-old woman shot and killed two people, a classmate and a teacher, at Abundant Life Christian School in Madison, Wisconsin. Six others, including two students, were injured and in critical condition.
James Alan Fox, a criminologist at Northeastern University who has studied mass murders for more than 40 years, said incidents like this involving a female mass shooter are extremely rare.
“Ninety-five percent of mass shootings are committed by men,” says Fox, a research professor of criminology, law, and public policy at Northeastern University. “The overall majority of violent crimes, particularly homicides and gun homicides, are committed by men.”
Police are investigating the motive of the shooter, identified as Natalie Rupnow, who was found dead when police arrived on campus Monday morning.
Fox’s study of mass murder provides perspective on the rarity of violence perpetrated by women.
“Since 2006, there have been 589 active shooters who have killed at least four victims,” Fox said. He heads the Associated Press/USA TODAY/Northeastern University Mass Murder Database, the most extensive source of data on the issue. “Of those shooters, 33 were women.”
Fox added: “Most of the cases committed by women involve family members.”
Fox said his research found that men and women approach violence differently.
“Women are more likely to use violence as a means of self-defense in response to perceived threats to themselves,” Fox says. “Men often use violence as an offensive weapon to establish control.”
Rapnow is believed to be the ninth female student to commit a school shooting since the Columbine High School murders in 1999, according to an analysis by The Washington Post. Four percent of school shooters are women, according to the Post’s database, which only tracks shootings that occur during class hours on K-12 campuses with students.
Fox says this distinction is important.
“We’re hearing numbers in the news media that say there have been 83 school shootings this year,” Fox said. “However, most of these shootings do not involve students and do not occur on school grounds. Many of the shootings that occur on school grounds involve non-students as both perpetrators and victims. Shootings occur during school holidays and on weekends, as well as accidental discharges of firearms.
Fox said it’s important for students and parents to realize that mass shootings like the one in Madison, which targeted students during school hours, are tragic but rare. He said that.
“This year, five students have been shot and killed by assailants on school grounds, and that’s five out of 50 million students enrolled in K-12 schools,” Fox said. “Shootings in school parking lots or playgrounds, regardless of the time, should not be taken lightly, but they are unrelated to measures such as lockdown drills and arming school staff.
“I do not want to downplay the horror that two students were killed and another student was seriously injured in this incident,” Fox said. “The average number of K-12 students killed by gun-wielding assailants in schools is six to seven per year. That’s clearly far too many.”
Fox said the problem is caused by active shooter drills in schools.
“Overemphasizing the dangers of school shootings and requiring children to undergo active shooter training sends a message to children that there is a target on their backs, which can increase children’s fears. The feeling is even higher. If you weren’t at risk, we wouldn’t be doing this,” Fox says.
“We’re also normalizing the whole school shooting thing, so kids who are angry at their teachers and peers are saying that this is what everyone else is doing and bringing guns to school.” They understand that it’s about taking them and shooting them. By continuing to obsess over school shootings and repeating the drill, we keep this idea alive in our children’s minds.”
According to Fox, violent crime across the U.S. will decline by 2024.
“Homicide rates and mass shootings are down this year,” he says. “But the media generally doesn’t cover this.”
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