Mass shooters are not a "toxic masculinity" problem. They're a product of men's inability to get help for mental health or suicidality. Here's proof:

Feminists keep blaming mass shootings on men, or toxic masculinity or incels. Well, this is a myth.

Myth 1: Public mass shootings happen all the time.

Actually, they don't. In fact, when looking at the 213 mass shootings from the first half of 2022, 37% had nobody killed, and three quarters had 1 or 0 people killed. Only 9 were mass murders of 3+ people, usually gang shootouts or family killings. Only 2 were public mass killings we see on the news. Researchers in 2015 examined each one of the 358 mass shooting incidents in the Gun Violence Archive’s database that year and found that two-thirds of them were either gang-related or resulted from arguments between groups of people—many of whom were drunk or high. Another 11% of the mass shooting incidents were domestic violence-related, resulting in a full 31% of all deaths in mass shootings in 2015. A substantial number of the remaining 24% of mass shooting incidents were robbery-related or committed in the commission of some other crime in high-crime areas of major or mid-sized cities.  A staggering 90% of all mass shootings occurred in areas with higher-than-average poverty rates. Very few of the shootings were public massacres we see on the news. In fact, almost all killings/gun violence is NOT mass shootings/serial killings.

Myth 2: It's a white guy problem

Nope. In fact, when looking at the 358 mass shootings from 2015, 90% of it happened in areas with high poverty rates and often in economically struggling neighborhoods. The New York Times requested official details from law enforcement on 358 incidents from 2015, in which 462 people were killed and 1,330 were injured. It was able to obtain details about race for 67% of victims. Nearly three-quarters of those were black, as were about three-quarters of alleged assailants. Investigators could provide information about motivation in three out of four of the shootings.

When looking at PUBLIC mass killings (what you see on the news), they found that public mass shooters were "52.3% White, 20.9% Black, 8.1% Latino, 6.4% Asian, 4.2% Middle Eastern, and 1.8% Native American." This is an underrepresentation of whites and overrepresentation of blacks. Whites are just a majority of Americans and blacks are 13% of Americans.

Myth 3: Mass shootings are caused by racism, white supremacy, misogyny, incels or homophobia.

Not that often. When looking at public mass shooters, only a minuscule percentage were motivated by homophobia, a minuscule percentage were motivated by misogyny (I even looked up those shooters and almost all of them didn't actually appear to be motivated by misogyny), 9.3% were motivated by racism, and 5.2% were motivated by religious discrimination (e.g.: anti-semitism). Hardly any were self-identified incels. In fact, Alek Minassian, the offender of Toronto van massacre in 2018 that gave incels headlines, said a couple years later to a doctor that he was not an incel and made that up for media attention. His motive was anxiety over his job issues. Very few killings/massacres are committed by a self-identified incel, and the ones that happened were rarely committed by people who used incel forums and they usually happened after Alek's massacre, suggesting that the media's panic over incels motivates most of these killings.

Also, most hate crimes are just assault or intimidation, often with no injuries, not killings.

Myth 4: Mass shootings are often school shootings.

No they are not. In fact, most school shootings in America are just someone killing themself at school, someone going to school with a gun without plans to use it and accidentally firing it, a robber walking on school property to rob people, an altercation between two people in a parking lot, etc. The school shootings you see on the news happen only a couple times each year. In fact, of all public mass shootings, just 7.6% are at K-12 schools (93% of which are high schools), and only 5.2% of public mass shootings occur at colleges. In fact, a third of public mass shootings happen at the workplace, often blue-collared workplaces, which the media never covers. The media just disproportionately covers racist mass shootings, school shootings, etc.

AND FINALLY: the final myth: men are to blame for mass shootings, or that mass shooters are all about toxic masculinity. No this is not true. Mass shootings are actually a suicide and mental health problem.

The media has done all they can to deny the role mental illness or mental health plays in mass shootings or to deny how often school shooters are bullied. They prove this by saying that mass shooters were found to be lack mental illness and that they usually were domestic abusers often killing partners, but these stats by experts often include private mass shootings not the public massacres you see on news which are the minority.

Of all public mass shooters, anywhere from 28 to 36% had a history of domestic violence, but a majority did not. The vast majority were not killing their partner or committing a massacre over relationship issues. In fact, almost half were single.

When looking at private mass shooters, they are not mentally ill, but public mass shooters often are. Statistics found that 58.7% had a history of mental health problems, somewhat higher than the general population. However, the Violence Project, conducted by the same researchers, found that 68.6% had a history of mental illness. In fact, in 30.2% of cases, psychosis played at least a minor role in the crime. In 19.2% of cases, it played at least a significant role, and in 10.5% of cases, it played a primary role. 26.7% were diagnosed with a psychotic disorder, 15.7% had a mood disorder, and 6.4% were autistic. This means public mass shooters have way more psychotic disorders than the general population, along with having more mood disorders or having more autism.

Mass shootings appear to be mostly a suicide and mental health problem.

Of all public mass shooters, 50% had a history of substance use, up to 71.5% were suicidal, and 80% had signs of a crisis. 42.4% had a history of trauma, 34.3% had been abused, 51.2% had employment troubles, and 31% had severe childhood trauma. 68% of school shooters had severe childhood trauma. Most were suicidal, and up to 92% of school shooters and 100% college shooters were suicidal. A majority die at the shooting, either by their own hand (38.4%) or by police (20.3%). Even many school shooters commit suicide or die by police. In fact, many commit suicide by cop.

In fact, statistics found that although two-thirds of public mass shooters had a criminal record and a history of violence (half of which is non-domestic violence, most did not commit domestic violence), they found that public mass shooters have much more in common with people who commit suicide than they have in common with other homicide offenders.

“Homicides are rarely premeditated but public mass shootings almost always are,” Lankford said. So are suicides. While mass shootings were 3.8 times more likely to be premeditated than standard homicides, they were only 1.2 times more likely to premeditated compared to suicide. Mass shooters were more likely than other homicide offenders to act alone. They were more likely to be killed by law enforcement. And while standard homicide offenders aren’t particularly likely to experience suicidal tendencies, in Lankford’s study anyway, mass shooters were a bit more likely to have a history of suicidal ideation than even people who actually died by suicide. 

Many mass shooters get killed by police much more than most homicide offenders. They often plan to commit a mass shooting because it makes their chances of escaping prison or death minuscule, and increases their odds of being killed by cops. They either kill themself or have the cop do it for them. They use mass shootings as a form of suicide by cop. It's called suicide with hostile intent.

When looking at school shooters, many had been bullied. Many had bullied others, but that's because many bullies are also victims of bullying. Traumatized school shooters especially were bullied, and usually did not bully others. Psychopathic shooters usually bullied others but were not bullied. It is true that school shooters rarely kill their bullies, but that's because so many people are fleeing the school and they might not even encounter the bully. Also, many feel hated by the whole school and might view the entire school as the enemy, which is why they'll kill random people or people who didn't bully them. They might even kill staff and resent staff for not stopping the bullying or ostracism. Half of school shooters dealt with a lot of rejection (not rejection from girls, but rejection from their peers). More than half of school shooters had psychological problems like suicidality, depression, psychotic episodes or bipolar disorder).

Mass murderers often deal with chronic social isolation and often experience years of disappointment and failure the create a mix of intense hopelessness and resentment. This causes mass shooters to have a craving for notoriety. Mass shooters who feel nameless or no one would care for them when they're gone could do something like a mass shooting or a school shooting to make a name for themselves in history. Researchers "found mass shooters had four things in common: (1) early childhood trauma and exposure to violence at a young age; (2) an identifiable grievance or crisis point; (3) validation for their belief system, have studied past shootings to find inspiration; and (4) the means to carry out an attack."

Now, many are going to say "grrrr how dare you come up with excuses for mass shootings". I'm not. I'm just using an objective explanation for why this happens. Stating motives or causes =/= excuses. So stop using that strawman. I know many people will argue "oh but most people who deal with this problem in life never would kill people" but this is the sweeping generalizations fallacy where they apply what is generally true to specific individual cases. Just because mentally ill people are not more likely to be violent doesn't there isn't a low minority who can be disproportionately violent and you can't expect everyone who deals with these crisis in life to handle the situation the same way as each other just because virtually all of them have moral luck and don't go down a homicidal path. This is the survivorship bias fallacy.

Yes, other countries in the West have less massacres but mentally ill people or people dealing with a crisis, but guess what? When looking at the incidence of mass shootings in the United States, criminologist Peter Squires states that the individualistic culture in the United States puts the nation at greater odds for mass shootings than other countries, pointing out that "many other countries where gun ownership is high, such as Norway, Finland, Switzerland and Israel . . . tend to have more tight-knit societies where a strong social bond supports people through crises, and mass killings are fewer." He is an advocate of gun control, but contends there is more to mass shootings than the prevalence of guns. And of course, younger men in individualistic cultures like the USA tend to be lonelier. Mass shooters often are ostracized, rejected by peers, unsuccessful, isolated, and/or miserable chronically. They often dealt with a huge crisis that led to them planning out a massacre as way to die or be imprisoned their whole life. The media often was found to inspire more mass shootings, and 63% of public mass shootings happened after Columbine, when public mass shootings skyrocketed afterward. This is called the Columbine effect. Many mass shooters even are inspired by previous ones. Mass shooters often resent the world and start massacres to make them a name for themselves, and the media helps them with that. Many mass shooters also leak their plans to others, with it fairly often being specific plans, including to family, friends, colleagues or police. Suicidal mass shooters and ones who received counseling especially leaked plans to others, suggesting a cry for help. In fact, statistics show that most public mass shooters die at the scene and most even have untreated mental illnesses such as schizophrenia, bipolar, delusional disorders, personality disorders, and substance disorders. None of them were treated.

But feminists like to argue: but it's a male problem! Women who go through these things don't do this!

This is because women have a lot more social support from people they know. Men often rely on girlfriends for emotional support whereas women rely on female friends for emotional support, and 46.5% of mass shooters were single, and 15.1% were divorced, separated or widowed. 34.3% were in a relationship or married and 61.6% were single/divorced/separated/widowed. Many probably had a girlfriend in the past though but not at the moment. Women rely on female friends for support instead, and women are more likely than men to have a best friend, and men are more likely to have zero close friends. Having no close friends is more common now than in the year 1990, when public mass shootings were less common. The friendship decline affects men much more. Moreover, statistics show that men and boys are more socially isolated than women and girls. Unless men are single, they have no confidants and women still have confidants even when single. Men also tend to be disinterested in making friends with men because they think it's gay or unmanly to be close with other men. Men's friendship networks are hierarchal and involve a large number of casual friends with just a couple close friends, whereas women's friendship networks are a peer group of close friends.

Additionally, women tend to usually emphasize relational aggression (e.g.: gossip and character assassination) as a way to get back at people, whereas men's aggression is more in-your-face, which also explains why women don't resort to school shootings as a result of being ostracized, rejected or isolated or bullied and also explains why women don't resort to mass shootings in general. Women also get far more likes and followers on social media, which means they can use social media more easily than men to get validation from others rather than a massacre. Also, studies found that male and female participants perceive neurotypical women the most likable, least awkward and most worth hanging out with or being friends with far more than neurotypical men, autistic women, and autistic men. Autistic women were only viewed slightly less favorably than neurotypical men, and autistic men were viewed as the least likable, most awkward, and least worth spending time with. Autistic men were more stigmatized than autistic women even when controlling for masking (autistic women mask their autism better). They concluded being a woman made autistic women be seen as more likable than autistic men rather than masking. Autistic men often are isolated, bullied and unsuccessful throughout their life, which is why, despite not being more likely to commit crime in general, autistic people are 6.4% of public mass shooters but about 2% of the general population and they see the media as a fuel for getting a name for themselves in this world. Compared to autistic women, autistic men also were less sexually/romantically experienced, more unemployed, and less likely to attend or finish college.

Furthermore, most suicides are men, and people argue women attempt it more but men use lethal methods more, but even when men use the same methods as women, they complete their suicide more. They concluded that many women who are suicidal just engage in suicidal gestures where they severely self-harm themselves as a cry for help, and it gets included in suicide attempt statistics. Men have more suicidal intent. Also, men are just as likely, if not slightly more likely, than women to suffer depression. The criteria for depression is often female-biased and thus includes feminine-associated traits like crying or sadness. When including gender neutral criteria, they find that men are slightly more likely to be depressed, but they often engage in depression through anger, aggression, or substance abuse. Many of these men might not realize they're depressed and mistake it for anger. In fact, depression and anger often overlap. Men also receive mental health treatment much less than women, which explains many mass shooters being untreated for mental illness or not getting any help despite leaking warning signs. Additionally, there's a bias favoring women over men in psychotherapy. Suicide prevention programs also work better for girls than boys.

The reason why men cannot get help isn't just because traditional masculine norms, it's also because nobody gives a shit about men's problems. Even feminists dismiss their problems and told they aren't owed anything. Feminists might say they want men to open up more, but these same feminists kick these men while they're down.

So that's why women dealing with these circumstances don't commit mass shootings. It's because they have other convenient outlets. Besides, women actually get away with murder more, and usually use clever methods to hide their crimes. They often hire hitmen or poison people, and men who use these methods don't get away with it as much because nobody suspects a woman. Female killers usually use more clever methods whereas male killers are more explicit and in your face. This also explains why women won't commit as many mass shootings. This also explains why they're underrepresented among mass shooters.

TLDR: How to stop mass shootings

We need to have gun control, stop the media from reporting on mass shootings, watch out for warning signs and intervene, and give people help that they need to overcome isolation, mental health issues, and their lack of success in life. We also need people to have confidants to talk to as well and any problem they go through in life should be solved. We also need to give more treatment to people who have mental health problems or deal with suicide. Armed guards won't help, and school shootings were deadlier when there were armed guards because mass shooters often might see armed guards as a convenient way to die. Armed guards might encourage more mass shooters because it means they're gonna die more, and shooters often are suicidal, which is why they are killed by police or commit suicide more than other homicide offenders. Some survive, but they did not intend to do so, and the ones who did may have originally planned to die but changed their mind in the end. They usually are life indifferent or even just suicidal. They plan to end their life they hated by dropping dead or by spending their whole life in prison. In fact, giving life sentences or death sentences won't help. Most don't want to be in the free world anymore. Murderers have a low recividism rate and hardly any murderers kill again. Mass shooters perhaps might be able to be rehabilitated, and if they know they'll just be rehabilitated and eventually released from prison, this might deter many from committing a massacre unless they try even harder to die at the scene so they won't go to prison just for only some of their life. They usually want either death or at least life in prison. Yeah, victims' families might disagree with allowing them out of prison later in life, but i don't think the criminal justice system should pander to our emotions. Norway's criminal justice system doesn't, and they gave Anders Breivek the maximum sentence they have (21 years) and most Norwegians, including the victims' parents, were fine with his sentence. People in America would've been up in arms with his sentence because Norwegians like rehabilitation systems but Americans are pro-punishment due to our Puritian roots. Each one of the four themes represents an opportunity for intervention. By reducing access to firearms (means), slowing contagion (validation), training in crisis intervention de-escalation (crisis), and increasing access to affordable mental healthcare (trauma), a mass shooting can be averted.

I know people here will argue there's no excuse for their crimes and you don't feel bad for them and you hate them. We get it. But if you're going to have to still care about what led to them committing massacres instead of just sitting there saying "i don't give a fuck they all deserve to rot in hell!!". If we're going to stop mass shootings, we have to acknowledge what leads to this happening in order to figure out how to stop it, but most mass shooters are not motivated by incels, white supremacy or toxic masculinity. It's not a male problem when hardly any men commit murder.

But serial killers are different. They're usually not mentally ill and just have antisocial personality disorder and usually kill people for thrill. They're much more malicious than mass shooters.