What causes a shooter’s brain dysfunction and loss of control leading to mass murder?
Background checks, red flags, mental illness, history of abuse or bullying, banning semiautomatic military-style rifles, age to purchase, social media rants, and redundant gun sales, among others, have been bandied about as the probable keys to solving our uniquely American epidemic of brutal mass murders.
It is infinitely more efficient and cost-effective to embrace prevention than to chase an established menace. Since serving as a trauma surgeon in Vietnam, this author has been studying and hypothesizing the etiology of active duty and veteran military PTS(D), substance abuse (self-medicating), and suicide.
The author’s approach has championed a “Therapeutic Time Out” prior to discharge to rescue the warrior from military-induced disharmony and reintegrate the soldier into a peaceful society functionally.
The US Air Force promotes this approach at their Deployment Transition Center in Ramstein, Germany.
Gus’s PTS(D) studies directly apply to our American mass shooting epidemic.
The current understanding of human brain function applies to these shootings.
With the adolescent brain, it is imperative to accept specific parameters. Their brain’s Prefrontal Cortex (the area that espouses morality and harmony) is easily overwhelmed by the explosive sympathetic stimulation of adrenalin and cortisol production triggered by our primitive Limbic System — “Fight or Flight.”
That excited state can be life-saving. However, a constant barrage of this stimulation destroys a portion of the brain’s Prefrontal Cortex nerve cells (neurons) and prevents the growth and maturation of those that should evolve. The Prefrontal Cortex’s disadvantage magnifies. Sympathetic explosions become uncontrollable. The demons of isolation, helplessness, free-flowing anger, revenge, and aggression replace morality and harmony.
The constant barrage of adrenalin and cortisol interfere with the ability of mitochondria within brain neurons to process oxygen into ATP, which is the fuel that powers all cells.
These building blocks become acidic and release toxic chemicals (Cytokines) and then die. The brain’s circuitry is derailed and loses being capable to promote morality and harmony. The adolescent’s mind floods with demons. There is an inability to restore harmony, and suicide beckons.
Please view https://youtu.be/C6nw9nQ_FMw
Why brutally slaughter ten-year-old innocents? They were not only killed, but their bodies suffered mutilation beyond recognition.
His choice is not fully understood. He certainly was not rational.
He must have accepted that he would die.
What about the mass killers who are not adolescents or young adults?
The identical changes I defined persist and magnify throughout the potential shooter’s life. Repetitive Limbic explosions with neuronal damage continue until the Prefrontal Cortical ability to enforce a semblance of moral control and harmony is inadequate.
The shooter’s damaged brain condones lethality over morality.
So consider-
PREVENTION
Stress is present in all of us to some degree. For example, learning to read, spell, and write, taking exams, fitting in at school, sexual abuse, shunning, disruptive home environment, gun violence, gang pressure, exposure to “drugs,” starting in a ball game, applying to college, a first job interview, dating, marriage, kids, paying for college, retirement, death of a spouse, inability to walk steadily, and other life challenges.
These stresses, even if non-consuming traumas, if not rationalized, may begin to influence one’s Prefrontal Cortex negatively and risk the (D) — Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.
Why not screen grade school children for stress and dampened harmony and institute appropriate psychological support?
Continue the screening throughout middle school, high school, and college.
Intervene with a rescue when PTS becomes symptomatic to reestablish harmony.
Please view this plea for PTS(D) prevention in the military. It reinforces my inclination.
EDUCATION
All students must participate in a gun safety class. Demonstrate a pumpkin’s explosion into hundreds of pieces when struck by a bullet from a high-velocity M16 type weapon.
Demonstrate the damage inflicted by these weapons on living tissue.
SURVEILLANCE
Once the age restriction to purchase an assault weapon is universally twenty-one, each new gun owner will undergo monitoring through age twenty-six for illicit activity.
Sincerely,
Gus Kappler, MD, FACS
