In almost every single shooter case, a true Christian father is missing. By his example and counsel, the Christian father directs the boy to channel his energies and emotions into manly pursuits and virtuous action. Indeed, the devoted father provides society with a balanced young man who will defend society from attacks.
Across the country, thousands of confused young men are a potential danger to their communities. Everyone knows they are there and, in some cases, who they might be. They fit a consistent profile that makes them easy to point out. They are self-centered frustrated men with mental-health issues, often from white middle-class backgrounds. They come from broken families and possess limited social skills and self-discipline. These psychopathic young men become the mass shooters that are terrorizing America. Each one is like a ticking time bomb waiting to go off.
America now faces the problem of dealing with these explosive young men. The matter calls for urgent action as the number of shooters and shootings grows.
There are two main solutions to this problem, only one of which is effective.
Employing the Force of Government
The first one consists of bringing the full power of the government to bear upon these unfortunate individuals and thus eliminating every possibility of a shooting event before it happens. Everyone must get involved to save these poor young men from themselves before it is too late.
This solution calls for employing people to monitor these individuals’ actions, social-media posts, and tweets for signs of instability and hostility. School staff must be on board to notice anti-social behavior in the classroom. The police must also be ready to move at the slightest sign of trouble. Officials must compile lists identifying potential offenders who could become dangerous.
Another essential component of this strategy is censoring the Internet and eliminating sites that promote hatred and strange ideologies that might prove attractive to these young males. Outreach programs would seek to educate them about the evil of these sites. Sociologists might study the systemic causes of their anti-social and violent behavior and propose government programs to address them.
Of course, these young men must be disarmed lest they put their bizarre plans into action. This involves the complicated intervention of judges and police who must make preventative “red flag” decisions.
Counseling, Aid, and Entitlements
In addition to the force of law, the government must also make the services of counselors and mental health professionals available. These helpers should be equipped with the latest methods and drugs to calm down angry individuals who have lost control of their rage. The counselors must be understanding and helpful; public prosecutors should be lenient when they commit minor crimes, lest punishment contribute to the wrath that dominates their lives.
Nothing should be denied the angry young men. If necessary, they should have access to public assistance, healthcare, and entitlements to help them survive in society.
All these tasks need to be done very carefully so as not to infringe upon their personal rights. They must always be free to express themselves as each sees fit. Above all, blame for their actions must always be placed upon society and social structures and never upon the offending young men.
The Costs of the First Solution
Thus, this first plan is extremely comprehensive. It involves every aspect of the prospective shooter’s life. It calls for an army of public servants who monitor these angry young men for signs of anti-social and violent behavior. Others must be ready to react quickly to signs that might indicate evil intentions. Such a plan costs a mountain of money for each individual. In addition, each new shooting provokes do-something gestures that add more time and money to the equation.
Alas, each lapse on the part of any person involved in this process might appear in the next day’s headlines. Every failure leads to endless finger-pointing about how society failed.
Unfortunately, this first, top-heavy solution is the one presently in effect. As society decays, the solution decreases in effectiveness. Since it is not illegal to be troubled, most of these rogue young men are free to engage in video games, drugs, and rage (all part of the shooter profile) without consequences.
Thus, communities face the impossibility of monitoring the growing number of such youths that roam freely until the fateful day they go amok.
This “solution” has never worked. It tends to turn communities, especially schools, into prisons full of security measures and lockdowns to protect themselves against potential shooters.
The Second Solution: Finding One Person to Do Everything
The second solution to the shooter problem has been rejected despite its obvious benefits. It calls for finding a single person for each troubled youth who can provide the goods and services now distributed by government agencies. This person would need to be a monitor, educator, counselor, judge, provider, protector, and role model, all in one.
Finding someone to carry out such a complete task is not as difficult as it might seem. The missing person to deal with each troubled youth is the absent father. It must be not just any father, but a true Christian father who assumes the role of authority in the family and directs all its members to fulfillment and sanctity.
In almost every single shooter case, this father is missing. The mother cannot assume this role, however heroic she might be. Young men need strong fathers or father figures who will shoulder all these strength-infusing roles to keep them from becoming the weak and cowardly figures who kill innocent and defenseless people.
The Father as Monitor, Provider and Protector
This father is missing.
The father must constantly monitor his sons’ activities to keep them away from destructive influences, pornography, and drugs. He must be the teacher of what is right and wrong and not be afraid to affirm this teaching.
He must say no when children threaten to harm themselves and others. He represents strength at the service of good when he prevents disaster. He must be selfless and say yes when it comes time to exercise his functions and become a role model of manliness and sacrifice. The son is made to admire and imitate this father, in whom he sees his cause.
This father is the symbol of constancy as he does not get divorced but bears every hardship and treasures every joy to provide a haven of stability and formation so that his son might become a gentleman. He is the provider that teaches the son the meaning of responsibility and duty. Through him, the son learns to forget about self and to think only of others.
By his example and counsel, the father directs the boy to channel his energies and emotions into manly pursuits and virtuous action. He teaches honor, excellence, and courtesy to tame the wild passions of adolescence. The father is also the family’s protector and teaches his son to defend himself and others—those whose responsibility is to exercise authority for the good of society and all in society who are weak and vulnerable. He even encourages the safe handling of firearms.
The father exercises his God-given authority to lead his own family to God. This almost-priestly role confers upon the father a sacral dignity that inspires wonder, respect, obedience, and reverence. By his good example, the father teaches his son the worship of the ultimate Authority, the One True God, and fills him with the desire for virtue and heaven.
Bringing Back the Father
This father is missing.
The only way to stop the shootings is to bring back the father. This does not involve government programs, social monitoring, and financial benefits. The selfless father performs his duties at no cost to the state. Indeed, this devoted father—together with a loving mother—provides society with a balanced young man who will defend society from attacks.
Bringing back the father means recreating the culture that allows this Christian father to flourish. Modern and postmodern society rejected this solution because it requires effort, assigns responsibility, and promotes virtue. This secular, anti-Christian age hates the idea of the father because it restricts absolute license (as distinguished from ordered liberty), affirms the goodness of inequality in Creation, and reflects God’s Supreme Authority.
Thus, in their denial of this real solution, people will continue to turn to an ever-bigger and liberty-crushing government, mountains of money, and worthless programs. Meanwhile, the shootings will continue to increase. The finger-pointing debate will go round and round without resolution.
The world must return to order and God. Bring back the father, and the son will be transformed.
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John,
Thank you for this excellent piece. I would add that in addition to a virtuous father the presence of a good community in which to grow up helps as well. For a young man, even where a father is missing or barely present, other men can often step in to fill the void in an informal way. I have seen this happen in my own church and neighborhood. Too many young men grow up today not only fatherless but isolated, alone, and way too immersed in their own unhealthy bubble. As men, we should all strive to be intentional within our own “village” to come alongside a young man in need. We know who they are. Peace.
Well said.
And in the service of this we need a few more things:
o The revival of chaste, marriage-minded dating starting at age eighteen
o Private-sector-provided depth psychotherapy, so that people without prudence and self-control can develop it
o Family-life education, also private-sector-provided, that impresses on future and current mothers and fathers that it isn’t enough for the father to live with his kids. He must be emotionally available when he’s there, and when he’s not–away in the military or on business, for example–he and his wife must provide second-father figures to their children.
Yes, we need strong, christian men to step up. Excellent article.
Why not combine aspects of the first plan and the second one? Instead of intrusive government surveillance, get these poor souls into the counseling they really do need. That doesn’t need the inevitably red-tape-loaded government bureaucracy. A partnership between private practitioners and the government would beneficial – look no further than any country with universal healthcare.
What also needs to be brought back are the community bonds and community moral standards (which must, as an ironclad rule, include those that were once upon a time marginalized) that have been shattered in this country since the counterculture of the 1960s. Government can have a role, but not an all-encompassing one.
Without God the Father returning to our classrooms as once existed prior to mid 20th century, and as the Puritans who started the American education system knew was critical to a rounded education, we will still be plagued by misguided youth.
Why do you fail to acknowledge that the most common reasons for father’s being absent is a) irresponsible unwed mothers and b) high divorce rates in which it usually the mother (approaching 80%, 90% among the college-educated) who evicts the father from his home. The father is then marginalized by the state, and his children are held hostage by their mother. Until no-fault divorce is eliminated and illegitimacy is addressed this problem will only worsen.
Another great analysis Mr. Horvat: what amazes me is that for all of our society’s ills there has been so much said and written of solutions for them by men and women of wisdom: we just don’t read these words: it’s like these ills are new, but they have been seen and addressed for centuries upon centuries, because the ills aren’t new and neither are men and women who are willing to think about what they reveal about human nature and how human nature, with the grace of God, and do far, far better than fall to them. Thank you for being such an amazingly clear voice among the wise.