I believe that when we air videos of a ranting insane person, we only encourage other unstable individuals, and copycat crimes have proven this. We don't need to see that in order to "understand" - the man was irrational and homocidal.
It isn't a matter of understanding- the people who reached out to help him were rejected. I know what it is like to try to help someone who displays all the characteristics of a sociopathic narcissist. I have taught college students for the past 13 years, and I experienced what it was like to sit across the desk from a student who was easily the most disturbed person I've ever known. His behavior caused anxiety among students and faculty, and he was eventually admitted to a local mental hospital. Before he left our school, he had something nasty to say about every teacher who tried to help him. I wonder if he watched the news coverage. I wonder what he thinks of it.
In class yesterday, we talked about what we would do if someone burst into the classroom with a gun. This is a small group of mostly ESL students, many of whom are the first in their family to go to college. They work full-time jobs and carry full-time course loads; some are single parents. They are all dear to me, and our discussion left me feeling both anxious and leaden, a feeling I recognize from all the other school shootings. It hurts more each time for me, not less.
School is a place that should be safe, for people to share and learn. But the fact is there is very little faculty or administrators can do unless a crime occurs, even when the red flags are everywhere. Most everybody knew he was disturbed, but the hospital discharged him simply with the advice to get outpatient counseling, though he had been admitted for a 48 hr hold as a threat to self and others.
There are so many layers to this problem, and the media only compounded the problem.