Cho Seung Hui, the Virginia Tech gunman, may have taken to the grave what, in
the end, pushed him over the edge to murder 32 people. But as a
psychological profile of a mass killer he was, in many ways, the walking
blueprint.
After the Columbine High School massacre in 1999 experts drew up a checklist
of warning signs that might alert teachers and peers to worrying behaviour
in a student. They included obsession with violence, resentment, a need to
blame others, arrogance, contempt and unusual isolation.
Cho, a “weirdo loner” who had been treated for depression, wrote copiously
about suicide and death and had recently tried to start a fire in a campus
dormitory, ticks virtually every box. The 23-year-old son of South Korean
immigrants who had moved to the US when he was 8, rarely removed his
sunglasses and hat, presenting a barrier to the world. He took pictures of
his classmates in lectures but never spoke. He had so unnerved his tutors
that when the head of English agreed to see him she was asked if she wanted
protection. She declined, saying that she thought Cho “exuded loneliness”.
In the month before the killings he had stopped attending class.
And there was an extra aggravating feature.
Psychologists agree that people driven to such extreme behaviour have usually
suffered some form of rejection, loss or affront. Crucially, they believe
that their hurt feelings have not been acknowledged, their distress not
taken seriously. So their frustration at the external world turns to
seething rage which, finally, they can vent only by killing — often in a
highly public way. Cho was believed to be infatuated with a beautiful
student, Emily Hilscher, 18. His feelings were evidently not reciprocated
since she wrote enthusiastically on her website page of a “wonderful” new
boyfriend. She was among the first two people to be killed by Cho. It was
possibly a misguided sense of rejection and a mad fit of jealousy which, in
his fragile mental state, was the final straw for him.
But most peoplesuffer rejection and loss at some stage in their lives and do
not turn into mass murderers. Why does it tip some people — almost always
men — over the edge but not others? The Times psychologist Dr Tanya Byron
said that we all have underlying predispositions to certain emotional and
behavioural traits. One person might be more predisposed to, say,
depression, another to alcoholism partly through genetics, partly through
how they are socialised. But a combination of factors including stress and
the environment can combine to push some people into more extreme behaviour.
This is shown by the 1977 Stress Vulnerability Model, which proposes that
people with a vulnerability to psychosis are at a proportionate risk of
developing a psychosis as their stress levels increase.
“The vulnerable person might never have behaved that way if they had a strong
family or very good friends around them, for instance,” she said.
“But if the factors aren’t mitigated against and that vulnerability is
accelerated, disastrous things can happen.” She added that such killers
usually lack social skills and are withdrawn. For them huge feelings of
inferiority can be overcome by the use of a weapon. The profile of such
young men usually showed them to be overly anxious, often having had their
hearts broken. “They don’t know any other way to express their rage,” she
said. Dr Byron also believes that a significant contributing factor is a
culture which “normalises” tough-guy gun killings such as in blockbuster
films and computer games, blurring the boundary between fantasy and reality.
“There is a macho gun culture in Hollywood — the hero in the blood-soaked
vest taking everybody down,” she said.
“It desensitises a lot of young people to violence. For the very vulnerable it
gives them a platform, a licence to express their extreme and deviant
behaviour. Anyone who says that the media doesn’t play a part in this is
being naive.
“This is a public health issue. We need to ask: how has someone with a
vulnerability been moved to committing such acts of violence? What were the
triggers?”
It is a fact that in the vast majority of cases such killers are men. This is
because females tend to direct anger inwards, via self-harm or eating
disorders, while males direct it outwards. Dr Jack Boyle, a child
psychologist, said that gunmen like Cho are totally distinct from serial
killers who go to great lengths not to be caught. This type of killer
orchestrates a spectacular suicide in a public place, often after murdering
the person whom they feel has rejected them.
Dorothy Rowe, a psychologist and author, said that school and college campuses
may exacerbate extreme behaviour because they are enclosed, separate worlds.
“Things that may be quite trivial take on an intensity because you
cannot get away from them,” she said. “All you see are other students. It is
like a hothouse.” Dr Rowe said that such people need to be listened to,
their fears heard. A dangerous person becomes even more dangerous when they
are alienated. If they feel their anger is unacknowledged, said Dr Rowe,
they will, in rare cases, go to the extreme of wickedness to be noticed. And
America is a difficult place for outsiders.
“In the US there is a lot of emphasis on conformity,” she said. “Children and
young people who find it hard to conform have a difficult time.” Indeed, the
two Columbine killers were known misfits who wore trenchcoats and had
suffered from bullying.
The “disconnected” loner might in the end give up and go to the other extreme.
“It’s as if they say: ‘If people won’t acknowledge me for my goodness, I
will force them to acknowledge me for my wickedness’,” said Dr Rowe.
But she added that no psychologist would accept that there was such a thing as
inborn wickedness. “We merely get trapped by our own ideas and our ideas
grow out of our experiences. The process of therapy was to help the person
see how they had trapped themselves.
“To ask what are we going to do about the guns (law) is futile. The guns come
at the very end,” she said. “It’s nota question of restricting guns — it is
asking what happens to young people who grow up in a society that doesn’t
meet its very ordinary needs.”
Tragically, there seems little doubt that such a massacre will happen again.
Copycat killings are a major concern in America. Dr Herbert Mandell, a
psychiatrist specialising in gun crime, said that the Virginia gunman had
broken the record for the number of students killed. “Someone is going to
try to top that,” he said. “If someone is on the edge this might be enough
to push them.”
I am interested to know how a few people have posted on this page, saying that it is the confident individuals that are to blame. Well, my job requires me to be socially confident, adaptable and self assured in my skills both professionally and personally. It is not popularity or 'over confidence' that causes problems like this. It is lack of it. you cannot argue that someone should be 'brought down in confidence' or else, why try to instill it in people in the first place. You need to encourage more people to deal with their own social anxiety, not punish those that are happy and popular.
HLR, HGTE, N. Yorks
Obviously he is not the only person to blame but don't forget he is the one who pulled the trigger.
Justin, Saskatoon, Saskatchewan
Cho was pushed over the edge. He was different and didn't conform to this pathetic cultutre in the U.K and the USA of popularity, status, looks etc. I'm not condoning want he did for one minute but he led a difficult life. When i was at school i was never bullied myself but i saw it happen and i never agreed with it. There was a kid at my school that everyone thought was a freak but i took the time to speak to him once and he was a good kid just a bit shy, un confident and a bit eccentric but yet everyone hated him cos he was different. Blame Cho for this but Blame arrogant pretty boy's and girls who think they are god's gift down with, social staus?!?
matt, hemel, herts, UK
Congratulations to all the egotistical bullies of the world who seek to reinforce their own self esteem at the cost of others. Next time you try to make yourself look big and macho at the expense of a more sensitive and weaker individual, perhaps you will stop and think to see what you have created.... a serial killer....does that make you feel better about yourself?
Evie, Charlotte, USA
Why can't anyone interviewed say, "I took him out for a cheeseburger once a week and told him what a great, fascinating individual he was" There's the problem right there!!! Lack of tolerance, empathy and self-centeredness in our society.
Bob Empathy, Kent, WA
I don't agree that there is no such thing as inborn wickedness. All I read here is excuses for this murderer. People like Cho need to be recognised for what they are (in this case the warning signs were loud and clear, even for psychologists!) and put away before they can murder anyone.
Let's have more concern for the safety of the public, so that people don't become victims of the likes of Cho in the first place.
Marianne, The Hague, Netherlands.
""obsession with violence, resentment, a need to blame others, arrogance, contempt and unusual isolation". There are disturbing parallels here with the diatribes of Syed Qutb and Osama bin Laden and some education material coming out of the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia."
Parallels? There are no parallels here. A lot of countries all over the world, including those in the middle east have been devastated by the US-foreign-policy-led massacres. That's very real. It is a sad reality that their voices are only heard when something so negative and disastrous happens e.g. when they crash planes into buildings.
Are you saying that these kids' shootings are in some sense legitimate?
Tomoito, New York, US
One of the main reasons why people are able to commit such acts is that they depersonalise. They no longer see a person or persons as human beings but as 'objects' or part of a 'system'. Thus, they can rationalise their actions to themselves, as objects and systems cannot feel pain. This, is I believe an explanation for how they can carry through the masacre of so many 'innocent people' as in their distorted world view, they are all guilty as charged. They act as jury, judge and executioner.
Chris Barratt, Cornwall, UK,
I think this disturbed victim felt as though everyone was rejecting him and thus had no hesitation in killing anonymously. I think it's human nature to blame someone or something other than ourselves, but this is clearly a case where our society FAILED this individual chronically over many years. Cho Seung Hui sounds to me like an individual ill equiped to be successful in today's society and so was basically tortured for it chronically over the entirety of his youth in a manner similar to solitary confinement. The real PROBLEM is that our youth is being pushed more and more to fulfill unrealistic expectations of themselves and thus there is an ever increasing intolerance for imperfection. Secondly, the weak have recourse in this survival of the fittest mentality. Imagine the proverbial lamb with a 45 magnum.
Bob Empathy, Kent, WA
Thank You! Finally there is a report in the media other than blaming Cho was his own mental problem!
A writer, Nathalie Petrowski, after a similar accident happened in Montreal in 1989, wrote that
"Inside every aggressor, every villain, there hides a victim"
We can't change the past, but we can, at least, try to prevent something similar to happen in the future by try to give more warmth to everyone around us.
Rena, London, UK
At what point do you change from being a responsible person with a psychotic predisposition, into being a psychotic with no control whatsoever, or self control over your responsibilities? Cases like this do not help the governments apparent new plans to hospitalise everyone with signs of ill-mental health. Also, at what point do you say that the blame was with an 'illness' rather than with the individual. These are questions that probably Freud couldn't even have answered. I walked through Dunblane as a child after the massacres, the atmosphere was horrific and i'm sure the residents have a better perspective of where the blame lays.
HLR, HGTE, N. Yorks
There seems to be little doubt that this man was severely psychiatrically disturbed, and it is tragic that there seemed to be no way in which he could be taken out of circulation before he finally snapped. However, the main culprit is the gun culture of the USA. No matter what the NRA says, guns DO kill people, and until that fatuously misleading second amendment to the constitution is removed, tragedies like this will continue to occur.
Dr.Nicholas Lee, Windsor, UK
Not sure we should blame this all on Cho Seung Hui. What in his life made him feel so isolated? Poverty, deprevation or a host of other factors.
sohiab, Hemel, Herts
"obsession with violence, resentment, a need to blame others, arrogance, contempt and unusual isolation". There are disturbing parallels here with the diatribes of Syed Qutb and Osama bin Laden and some education material coming out of the Middle East, particularly Saudi Arabia. When a whole culture teaches that such impulses are OK when channeled against "other" people, a far greater disaster cannot be far away.
Richard, Preston, UK
Consider also the side effects of "psychoremedies" and of psychiatric heavy hand, when intervenes, if somebody represents deseases. In many cases suicide or omicide are often collateral effects (read contra-indications in antipsychotic "remedies").
Dr. F. Gailei, Florence,
So many of the high schools and colleges are incredibly large -- VTech has over 24K students. Many high schools are over 3 thousand, and even elementary schools often have a thousand kids. This seems to be the trend.
Perhaps much smaller schools and campuses would be a solution for many students who become so alienated. The trend to great size seems tl lead to depersonalization; less participation in community, and even cheating and taking shortcuts (on the part of teachers as well as students.)
At one time a Bachelor's degree really meant something -- schools were actually vouching for the quality of the student as a human being when it was granted. Now it's all about the bucks.
Some grads from what used to be good schools don't speak or write well, or have poor math skills, have an incredibly poor grasp of even national Geography, and are ethically stunted. Some may even lie and cheat in business operations. Maybe fewer degrees should be granted.
Poppy, Fremont, CA
hello - I´m an austrian female teacher,
I do know well the prblems with crazy kids..........
I´ve been hurt by a 13 years ols boy 4 weeks ago
(a chair towards my billy.........)
it´s terrible,
kids go mean, too many computer games, too much tv,
parents don´t take good care, as they should do!!!!
hoping that politicians do make new laws,
helping teachers.........and the society...........
in austria we are not allowed to "punish" those kids -
only if the kids become very dangerous,
we can send them away from school..........
please do reply..........
helga gruber, weiz, austria
"Experts?" I challenge Dr. Rowe's assertion that "the US is a difficult place for outsiders" and "there is a lot of emphasis on conformity." True, school can be oppressive for students who are out of the mainstream... and I suppose certain adult social circles make demands if you let them. But hard? Compared to where? In my experience growing up in Scandinavia, people are wonderful, but put (at least in the 1960's) massive emphasis on homogeneity of behavior, attitudes, appearance. Hearing similar tales from friends raised in Asia, I challenge the notion that America is worse on that score. To the contrary, for all its real faults, America in my 20+ years' experience does more to welcome a wide variety of humanity-- ethnicities, lifestyles, ideologies, values. It is possible for adult immigrants to become elected officials, teachers, lawyers, doctors, movie stars, business tycoons. Where else is it easier? Fewer facile opinions, more facts, please. Thanks.
Judy, Chicago, USA
Your Columbine description is wrong. The pair were not part of the "Trench Coat Mafia" nor were they complete outcasts.
What drove them to do what they did was incredibly more complex than anger due to taunts from popular kids.
Slate.com has an excellent article on the topic.
http://www.slate.com/id/2099203/
Also, how much time has Dr Rowe spent in American high schools? Every country has conformity. Why act like America is unique in that regard?
Ryan, Springfield, U.S.
America lays claim to being mostly a God fearing country full of Christians.....Hmmm......Where was that one compassionate Christ-like
person to befriend this troubled young man????? It seems that the evangelical crowd seeks it's exclusiveness by shutting out others, which don't end every second sentence with Praise the Lord......The better than THOU behaviour leads to the shunning of the foreigner or non co-religionist.......the fact Christ said: what you do to the least amongst you You have done to me....totally eludes the selfrighteous evangelical crowd.....Wake up Christian soldiers and do the walking instead of the talking....Pitty the poor parents of the students..may they find solace by befriending some young lost soul that needs a touch of non judgemental friendship....Amen Rudi Sauter immigrant
Rudi Sauter, Parksville, BC Canada
His father had worked for the middle east. And his sister as well. the ghost in his body came along with his father at that time.
All loners doesn't work in that way. He is not just a loner.
He was lonely, accept the anger gradually.
Bright, London, UK
Yes i agree with this article. One of the striking feature is bringing our the fact " Its not guns but asking what happens to young people who grow up in a society that doesn’t meet its very ordinary needs.”
Well said but who is listening. Another warning sign that people are deaf!!!!. I do not know how many are at risk even as we are discussing this. But hopefully people will take time and that paragraph has to be in bold to make people take notice of it. I do not have any other way to ighlight or throw light on the subject
Vivian, Arlington, Texas