A teenage gunman who killed eight people in a high school rampage before turning the weapon on himself has died in hospital.
Seven students and the school principal died when 18-year-old student Pekka-Eric Auvinen opened fire at a school in southern Finland yesterday, hours after he posted a video on YouTube foreshadowing the massacre.
Witnesses said Auvinen walked through the corridors of Jokela High School firing into classroom after classroom with a .22-caliber handgun.
Police said Auvinen came from "a very normal family".
"He had no problems in school,'' said local police officer Jan-Olav Nyholm.
Police chief Matti Tohkanen said Auvinen killed five boys, two girls and an adult woman.
He later identified the woman as the principal of the school in Tuusula municipality, a town of 35,000 about 60 kilometres from Helsinki.
The YouTube video, set to a hard-driving song called Stray Bullet by the industrial rock band KMFDM, shows a still photo of a low building that appears to be Jokela High School.
I can't think of anything profound to say. This is very sad. Why do so many young people want to not only kill themselves but innocent bystanders? Why is so much rage directed at government schools?
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Technorati tags: school shooting, public education
39 comments:
Just wondering... How much do you know about the Finnish school system or about the way how it is run? I would not tie this incident to the school system - this person was mentally disturebed and it seems that he would have done it somewherer public anyway; church, the mall etc. had he not done it at school.
The Finnish school system happens to be one of the best ones in the whole world (do a bit research).
Weird insinuation at the end.
This guy was essentially an ideologically committed extreme right-winger indoctrinated into hating the public school system as a matter of political dogma. We have educated generations of Finns in a public school and it's worked great -- UNTIL some idiot decides to become Columbine copycat because he has some nazi delusions about his own superiority and the supposed inferiority of his schoolmates because -- you guessed it -- they happen to be going to a public school.
Please stop brainwashing our kids into monsters who commit acts of political terrorism on our people, and especially all the other kids who are getting their education without any problems.
What was completely the fault of this murdering psychopath and the ideology HE chose to adhere to, not our school system.
Excellent answers. This kind of thing is unheard of in Finland, and it will in all probability stay an isolated incident. It's very sad and almost as revolting as the incident itself, that all kinds of people around the world are using this tragedy to further their own causes.
Obviously, the boy was deranged.
However: Finland, in spite of our well-rated schooling system is still not adopting the zero-tolerance principle when it comes to bullying and especially hidden verbal and nonverbal aggression in schools. Interviews with this guy's 'friends' suggest that he (among legions of others, of course) had been the victim of constant, though silent bullying.
I hope this incident scares the s**t out of people who bully and tease others, anywhere. Come on, they know they're doing it!
I don't see how a zero-tolerance system could harm anyone more than the present situation - where people invisibly pick on each other to alleviate their boredom and frustration until someone blows a fuse. Then again, the place where it all begins is HOME, and there's no way to monitor people's wrongdoings there. But doing so at school could be a start.
Actually, I think the Finnish school system is better than most.
There is no doubt that the shooter was one sick puppy and he was imitating the American school shooting epidemic.
The problem is that institutionalized settings may be efficient, but bad for the emotional and moral development. It is that whole "Lord of the Flies" phenomenon.
Socializing children in large groups with minimal parental and adult influence is a bad idea.
This type of rage doesn't grow in a vacuum. The fact that these incidents are occurring more frequently in a school setting, should tell us something.
Parents and society as a whole need to reevaluate how children are educated. Because of changes in society and family structure, children are increasingly more isolated. Large institutions, like schools, add to that sense of isolation.
The shooter could have gone to a mall or a church. But, he didn't. He picked a school for a reason.
You're just making excuses for essentially a terrorist strike motivated by his ideological hate which stemmed merely from what he had learned from Mein Kampf and the Internet. This was not the fault of the victim.
Your argument is analogous to wondering what the heck is wrong with the the Jews so they inspired such hatred in Germany that they invited the Holocaust upon them...
Actually in his Manifesto he said that he didn't choose a school as a target for a particular reason. My feeling is that he attacked it because as a school student it was, in his world, the immediate representation of "the system" he wished to destroy.
Of course, a public school is ideologically fitting because of his self-declared "anti-social natural selector" (and whatever) nature.
He wasn't a product of an institutionalized setting. He was a product of an ideology that believed it was OK to go kill people in such a perceived institutionalized setting because he was "above it". It's the "sheep" (that is, normal, peaceful people who constitute pretty much all the rest of the school population except him) he wanted to kill because he believed they were made so by the institution...
The increased bullying in recent years referred to by an above poster is a genuine issue but it reflects problems elsewhere in society... they just show up at the school because that's where the kids are, and they would show up at any school, not just a public one. It's a complex issue, but early intervention certainly would help. Despite of what most Americans seem to believe of our "institutionalized" education, our teachers and schools are actually a bit TOO reluctant to engage with the children's lives outside of education in classroom exactly because of the reason that it's the schools business to mostly educate... it's a lack of *parenting* and a general degradation in the cohesion in society we're seeing, not a school's failure.
Like it or not, in life you have to deal with other people, and a school is a great place to learn to do that. I have no sympathy for the idea that perhaps, say, this kid should have been homeschooled because when put in the middle of his peers, he explodes in murderous rage. He is the misfit, he was in the wrong here.
Trust me, he would have become a murderer later in life, if not at 18, because he would always have found new social situations to hate because they involve his inferiors...
Interestingly, I was a slightly arrogant straight-A student who was interested in Nietzsche and played with similar nihilistic, semi-fascist thoughts in school. Typical male adolescence I suppose. I never set up a one-man trenchcoat mafia though, wasn't a loner, and eventually grew out of it when the real world showed me I'm not an overman.
Perhaps one of the reasons why I finally didn't quite like the ideology I was fooling around with was that I was also a disabled student too that would have been at the top of this lunatic's kill list, but yet all of my classmates were great and tolerant, my experience in school was good, and the older I get, the more grateful I am it was the way it is. It's GOOD to be around people who are socially well-adjusted at least when they need to be... they can proclaim their hatred of the system as much as they want on their free time.
>it's a lack of *parenting* and a general degradation in the cohesion in society we're seeing, not a school's failure.
I totally agree that it is a lack of parenting. I agree with much of what you(cptpicard) had to say.
Did the school "cause" this young man to kill others and himself? Of course not. However, did the school environment negatively influence this young man? Yes, it did. Did the internet play a role in this tragedy? Yes, maybe more than any other factor.
>Like it or not, in life you have to deal with other people, and a school is a great place to learn to do that.
This is where we disagree. Children learn healthy socialization from adults, not other children. Children do need a peer group, but should not be immersed in it. Children should model their behavior from the adults in their life, not adolescent peer group. Children can't do that if adults are only on the periphery of their school day.
I'm not raising a "big kid." I'm raising an adult. A child can not teach another child how to be a high functioning, moral adult. The playground or the classroom is rarely the source of high moral thinking.
Funny how public schools here raise lots and lots of highly functioning, moral adults all the time, then, huh -- such as yours truly? -- and fail like this once in a century :)
You are making a statistical error when it comes to your sample size, and attributing blame to likely factors. I would say neonazism influenced this guy more than anything, and school's influence is negligible. You could say that school influences anything and everything kids do and them blame everything negative on the school (in particular if it happens to be public). Of course, we must now bear in mind that your arguments mostly are against "a school" in general -- it's not a public education issue.
If we found out that the guy was Lutheran like most of the habitual Christian people around here, could we say that his brief exposure to Jesus must have influenced him, no getting around that because after all, he used to go to Sunday school as a kid?
If he had got out of school and went to work someplace, hated his corporate drone colleagues and "The Man" and then opened fire in the office, would it have been the fault of how the rest of society is organized?
I know it's a convenient strategy to sow doubt, but clinging on to a single extreme statistical outlier who actually had his grudge against his school (and what it represents) brought to him *from the outside* doesn't cut it for me.
Actually I just learned a far better counter-example to your suggestion that the "school influenced him anyway, so it's the school's fault"...
His mother seemed to be a bit of an eco-fascist, so that's where her son probably got parts of the idea of weeding out the weak.
What if this woman had homeschooled him? Could I PLEASE suggest that if he had then gone killing people he considers unfit, his education MIGHT have had something to do with it, and he might have turned out better in a regular school? :D
>Funny how public schools here raise lots and lots of highly functioning, moral adults all the time
There is some debate there, present company excluded. ;)
For example, suicide is an indicator of the mental health and social wellbeing of society. Finland has the highest male suicide rate in the entire world (26.5/100,000).
A better debate might be "Why do so many young men in Finland try to kill themselves?" The United States with its higher crime rate and easy availability of guns has nearly half the male suicide rate of Finland(14.6). Great Britain has nearly 1/3 the male suicide rate (9.9).
And, don't get me wrong. I think Finland is a wonderful country with relatively decent schools. My point is that parents need to be actively involved.
Public education makes it too easy for the parents to fade out of the picture. Sometimes, school purposely push them out.
Still, for many families, the public school is a good choice. For other families, homeschooling, private school, distance learning or independent study can be a better choice.
Regardless of which way you choose to educate your children, it is important that there is more than one option. A one size fits all mentality is dangerous.
Maybe in Finland public schools are perfect.
In America pretty much everyone acknowledges there are problems with American public schools. The discussion is on what are the exact causes and how best to fix it.
As a homeschooling parent, I agree with much of what is said here. I believe there are many kids who think like this young man and that post-modernism is killing our kids. I posted entry today about my feelings today on my blog. I'd appreciate your comments.
http://spiritfilledpuritan.wordpress.com/2007/11/08/finland-evolution-and-philippians/
I double check the stats on suicide rates in Finland. According to the WHO, the suicide rate in Finland for males is actually 34.6. While that is higher than previously reported, it is not the highest in the world. According to WHO, the suicide rate in Lithuania and The Russian Federation is higher than Finland. Another source, claims that Southern India's suicide rate is the highest in the world.
Either way, Finland still has a relatively high suicide rate.
The suicide issue with the Finnish males could of course have nothing to do with the educational system. There are quite a few studies about this and the whole thing is very complex. There are so many factors there that trying to blame the school for it (how come the girls don't kill themselves?) is a bit out reached.
Like someone in this thread said: in most of the cases the disturbance in a young child's or teen's life is often related directly to home.
I'm not saying homeschooling is bad - if the parents are well educated, responsible etc. it can be a good idea; of course in Finland both parents tend to have full time jobs. By education I mean more than the basic stuff about geometry etc. Having a good knowled of psychology, educational sciences, pedagogy are quite essential, too.
All I am saying is that to my experience, the troubled ones have most of the cases huge problems at home - school could be just the thing keeping them from going over the edge. If these childred would not attend public school (we don't have private schools in Finland), things would get worse.
Wow! you sure are getting beat up over here, aren't you?
For the record, I agree with you. Granted there was something wrong with this kid, I disagree that he would necessarily have done "somewhere public anyway" as your first poster suggested. I've yet to see a school shooting case where the shooter wasn't a social outcast who, while in school, found that his awkwardness made him a target to be bullied mercilessly.
Home schooling allows a child to grow through his awkwardness. State sponsored schools leave his vulnerabilities exposed. Only by the most rigorous policing can an institution running herd on masses of children approach the level of social acceptance that a homeschooled child enjoys on a fundamental level.
You pointed this out correctly - I think you are hearing people who are more interested in national pride than honest assessments at this point. You are still right to point it out.
I also wanted to add, part of why I'm so surprised that you are getting attacked like this is that you said so little to bring it on. others have been MUCH more explicit about this subject and its relationship to school (see, for example, Vox Day). You don't deserve this kind of treatment!
>(we don't have private schools in Finland)
Why aren't there private schools in Finland? I'm just curious.
And, please, I get grumpy when people don't read comments carefully.
>Still, for many families, the public school is a good choice.
>Did the school "cause" this young man to kill others and himself? Of course not.
>A better debate might be "Why do so many young men in Finland try to kill themselves?"
It is alright if you don't agree with me, but it is frustrating to be debated on points upon which we do not actually disagree. :)
Daniel,
Thanks for your comments and the links.
"The suicide issue with the Finnish males could of course have nothing to do with the educational system"
Children spend much of their childhood in the school. Out of 168 hours in a week they are often in class over 30 hours of the 100 hours they are awake.
It seems fooshish to claim that suicide has nothing to do with government schools. Government schools may be a small factor, but with so much time spent, government schools have to have some kind of influence.
Stand your ground, Janine. The school is emphatically not the victim here: the school is a building or abstractly, an institution. It cannot be a victim, only the innocent individuals were victimized. Regardless of how much anger toward the schools may or may not have motivated this killer, it cannot be denied that the school provided, in the euphemisms of the military, a "target rich environment." Lots of people gathered in one place that, not allowed to defend themselves, turned out to be easy pickings.
My pleasure! You're in the right here - backing you is the least I could do in good conscience :)
Oh, so you're resorting to playing the victim now, like Creationists and other fringe groups when they they are called on claims they are not able to support. She is being "beaten up" because she is wrong, and essentially engaging in propaganda based on an ideologically derived world-view instead of reality on the ground.
I am opposing her views not neccessarily because I would be completely against homeschooling; I wouldn't even be around if this blog had not been linked from CNN (for what reason, I have no idea). Unfortunately of course, most home-schoolers are more interested in indoctrinating, not educating, their children. Just consider my argument regarding the contents of Auvinen's probable home-schooling, had he had one...
What I do oppose is, however, the abuse of a tragedy by generally the American political right for political aims while the assailant was close to being their ideological brother -- it's hard not to notice the fact that they are having a field day gloating over the fact that someone pulled a gun on a Nordic public school, and then blame it on the school itself. The school -- and essentially what it represents: the education of all his peers that he despised -- was a victim -- read the shooter's manifesto. It's all there.
Accounts of whether he was bullied vary. He was actually described as intelligent, articulate, a good student and even sociable if neccessary. Yes, he had weird ideas, and he was actually quite loudly Nazi through school, especially during history lessons. It is quite understandable that the other students... left him alone. I really do not understand how you can pretend he was somehow victimized because of his ideas, so he just HAD to go let out some steam. Poor oppressed kid in a Socialist school that teaches all. He just couldn't take all the inclusion. No wonder he chose to keep to himself.
I, for one, would have kept my distance, for understandable reasons. Fortunately, there was nobody like that in my school... the wild kids yes, but not obviously murderous ones.
By the way Janice, the question as to why there are no private schools in Finland, is a simple question of supply and demand. Interestingly, even the local conservatives don't want to start pulling off the classic "starving the beast" stunt by undermining the quality of public education so that it wouldn't compete effectively with the hypothetical private one. It really is remarkable how you have kids even from the wealthiest families in town in the same school with your kid, and it is not a problem even for their own parents.
You really don't know much about Finland or our education system if you had to ask the question.
The suicide argument is particularly bad and I really feel like teaching a class of third-graders having to tell you why. Male suicide is a bit of a Finnish "cultural tradition" whose roots go far, way beyond the beginnings our our public school system some 100 years ago. A part of it has to do with our alcohol culture, and the fact that Finnish males still have a bit of a macho culture about "dealing with their own problems" which sometimes means doing away with yourself. To briefly debunk you -- I honestly can't imagine how a private school would, by setting or curriculum, be ANY different, its funding would just come from somewhere else; girls aren't killing themselves; Finnish suicide rates are statistically high compared to other public-schooling Western industrialized nations, without any indication that it is the *taxpayer-funded* schools that increase suicide rate.
Children do spend a big part of their day in class under supervision of a teacher in any school system. Where-ever the money comes from is immaterial. Breaks are a minority of the time, and those can be included in the "peer-group" time... and even those are more under adult supervision than they otherwise would be.
Anyway, I'm not going to allow myself being goaded any further in this, because it will be in vain. You are way too "home-schooled" to have a rational discussion with :)
Just consider something. This supposedly dysfunctional public school has been in deep, collective mourning for a few days now. It really is touching. I live just 30 km away from the school, I went to check it out. They really care for their community, no matter how much you feel it was at fault for the gunman's flipping.
The only people who aren't there are Pekka-Eric Auvinen and his victims, and P-E is the only one who really deserves to be dead.
What a load of self-righteous, sentimentalist hogwash you spout, Picard. First, you take such profound offense at a brief and perfectly reasonable question, declaring that it may not even be wondered if the school environment had some aggravating effect on this murderer, and then you assert that it was evil people on the "American right" who are "brainwashing" young Finns into committing murderous rampages in your beloved and saintly public schools. Worse, you claim that the author was writing apologetics for the killing and then imply that someone said the victims deserved their fate.
Well, I'm glad to read that you won't be drawn into this anymore. Your straw-man arguments and condescension are exhausting.
Janine asks what seems like a reasonable question: "Why aren't there private schools in Finland? I'm just curious."
To which CptPicard replies with a brief explanation and a rude comment: "You really don't know much about Finland or our education system if you had to ask the question."
Draw your own conclusions.
I will be brief, although it is probably a waste of my time -- I just can't keep myself from pointing out obvious fallacies. I will not get hooked by the personal attacks though :)
There has never been a single properly supported argument on this thread from your side. You merely insinuate and peddle spurious, convenient correlations. My "emotional" note that all the rest of the schoolkids are helping each other through the grief is a fact. Auvinen, the supposed victim, is not there. His martyrdom is all in your head.
You even quote me out of context in the very same thread I am speaking. Even my public-school-educated intellect tells me that you shouldn't ignore a plain open answer and then claim there is none, as comes to the non-existence of private schools in Finland.
CptPicard, it would help when you write sentences like: "You merely insinuate and peddle spurious, convenient correlations." if you used a name. By starting with "You" it isn't clear to me who you (CptPicard) are writing about.
It appears to me that my wife has been respectful in her replies to you (CptPicard).
It should be possible to have a difference of opinion without attacks.
Generally it regards the entire "opposition" here, so it does not REALLY matter -- but your wife has been guilty of invoking the most questionable spurious correlations in her initial post and the suicide rate suggestion. Assuming causality in these cases is just completely unreasonable for anyone without obvious pre-existing bias. What exactly is your wife's experience with Finnish people and culture?
Calling her argument faulty like this is not an attack. Trying to make my argumentation look like ad hominem which it is not, is an attempt at sidetracking the discussion. I do know the tactic though, I'm experienced with Creationists and others :) It IS rather tiring to produce the posts with the most content only to be completely ignored on facts and arguments and then kicked on technicalities, such as the semantic meaning of "you". :D
A person of honour will answer to the argument when he understands it, even though he could resort to sophistry.
I'm really glad this discussion was linked by CNN though, hopefully people read it :)
No one has said that the killer was a victim or a martyr. No one except for Picard, that is, falsely attributing this sentiment to others. This is but one of several fallacies he has advanced, including ad hominem attacks (such as where, in his very first post, he asks the author: "Please stop brainwashing our kids into monsters who commit acts of political terrorism on our people") and poisoning the well.
Yes, well, the rage might be directed at the machine which means to, and does for the most part, act as a state controlled socialization tool. If one does not fit in, they are marginalized. Too smart, too big, too small, too fat, to dumb, you don't have a place in that system.
I doubt if many understand their hate for a system that inculcates mediocrity, they just understand something is terribly wrong. Something is against their nature and the natural order. And, often, it is against them, personally.
Wow, speaking the truth will get you really beat up these days. Oh, I guess that is part and parcel of the mediocrity machine at work. If you don't fit, those who do know what to do, at this point. Stepford citizen, 1 through 100, report to this blog and attack! Blah.
Two indisputable facts:
1. This whole incident could have happened in any modern, western european country. It just came to be that the lunatic in question happened to be born in Finland.
2. None of this would have happened had there not been the shootings at Columbine (and the other places).
Antti29
Those are hugely disputable facts. The first easily set aside by the fact that they could happen (and do) everywhere, not just the West. The second is that it's the systems (education in this case) which are set to fail which lead to this, that it (seems to have) started in America is just coincidence. Go back to school, where you indisputably belong. Oh, perhaps you are a social scientist, same same. Carry on.
It's always amusing when U.S. citizens, who have next to no knowledge over other, especially far away countries, suddenly develop an expertise on them all the while seeing no faults in their own country.
For every fact about the Finnish school system that leads into people shooting mindlessly that you can point out, I'll throw in five facts that prove that mental disorders can do the same.
Doom, great posts. ;) Almost like from NaturalSelector89's pen. It all seems so similar. It really is the one of the most homogenous thought models of all ideological positions I've seen. Even disagreement on values basis is a sign of inferiority because, well, you're just evolved beyond us :)
Actually, this crap doesn't really happen all that much everywhere. It's been mostly a US thing, and then some messed up random kids have copied in some random places. European public schools are still statistically speaking *shining* examples of this NOT happening, no matter how much you want to confuse the issue -- although the potential for an attack by someone insane exists everywhere. Again, possibility is not causality.
I really would want to know what exactly you suggest would be the practical option. Turning schools into private schools would still keep them, well, schools. The difference really is not hat great, unless you start selecting students by parents' money, which still doesn't make some schools beacons of excellence. Home-schooling all kids is not a practical option.
And frankly, only psychopaths feel oppressed in a Finnish public school. Those people are by definition unable to understand the fact that there are other people around. Why all the rest of the people should adapt their behaviour and organize their lives around THEIR requirements so that they won't go postal because of all the inferiority around them is beyond me.
If you're truly gifted, you're challenged enough, and can apply yourself also outside of class. And you have a future ahead of yourself without killing off your schoolmates in frustration.
I laughed when I read cptpicard's comment:
>Assuming causality in these cases is just completely unreasonable for anyone without obvious pre-existing bias.
I didn't assume causality. I asked a question. I'm not trying to make Finnish school look bad. I really want to know what set this kid off.
Very few things in life happen only because of one reason. Human behavior is very complex. Often something happens because of a tipping point, an event that pushes someone over the edge.
My question was and still is, "why did the shooter have so much rage directed at the government school?"
What was it that pushed him over the edge? What role to the school system play in this tragedy?
I do not and did not assume that there is one cause or influence to his behavior.
Even if the Finnish schools are the envy of the world, it is reasonable to look at what could be done differently to prevent this kind of thing from happening again.
Is there something that can be done differently in the education of Finnish children which could diminish Finland's tragically high suicide rate?
Antti29:
"It's always amusing when U.S. citizens, who have next to no knowledge over other,...all the while seeing no faults in their own country."
Thank you, Antti, for providing such exceptional evidence that you are blinded by your own arrogance and preconceptions about Americans, especially with that last clause. How you can say that with a straight face on a blog about homeschooling and dissatisfaction with the mess of the American educational system either speaks to a great sense of humor or a humorous inability to grasp reality when it contradicts your assumptions.
And whence these assumptions that the shooter was insane, or afflicted by some sort of "mental disorder"? Does it have something to support it, besides simply labeling anyone who does something heinous or unusual enough as a nutcase, by definition?
Janine Cate: thanks for posting and appreciate your responses, as well. [Came here via key-words.]
cptpicard wrote Actually, this crap doesn't really happen all that much everywhere. It's been mostly a US thing, and then some messed up random kids have copied in some random places.
When I read that, it seemed to me that cptpicard has either poor memory or limited news source or just don't know how to use google. In few seconds I found:
CNN has an interesting list: Other school killings.
Also another by Time magazinse: some of Chinese killers.
In Japan, it seems to me that every few weeks, a student commits suicide due to bullying by peers. Every few months (or is that years?), that student would, instead, slash out (literally, since guns are tightly controlled) and kill their classmates. [According to a Japanese CSI that I got know, the crimes in Japan, in general, are underreported and is actually as bad as the US. So who knows how much real crimes are swept under the rug.]
So this problem (school related killings) is a world wide phenomenon, not an exclusive US problem....
I am wondering why more people aren't more curious about the toxicology report on this one.
Especially considering that every US School shooting has been linked to one kind of Anti-Depressant or another, or Psychotropic Drug.
Pat
>I am wondering why more people aren't more curious about the toxicology report on this one.
Especially considering that every US School shooting has been linked to one kind of Anti-Depressant or another, or Psychotropic Drug.
That's a very good point. I haven't heard anything in the news about that. If anyone know the answer, please post a comment with a link.
According to the News report I read, the toxicology report will take 2 weeks.
Why does it take so long? I never really understood that part.
Pat
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