"We just want to know why," claim the victims, parents and students of Santana High School? The why is simple. When you're 15 years old, self-perception is everything. It is bound up in your group acceptance, your sense of self worth, and your relationship or lack of relationship with the opposite sex. When I was 15, and painfully thin, I was so self-conscious of the fact that I would wear multiple layers of long sleeved shirts on hot days to try to disguise it. I was 6' 7" tall. A geek, a string bean, a weirdo, and a target. My emotions ran from the total embarrassment of being me to a blind rage at the beautiful kids whose perfect bodies, perfect complexions, and pretty faces gave them the entitlement of popularity. Popularity, the Holy Grail of adolescence. Even the teachers treated them differently. They were given license to be arrogant.

I managed to get through school without shooting any of that group, whose perfection I perceived as making my social life non-existent. My restraint did not come from any lack of access to guns. I had a gun. My mother bought me one when I was 14. My restraint didn't come from fear of the consequences. An adolescent is immortal. It is not that I didn't fantasize or even seriously consider acting out my revenge. I did. Most kids who have gone through adolescence as a target of ridicule consider getting even. It is a natural reaction to the relentless torment of not fitting in, when the desire to fit in is your entire universe.

No, my classmates and teachers were safe because of the world I grew up in. Human life was sacred, killing was wrong. Chewing gum in class was wrong. Talking back to a teacher was wrong. Lying, stealing, and cheating were wrong. Failing to obey your parents was wrong. Failing to turn in your homework was wrong. Behavioral discernment was okay. Value judgements were expected. All ideas were not equal. Punishment for breaking the rules was swift and often physical. Self esteem was earned and not bestowed. Civilization was built on the notion that certain behaviors are acceptable and certain behaviors are unacceptable. I can remember getting ordered to detention for talking in class and then having to take 4 licks with a board in place of the detention because I had track practice during the detention time. We pushed the envelope of acceptable behavior by bringing candy to study hall.

Today, we have largely abandoned discipline as a consequence for behavior. We have abandoned standards, picking our battles, so we can concentrate on the "big and important" while ignoring the small and trivial. The grand mosaic of what is right, what is wrong, what we can do, and what we shouldn't do has been replaced with a bare thread. A handful of behaviors determined to be the whole of what society may object to. We have stopped concerning ourselves with the actions of the person, looking for outside influences and to perceived actions of inanimate objects as places to lay blame.

This latest shooting of teenagers in a high school will result in several rounds of finger pointing. First at the skinny outcast, a class of kid we have always had. Second, at the popular kids who tormented him, an activity that has always occurred. Third, we will blame guns, which have been around for a long time. Fourth, we will blame the popular culture, a waste of time. Fifth, we will blame the parents, disillusioned parents, who are as mystified as society.