RICK TOONE

First disclose credentials (and bias).

I have a Masters in Elementary Education (K-5) plus years of work with education research scientists (ETS) involving classroom observation, education theory, and teacher training in U.S. public schools of every socio-economic background from temporary trailers in wire-fenced urban schoolyards, to noted-international-architect-purpose-built suburban schools where students carry a personal laptop during their walk past the custom rock-climbing wall to the robotics lab.

And no, the second half of the previous sentence is not fiction. Your tax dollars at work.

I've also done counselling work with urban teens who were unable to find foster placement. Teens who had been molested (brother), raped (father & uncle), burned alive in scalding water as punishment (grandmother), trapped with a junkie mother in project housing that had broken windows and one bare filthy mattress on the floor, HIV positive and living in a car because her parents disowned, working as a gay prostitute to survive...age range discussed is 12-16. Again, all socio-economic backgrounds. Interestingly, these were some of the most resilient and mentally healthy children I've known.

What, then, causes someone like Virgina Tech killer Cho Seung-hui to flip out?

In one word...alienation.

Specifically, alienation by peers. Social rejection by contemporaries. During formative years peer-to-peer relationships are significantly more influential than even parent-to-child relationships. Healthy individuals can result after parental or even societal rejection...but if you combine that with peer rejection, watch out.

Like the scissors-wielding second grader who threatened Tricia and tried to cut the phone cord a few years ago ["I am important!"], I once observed a student whose anti-social behavioral roots were right on the surface. Three socially precocious female fellow students had formed a clique and decided he was primary target for their teasing and bullying...at every opportunity they'd cut him from the social "herd" and whip him into a mental frenzy. These three girls carried disproportionate social weight within their grade level, as they'd learned (parents?) the value of manipulative ostracism.

His scarring likely ran deep. If he was unable to make friends and establish sociable peer relationships in the ensuing years (I lost contact), he could have become a strong candidate for adult psychotic behavior.

Oh, wait! There's a song about this.