Having Conversations With Young People About School Shootings
As students fled from their high school and into the football stadium nearby, the unthinkable has happened again at a U.S. high school. Another school shooting has left 4 dead and dozens injured at Apalachee High School in Winder, GA, about 40 miles east of Atlanta.
And we are faced again with how to recover as a nation from a national crisis that involves our children. Some of the most important discussions will take place in America at home around the dinner table, in the office, on social media, and between young people as they process the Apalachee High School shooting.
The nation will be talking about mental health, background checks, gun control, and the debate between soft or hardened schools with better security. The narrative will be given by both progressive and conservative platforms. And it will become a focused, yet short-lived, political tactic to try and temporarily move the needle for each presidential candidate during this 2024 election.
However, once again, if we do not talk about the most important issue regarding school shootings and violence in America right now, we are missing the most important solution. What is the most important solution? The family.
Talking Points
The talking points will be made the next few days on television and radio, in the office, and on social media:
-Mental health legislation is our first action and must be immediate
-Recognizing the triggers and signs of a child shooter
-Needed police officers or Security presence on every school campus in America
-Criminals and not guns kill people and the 2nd Amendment is our right to bear arms
-Guns kill people and we must make it harder for people to get guns
-We need new legislation.
-But, we already have laws to cover school shootings because murder is against the law.
-We have lost the sanctity of the unborn life in America and that has resulted in a loss of the sanctity of our born children
-Government is not a good parent and they have already failed this test
Lessons From Crises
Following another national tragedy, we must make clear this discussion about the absent parents and family structure in American homes.
Remember the 6 months after the tragedy that was 9/11? The unity in America was breathtaking as we watched our government leaders on the steps of the Capitol building singing together. Every night we saw stories on the news of the survivors and the slain that was both inspirational and overwhelming.
And the resurgence in the attendance at our churches from the deep pain that was felt became one of the great moments of our religious lives in America. The outcome of the unity and terror reforms following the 9/11 attacks had been relative safety and national security for the last two decades.
Remember the school shootings in Columbine, CO, Newtown, CT, Parkland, FL, Santa Fe, TX, or Uvalde, TX? The resulting social and political action seemed like a rising possibility to solve this reoccurring stain on America. Young people are being seen on television, social media, and even the White House promoting reformation in their schools. Could we see another civil and religious surge in America rise out of this national crisis?
Unfortunately, the past civil and religious awakenings have not been sustainable very often. But, let's hope that things are different this time post-Winder.
A History Lesson
It is good to have conversations about political leans in our discussions about guns and gun laws, police presence at schools, hardened schools with metal detectors or one-entry campuses, stricter mental health checks, and campaigns and marches.
We can compare gun laws in Japan or Australia, talk about whether guns shoot themselves or cars drive drunk, put stricter censorship on video games, debate from a democratic or republican interpretation of the 2nd Amendment to the Bill of Rights, or even demand it all started when prayer was removed from school.
However, there’s one thing that must become front and center in this debate and reform.
A Breakdown of the Family
At this moment in our nation, our efforts must be about the family.
I see family as the most important and the cheapest solution to America’s problems. It is the family setting that can place value on mental health. It is the family setting that can allow for the most healthy ongoing conversations. It is the family setting that can help children find the security they need in an unconditional environment. It is the family setting that creates a religious faith and worldview in the lives of our children.
Healthy families build healthy children who build healthy societies. And the reforms that we need right now in this nation begin with a renewed emphasis on the family in legislation, education, and our personal lives.
Young people are making their mark on history. This is why we must protect America’s greatest resource. Our children.
It is the healthy family setting that builds healthy children who build healthy societies.
I’m not saying that every shooter has come from a disjointed and unstructured or unhealthy family. Sometimes parents do everything right but still can’t combat the choices and behavior of a child.
In my 40 years of working with teenagers, I’ve seen the best kids come from the worst homes, and, the worst kids come from the best. Parenting is not math. It is art.
What we are seeing today in the violence in our nation is merely a repeat of history. And we don't have to look far to see the reality of the impact of the family upon this moment in history. If we are going to see lasting change, this dialogue must be more than gun control, school security, and mental health.
If we lose the emphasis and focus upon rebuilding our families and our children in America, we lose the lasting civil and religious surge we could capitalize on in our nation in this moment.
Every national crisis we see the stories on the news of both incredible heroism and unfortunate failure. And we see students taking leadership in public in every sector of society. Including government, education, entertainment, athletics, and social media. When are we going to focus upon our children?
Post-crisis Moments
What is undeniable, is that we will quickly be in the beginnings of a post-crisis moment in our nation once again. And let's hope that our nation's youth will help to lead us to another civil and religious revival. It's not too far a stretch to think that young people might be the key to the rise of another American civil and religious revival. Like they were in the mid 18th and mid 19th centuries with the First and Second Great Awakening‘s.
Over the years, after a shooting, my prayers and postings have been unceasing for the families in Anytown, USA. I have called local Church and organizational leaders in Columbine, CO, Newtown, CT, Parkland, FL, Santa Fe, TX, and now Winder, GA. My call to a local church and Pastor today was another call I never want to make as I told the local youth leader that we are praying for them and offered practical to help as well.
A Lack of Communication
Teenagers love to talk. It just requires from adults the willingness to listen. And ask the right questions.
How do we talk to our students about violence? And, what are the signs we should be looking for before these shootings? What should parents be talking about at home right now?
The Conversations really are easy. Maybe this will help.
Look for the signs. They are pretty clear. Although not every violent teen or shooter has walked the same destructive path, the signs have become a recognizable pattern.
A child is hurt or bullied in some way, a child isolates themself, a child gets caught in violent gaming or videos in their bedroom, a child reads threads of violence and anger on social media, a child is filled with images and violent conversations from music and movies, a child discovers an infatuation with weapons, a child plans how to get back at the people or the system that hurt them, and ultimately, a child has no one to talk to. And so they act out of desperation, immaturity, and an under-developed frontal lobe. Sound familiar?
Conversations with your children are actually easy also. Talk about what their friends are thinking. How are they handling this shooting? Are they worried about violence in their own lives? How could they intervene in a peers life that might show some of the signs above?
Hopefully understanding these signs and having these conversations will help us to see the need and heed the popular advice of ‘see something, say something.’ We must help students be pro-active with their peers when they see these signs.
Conversation could be one of the most important ways to curb violence.
Finally
Our prayers must continue. Not only today for Winder, GA and that small community outside of Atlanta, but, for the macro discussion about the family in America. To have the difficult conversations with the children we are building who will ultimately build the future of our nation.
So here is my ideal solution to the kind of talk we should be having with this generation right now. A solution that can solve the problem BEFORE the gun or weapon or media or mental health or locked-down schools solutions.
We must take the next decade in America and create sustainable family reforms in the government, educational, corporate, social, religious, and family sectors. Reforms that include law, family training, and resources from each of these sectors in our society for the family.
Reforms that bring immediate assistance at the local level to the family through multi-layered reform and include theory and practices that build healthy families.
Because, healthy families build healthy children who build healthy societies.