More expert opinions

Blog reveals ‘poster boy’ for school shooters:

One more expert that agrees with me that Kimveer Gill was a cookie-cutter school shooter…

Kimveer Gill’s death-obsessed, rage-filled blog reveals a man that psychologists say was the “the poster boy” and “absolute prototype” for a school shooter.

Robin Kowalski, a psychologist who co-wrote a comprehensive study on school shooters, said the 25-year-old Mr. Gill fits every pattern her colleagues uncovered.

“When I read his blog material, it was almost like I was running down a checklist,” Ms. Kowalski said from her office at Wake Forest University in North Carolina.

“You hate to say that this was waiting to happen, but the foundation for this violent act was clearly laid out long before it took place.”

And here’s the last item on the checklist…

In another entry, posted on Jan. 18, Mr. Gill wrote about his hatred for jocks and “preps” — convictions that are eerily similar to those held by infamous Columbine High School shooters Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold.

“I’m so sick of hearing about jocks and preps making life hard for the goths and others who look different, or are different … Why does society applaude (sic) jocks? I don’t understand. They are the worse kind of people on earth,” he wrote.

“And the preps are no better, they think they’re better than others … We will never be like them. NEVER.”

He’s at least 7 years out of high school and he’s still complaining about jocks and preps? I wonder if he even had a real job. If you’re out of high school and still obsessing about its cliques then there is something wrong with you and you should seek help.

Mr. Gill’s case features the five prevailing factors established by Ms. Kowalski’s research, a study of 15 high-profile school shootings between 1995 and 2001: obsession with guns and death, feelings of ongoing rejection (either bullying, social isolation or romantic rejection), psychological problems such as sociopathic tendencies and depression and “acute rejection” — a final event that pushes a shooter over the edge.

“Just like the Columbine shooters in 1999, the jocks and preps must have been the ones that Gill felt bullied him,” Ms. Kowalski said. “He writes that guns are the great equalizer. For all those who rejected him and made him feel like nothing, he was trying to show those people that he was something — that he had power.”

Do you want to have real power? Then don’t let the people who bullied you win by obsessing over it the rest of your life. Like I keep saying, it’s just high school. It’s a very small part of your overall life if you’re smart about it.

Ms. Kowalski, also the associate editor of the Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, said she believes the final catalyst for Mr. Gill’s alleged shooting spree may have been a failed romance or unrequited love. In his blog, Mr. Gill discusses meeting a like-minded woman through vampirefreaks.com. On at least two occasions, he discusses a general longing for, or loss of, love, once asking “Where is my Juliet?” In another entry on Feb. 21 he states, “They make you fall in love with them and then they run away.”

There’s no woman (or man) out there that’s worth killing people or yourself over. If you think there is, you’re very immature and need to do a lot of growing up.

While Mr. Gill may be a “poster child” for school shooters, Ms. Kowalski said it’s important not to paint all goths or counter-culture youths with the same brush.

“There are plenty of people who have a fascination with death and guns who would never do something like this,” she said. “All the factors we discovered may be present, but it’s the specific way those factors intertwine, often coupled with an inherent lack of empathy for others, that determine whether someone is going to become a shooter.”

That’s for the rest of you out there that like to stereotype.

Dave Marcus, author of What It Takes to Pull Me Through, a book about dealing with angry, disaffected youth, said there is one key difference between Mr. Gill and typical shooters.

“The surprising thing to me was his age, often people sort of outgrow this alienated phase,” Mr. Marcus said. “This shooter was 25, indicating an adolescence that never ended — he was still working out its terrible kinks in his twenties and that produced tragic results.”

See.