Guns aren’t the problem. Stricter gun laws aren’t the solution. Absentee fathers are the problem. Good fathers are the solution. The vast majority of violent boys—including school shooters are fatherless. Until we start taking fatherlessness more seriously and restore the nuclear family as the standard for healthy families, we will continue to live in a more violent society.
The father of the teenager who murdered 19 children and 2 adults in Uvalde, Texas said:
He probably would have shot me too, because he would always say I didn’t love him.
The father is also a criminal. He has an apparently lengthy criminal record. His most deadly crime, however, isn’t on his record. His most deadly crime is that he is an absentee father.
A father who doesn’t value his child’s life is teaching his child a person’s life isn’t valuable.
63% of teenagers who commit suicide are fatherless. 72% of adolescent murderers are fatherless. 75% of adolescents in rehab centres for drug abuse are fatherless. 60% of rapists are fatherless. 85% of teenagers in prison are fatherless.
And especially, 75% of the most-cited school shooters in America are fatherless—just like the teenager who walked into Robb Elementary School to murder 21 people.
Of course, most fatherless people value life. Fatherlessness doesn’t make a person a mass murderer or a criminal. However, fatherless children are significantly more likely to commit crimes. For instance, a 2012 study on juvenile male inmates found that fatherless boys are 279% more likely to carry guns for criminal behaviour.
Absentee fathers discourage their children and they provoke them to anger (Colossians 3:21
, Ephesians 6:4). I know that too well. 85% of children with behavioural problems are fatherless—that describes my childhood.
I was involved in over 20 fights before I was 18 years old. Most of these fights happened when I was between 4-10 years old, especially when other children made fun of me for being fatherless.
I didn’t know how to maintain my composure when other children blamed me for my father’s absence.