Why are the majority of mass shooters male?

Question

Women and non binary people have the same access to same weapons that men do but it rare to see them committing a mass shooting.

Since 1982, 123 mass shootings have been carried out in the United States by male shooters. In contrast, only three mass shootings have been carried out by women.

What do you think it is that causes men to disproportionately go on killing sprees as opposed to women?

Why are the majority of mass shooters male?

nightdrot · Accepted Answer

The answer to the question is complex and, at an irreducible level, case specific. Any mass shooting episode has its origins in the particularities of the events and circumstances that led to it.

However, to the extent that those factors are general and sociological, much has to do with the fact that the culture, at this moment in time, is discounting the value of males and those virtues that are attributed to masculinity. Hence the infamous phrase, "toxic masculinity."

At one level, this has a tendency to isolate males and in certain cases to discount their significance. In some males, this can exacerbate pre-existing psychological problems and lead to violence.

In addition, as the emphasis in the culture has switched to women and then homosexuals and transsexuals, this has resulted in the delegitimization of all male institutions as well as the defunding of organizations that tend to focus on the needs of males. (This including the de-emphasis of the traditional family, where men, in the past, often derived a critical sense of duty and the caring of others, as well as finding crucial support for themselves.) Thus, the support networks - formal and informal - that once existed to help men, teen boys and boys have declined. This leaving men to find support, in this particular era, in technology, social media and the like.

Oddly the effect of this is to intensify the sense of isolation and alienation that motivates men generally and can have particularly negative effects on those with emotional disturbances or mental illness. Left to themselves, these males exist in a psychological and sociological echo chamber that often leads them to violence.

In this, while the emphasis on mental illness is not entirely out of line, it is not sufficient, It fails to recognize that men - like women - are social beings and require a complex array of social networks to encourage their development and to step in when there are indications of violent behavior.

Of course, in the current culture, where - to repeat - the characteristics defined as masculinity are often labeled "toxic," rebuilding these social and cultural networks is problematic. Thus the law and the medical/psychological profession will be left to step in and fill the gap. Suffice to add, as recent events have shown, this only after the damage has been done.

ObscuredBeyond · Accepted Answer

There are no such things as nonbinaries. Just the delusional and mutilated. That notwithstanding, women are more gun shy. And it's a tiny bit harder for men to weaponize sex to destroy others. Media also fawn over male shooters, and tend to ignore female shooters. So copycats tend to be male.

It also has to do with common aggression targeting mechanisms, which have been observed in prisons. Men tend to externalize more often. Something from outside is the problem, and that outside target needs to be on the receiving end of the man's vengeance. Women internalize more, and are therefore more prone to self-harm.

A bullied high school girl is much more likely than a boy to commit suicide. To hang herself. A boy is much more likely to plot revenge on his tormentors, until they feel even worse than they made him feel. Why hang yourself, when you can mail a bomb to your enemy and blow up his house, ruining his entire life for the damage he did to yours?

I'd not be popular as a cop. If I saw a bigger kid bullying, beating, and damaging the property of a smaller boy, chucking his bike on a roof and smearing his face with ice cream while putting him down, I'd be whipping to the gun out and treating that bully the same as an armed robber or carjacker. That bully would get at least one night in jail, and have a juvie record just like that!

That's why shooters tend to be male, more often than not. A school shooting not only brings a warped sense of validation and externalization, but is also an easy path to becoming a celebrity. You become known for something. Your victims die as nobodies. Flipping the script on their previous boasts.

Women would rather turn the gun on themselves, in the hopes that the shock of their own demise will guilt their past tormentors into becoming better human beings. However, that's a foolish gamble. Female sociopaths only consider it another victory, and keep going. For these sick women, even the rope tightening around their necks, and the crows descending to peck out their eyes, is not enough to evoke penance. So the suicidal girl's self-sacrifice becomes meaningless.

whirled_up_girl · Accepted Answer

I think boys and men in American society are often faced with walking a fine line as they come of age and search for their identity. They face a fine line between being strong without being too mean, or too rough, being good and kind without being a doormat, (or I guess the new term is simp), and being sensitive without showing too much emotion and being labeled as effeminate. I know some will disagree with me but except for the ability to have great physical strength, I always felt that I had more advantages as a girl and now as a woman. But before anyone accuses me of using my body or my feminine wiles for my achievements, lol, let me explain. What I mean by that is I can be strong and still cry, and no one thinks any less of me. I can be good and kind and people say that's normal for a girl or woman and no one will call me a doormat or a simp. I can be sensitive without anyone using it to take anything away from my emotional strength. I felt this way as a young girl in my teens and I still feel this way still now as an adult woman.

I just think it's harder for men and boys in our society to find that balance of how to be. Then bottling conflicted or negative emotions up doesn't seem to be healthy either, that doesn't mean that every person who bottles up emotions is going to become a mass shooter but it's just one theory among the many that all of us are pondering, trying to make sense of these horrible tragedies.

Emiliamazing · Accepted Answer

We are born into this world with genetic predispositions, then we begin learning from the world around us. Men are subject to learning from patterns of who they are surrounded by as are women. We all develop role models, many times that role model is the same sex (doesn’t have to br a parent or close friend. It can be a cultural icon, leader, etc.)
My husband was raised fatherless, but had a strong family around him with genuinely good members surrounding him. I came from a traditional nuclear family whose values I respect, but don’t always agree with.
Point being, our influences have an impact on how we react to the world around “us”. Our genetic predisposition and who we choose to look up to will guide many decisions.
Finding the wrong group/mindset to follow will lead to terrible choices at times, finding the right group and mindset will elevate you and those around you when faced with hardship.
Men who make these violent choices did not choose the right model, and women who make decisions based on getting revenge obviously didn’t create good coping mechanisms either.

crossdressingrihno · Answer

For literal thousands of years men have have held the role of fighter and Hunter. While these days most men aren't going out to war or hunting boar a lot of these natural instincts are left behind a lot of these residual aspects are left and they aren't even necessarily useless anymore they're just being repurposed.

When men were out hunting to survive they needed to be aggressive to ensure that they were more dangerous than the thing they were hunting because if you were hunting a wild pig and you got impaled you would die and so you had to be more aggressive and more dangerous than the wild pig. Then of course after society was gained and hunting slowly started to become less important fighting other humans became more important because now there were more people and so territory need to be made to ensure that you had access to all the resources within that territory and not some other group of people otherwise you would run out of resources and probably die so war became a thing. With war what did we need? We needed strong laborers and very aggressive fighters. Well women weren't involved to be super aggressive because they weren't the ones hunting food it was the men so when war came about men were the stronger more aggressive sex so naturally we were the ones fighting the wars plus humanity needed more children societies were growing rules were needing to be filled in child mortality was at a high so naturally we needed more children to make up the difference and to do that naturally you need more people making children which means women were kind of stuck with the whole making children thing. And oh hey what's this? The thing that makes men aggressive can also be used as a tool to make men hard Laborers? Sign literally every government up for this because now we're stuck in an era where hard labor is becoming more and more of a thing so naturally we didn't have time to evolve it out then that whole aggressiveness because it just got used to make laborers even before the industrial revolution but especially during the industrial revolution. Now the industrial revolution is passed we're pretty much in the modern era now and the use for this residual trait from literal thousands of years ago is finally losing a lot of its purpose I say a lot of its purpose not all of its purpose because we still need people to go to war and we still need firefighters and police and things like that and in which case naturally we're still going to need someone who's able to throw common Sense out the window and be able to violently beat the crap out of someone or just risk their life all willy-nilly which fun fact that trait lets us do both. By the way this trait is called testosterone women have low testosterone men have high testosterone this testosterone essentially is the very reason why men are aggressive it's also the reason why they take up a lot of the more dangerous tasks it's because they're a lot more willing to throw their life away they get depressed by it but they do it anyways cuz literally there's this thing in their body telling them to do so essentially.

KitsuneFoxSpirit · Answer

Because men are, in many ways, third-class citizens in comparison. Why else would men have the highest suicidal rates? On average the stats are 4 times that of women.

Men are stigmatized by society for emotions. They are called derogatory terms, gay, weak, pathetic, etc. for simply crying. Whereas women & nonbinary are comforted or even patted on the back for impersonating a watering can, even if on a daily basis.

Men have very few support options. Sometimes they have nothing. For example, there are around 9 male-only abuse shelters & 211 female-only abuse shelters in the UK.

The society-based reasons are endless. Men are expected to be breadwinners, support the family, etc., etc. It'd be enough to drive God up the wall & around the bend.
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Until society enlightens itself, & when degenerative behaviors are ever-increasing that'll never happen, mass shooting will continue. Which is pathetic when you consider it.

What when we love to claim we're more advanced than our forefathers and yet when they committed mass murders it was very often because they were involved in colonization or wars & expected to. Not because society sucked.

Neilbud · Answer

This actually has been studied/ is being studied. I'm going to miss some stuff here so bear with me.

The thought is upbringing. Most men are taught to be tough, violent and receive less empathy. So they rarely go for help when they need it. Their is also a corollation to where you live. Rural area most people hunt and fish, and are more family oriented. Giving men a support structure and a way to releave stress, as well as a respect for life.

The jist is that depression and suside are on the ride. Mental health is a huge problem. Theirs tons of info on this. And we tend to blame the gun instead of looking at the real problem.

I also don't think it's intirely true. Men shoot themselves while weman overdose. A girl killed several people in Las Vegas with her Buick. Death is death weather it's with a gun or a car. Guns are loud, they kick and are messy.

But with mental instability on the rise and girls wanting to be more like men. I kinda wonder if female mass shootings are not just simply playing catch up.

globetrotter22 · Answer

It’s true @subarugirl. Most mass shooters are male. There have been some female psychos out there (one 18 year old girl planned to replicate the Columbine incident in 2019). However they don’t usually go through with their plans and if they do something it usually stops at one or two deaths.

This very complex but what you are seeing is what happens when masculinity isn’t given appropriate and healthy direction. Not surprisingly the mass shooter had a rather miserable life leading up to this. He had a drug addicted mother, father was out of the picture, didn’t have many financial resources, was bullied in school, suffered from an identity crisis, etc.

There are a lot of bad factors here. But I personally believe that social media is a huge contributor to this. People are constantly seeing messaging about how other people are more successful, better looking, richer, better with at getting gfs/bfs, happier, more respected, etc than they are. This is very dangerous for a troubled young man to see this. He’s was being told he had no future. No chance to be somebody. Not worthy of a girlfriend (or even friends) etc.

Now other people argue gun control of course. I personally think that kid one way or another would of eventually did something heinous (AR15 or not). The Columbine kids were building bombs out of propane tanks.

Personally we need more community support and intervention programs (including involuntarily committing people to psych wards if they come off as dangerous). Also young men who act aggressive need to healthy outlets. I would of invited this kid to a jiu jitsu or mma gym to get his anger out.

Johnagain · Answer

Failure to raise young men with the understanding that there are alternative, healthier ways of getting even, expressing their angst or disagreement to those they oppose. Who is mainly responsible? The parents; in the cases of generations after Gen-X, it comes back on us... Sorry. A lot of us didn't learn to be the best parents. But also, it's the responsibility of the whole community that young men grow up in. They're learning response habits from teachers loosing it, movies, news, gaming, and cops when the law has to intervene. Their parents are too busy working their asses off, splitting up in divorces, and trying to be mature adults themselves.
We raise boys differently than girls. It may make them tougher men, but only marginally. For fear of them turning out to be sissy's or gay, we don't teach them alternatives to violence. What easier and more lethal way to show "I'm bad-ass," and "Have power," than to wield a firearm and be the greater threat. Works for cops. Not for us. If we don't train, teach, and set the examples for young men that REAL MEN KNOW ALSO HOW TO BE SENSITIVE TO OTHERS LIBERTIES, and know how to express themselves EFFECTIVELY rather than with violence, they learn to use bad habits wrongly. And, depending on how extremely and desperately their emotions coincide with some neurosis and determination to get the upper hand, they're going to take the paths to these extreme measures. Sad.

Anonymous · Answer

Men have a much higher rate of depression and emotionally entangled mental illness.

I know I shouldn't be mad at you for this not being obvious because as a woman it's really not your fault. But it's a little hard to watch how ignorant woman are about how much harder it is to be a man in certain ways.

Was actually talking with some other guys about how it's really men's fault how gender roles are the way they are right now. Women are treated in such a way that their happiness is other people's responsibility.

A lot of women don't like hearing this for a lot of different reasons. Just for expediancy I'll say it's because it doesn't always work out the way we mean it to. Especially in a time where women today are sort of redefining what their place in the world is.

But just as an example, there was a little girl who asked me to give her change for a 5 so she could play the claw machine. I thought she was adorable so I gave her the dollar and told her to keep the 5.

I can promise you if it was a little boy, I almost certainly would have taken the 5 and given him change.

I realised later on how that was really symbolic of how men and women are treated differently down to the time were children. Imagine how that mentality of raising kids gives each gender a different perspective on life.

So yea, why would a woman go on a mass shooting? They're generally more care free because there will always be someone available to them to at least try to give them attention.

In short, (ignoring our biology which plays a role) woman don't have the same environment men do mentally to foster blind rage/hate.

Luopio27 · Answer

I've noticed that kids in elementary schools, when boys got beef, you can see it from miles away. They let their legs and fist do the talking. When girls have beef with each other, they discriminate and use their mean words to hurt their target.

Movie stars like Arnold in Terminator or Stallone in Rambo are far more idolised than Angelina Jolie in Tomb Raider or Milla Jovich in Resident evil. All four are known to look bad ass with their guns in action.

In all the wars of the world, most soldiers have always been men. Most school shooters are not just homicidal but suicidal, killing themselves right after they killed several people.

I do not have a direct or a right answer to this matter but I know that regardless of gender, violence is not just the failures of those who resort to it. Its bigger than that. After every mass shooting, there are the shooters former teachers, principles, doctors, and all professionals who have worked witj or for the shooter, feeling guilt and confusion on what went wrong on their behalf. Same goes with friends and family members who may never get over the traumas the shooter had caused.

bolverk · Answer

They are in a society that has rejected them, from the teachers at their schools (Who the vast majority female) through TV Programs/News/Adverts, Movies, who ALL tell them they are of no use and will amount to nothing, there is nowhere for them to express themselves or blow off steam and burn off their aggression as those places have been closed or forced to be Co-ed , the majority have no Male Authority Figures in their families or close to them. And for accessing mental services while there are services dedicated to women there are none for men, and if they go looking for them they face nothing but derision with the usual "Man up" or "What are you - a girl?"

Society has created this problem, it is up to society to solve it.

Mains Stream Media has a lot to answer for in the reporting of 'Mass shooting' incidents giving them wall to wall coverage especially when the shooters are Male, but for reasons best know to themselves they rarely give the same coverage when the shooter is Female which is strange because female mass shooters are rare and you would have thought more news worthy, after all the public’s perception of mass shootings is heavily influenced by mass media, primarily news media and social media.

YungBahlr · Answer

Bros really were foaming at the mouth because you pointed this out.💀💀 I think the answer primarily lies in the emotional suppression expected of men. Boys are socialized to believe the only proper way to process negative feelings is through anger or ignoring/bottling up their emotions. Both you can imagine leads to eventual outbursts.

I’m no scientist so take my thoughts with a grain of salt, but I seriously think that if society made therapy more appealing and accessible to men, we’d have significantly less shootings overall.

HighlyVolatile · Answer

Men got more testosterone, no? I think that causes them to externalize more of their aggressions. A depraved man is like a nuclear bomb. It tends to affect a lot of people. A depraved woman usually cuts herself more often or swallows pills or something like that.

She internalizes her aggression. I think it's because aggression usually targets weaker people. So maybe the few externally abusive women tend to abuse children or something like that. They don't tend to abuse men as often unless the men are very weak and lack a backbone.

Abusive and desperate men are like an atom bomb. If we failed to domesticate their aggression from their testosterone, we're fucked! Even pencil-necked guys got so much more testosterone.

Anonymous · Answer

That is exactly what happens when boys and men hold onto their toxic masculinity.
There is a reason we call it toxic masculinity.

But of course the blues rather blame women and feminism rather than doing the hard work to reflect upon themselves and reaching out for help. but no wait, that is "weakness". 🫣🙄

SkyCastle90 · Answer

It's all due to emotional instability, immaturity, misguided, and mental illness for both men and women.

From what I've noticed, majority of mentally ill women tend to hurt themselves or their immediate family with their rage (i. e. killing/beating their young child/baby, elderly parent, young sibling (s); basically anyone physically weaker). While mentally ill men tend to blame society, groups, genders, etc, as if the world owes them an apology or recognition.

Honestly, I wish free mental health evaluations were mandatory for all citizens to renew their license, buy a gun, in schools/colleges/universities, etc. People in law enforcement should get mental health evaluations every 6 months.

We got to start talking mental health more seriously.

BigWhiteWolf87 · Answer

I see a lot of imbeciles saying testosterone. Okay. Too bad science, and real scientists who spent years not just getting their PhDs or MScs but years studying it, proved that proven testosterone alone doesn't contribute to aggressive behaviors. Anti social behavior is far more a problem.

That's why - even an idiot would know this - some of the worst criminals in history, such as Jeffery Dalmer, are not testosterone ridden meatheads with the IQ of a snail but actually very intelligent, far from aggressive individuals...

TonyV · Answer

Same reason men commit suicide way more, men have harder lives, most people don't give a shit about men's mental health.

Guys voicing a problem usually get one of two responses 1 called a pussy and told to suck it up buttercup or 2, their problems simply get ignored.

Just look at the "how do I look?" Section here, every woman will have at least some simps tell her how beautiful she is, and men barely get any replies, kind of shows how men are treated on average.

Men get treated as expendable and weak if they can't handle their own issues themselves, so most of us try to, but not all of us can, they break, and broken men do sometimes do stupid bad things.

SimpleGuy95 · Answer

Because they are more likely to develop dysfunctions that cause a lack of empathy and they are more likely to be alone most of the times that way so it´s easier to prepare a shooting and the personal obstacles are lower because there are fewer emotional bonds.
Like if you don´t have friends no one will know what´s in your head.
Another reason could be that guys are more likely to risk something or do try out something even if sounds unreasonable just because they want to do it like many of those people that do risky stuff like extreme sports are also more likely to be man.

HighValue · Answer

Women tend to use their cars to purposefully kill people instead of guns.
But women are more likely to try to harm someone emotionally, socially, and financially than physically. For example, they will try to turn kids against their father, use the courts to steal kids from their fathers, or when they get upset with one of their friends, they try to spread gossip among the rest of the friend group and turn the others against that person.
Men tend to lash out physically more often instead.

Birdlegs · Answer

Testosterone. The most violent criminals have higher levels of testosterone than the general public. And it seems a lot of school shooters are in the puberty phase which will spike their testosterone. Of course there are other factors like like of communication to express how they feel leading to no help or mental illness I just looked and found that women are treasured more for mental illness than men are (are women more mentally I’ll or do they just get help for it more often?) but I think a huge factor is they can’t control their emotions.

Agape93 · Answer

Because guys as a generality, aren't used to the stresses of life despite having overall less issues of day to day concern, and thus have lackluster coping mechanisms. Coupled with a naturally higher aggression and a lesser ability to control emotions, it's hardly a surprise.

bademoxy · Answer

First ask THIS LARGER question: "why are the majority of violent crimes caused by FATHERLESS young men?".
Answer : because that was the INTENDED consequence of Socialist slavery welfare going back 3 generations ago- DESTROY our civilization down to the nuclear family , so the native born population becomes depopulated, then replaced by outsiders who've no birthright to our individual freedoms known as Constitutional Rights.
Cultural warfare is here, waged on us by Frankfurt School Marxist political SJW fronts (such as collective group identitarians in 3rd Wave Feminism, BLM & Antifa) and funded by Global Corporatists such as Gates, Soros and Zuckergburg in World Economic Forum. THEY WANT MOST FOLKS DEAD. THAT is their REAL "green plan";
creating a lost generation was their perfect foil to justify taking away all our wealth and our freedom, so we've no resources to resist their Great Reset Depopulation plans.

TheFlak38 · Answer

You're a woman who spends hours of her life on this forum constantly beating on men telling them what disgusting pieces of shit they are with your feminist bullcrap. Imagine now being a man who since childhood is being told by society exactly that over and over and how he has some original sin that turns him into an evil fascist who oppresses women and how man's ambition to strive for something is the manifestation of the patriarchy. Combine that with single motherhood and you get a criminal. This is all thanks to women like yourself who beat on men every day.

Why are the majority of mass shooters male?

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