Posted on 10/07/2015 10:07:57 AM PDT by Presbyterian Reporter
As details emerge about Laurel Harper, whose 26-year-old son, Christopher Harper-Mercer, opened fire on his creative writing class at Umpqua Community College, so too has a common, unsurprising, undercurrent of blame.
Why didn't Laurel Harper do more to curb her son's violent tendencies? Shouldn't she have seen this coming?
After all, according to online writings apparently made by Harper and first described in The New York Times, not only did she neglect to discourage her son's growing interest in guns, but she also seemed to encourage it. Over the years, according to the posts linked to Harper, she expressed pride in her son's expertise with guns, bragging in an online journal about his prowess.
Writings from "Tweety Bird" (the Yahoo account name linked to Harper) appear to indicate that she did this even as she told others she worried about her son's violent tendencies. Tweety offers that her son was a "headbanger," and was a child who had been diagnosed with Asperger's syndrome -- which she also had, according to a Tweety post. (Studies have shown there is no direct link between Asperger's and violence.)
And yet, according to her neighbors, Harper brought her son to shooting ranges. Police would eventually recover 14 firearms from the two -- six from the shooting, and the rest from the apartment they shared.
Indeed, it's hard not to point the finger at Harper, a mother who most assuredly knew her son was not entirely stable.
Children develop interests and often look to those adults who can help nurture them. There's a good chance that, had his mother not been interested or available, Harper-Mercer might have sought out another person to talk with about guns and the horrendous result might have been the same.
(Excerpt) Read more at cnn.com ...
No, no, no! The mother is black. The dad is white so HE is the one that the Left should find guilty. After all, SHE is a victim of racism and oppression.
All the guns in the rampage and at home were legally purchased.
He son was 26 yrs old.
She is a Donald Trump fan. ...read "Art of the Deal" to her son when younger.
Her current husband is an avid hunter and ex-military.
Doesn't sound like someone CNN would be making excuses for.
In fact, the last sentence reveals her gun-grabbing agenda.
And such events will continue to occur if the resources for people such as Laurel Harper, and the laws for who can own guns (and how many), do not change. There's a bigger problem in this country than one irresponsible mother, and I think most of us know that.
Absolutely.
If she helped in the planning or gave him a directive, then yes.
Otherwise this is just another way to scare people into getting rid of their guns.
NO SALE!
Making your demented son keeper of the armory is irresponsible.
Poor parenting, like Mike Brown’s poor excuses for parental units.
Same. In a very similar situation here. There are legal rights and then there are common sense/moral responsibilities.
It’s hard to blame the mother, particularly given that she appears to be on our team, but I wonder if shaming and shunning the family members of mass shooters would go a long way in stopping these sorts of acts. And I’m talking about shaming/shunning WHETHER OR NOT it is justified in the abstract. Perhaps if would-be mass murderers knew that their actions were going to devastate their parents’ reputations, they would think twice.
She’s probably invisible. Happens all the time.
No. "The soul who sins shall die. The son shall not suffer for the iniquity of the father, nor the father suffer for the iniquity of the son." Ezekiel 18:20
You’re not the only one. “Recovering” other people’s property? We’re living in a fascist police state.
Morally she shares some responsibility, after acknowledging that her son was a mental case and knowing full well of his temperament and ownership of more that a dozen firearms, she should have tried to get help. But there is no crime on her part.
Some, if not all, of these shooters are nutcases. Believe me, those families have already been burdened, and likely stigmatized, by the perp’s behavior.
Shaming the innocent is a terrible idea. They are victims, too, and grieving.
That said, if they allowed or encouraged the perp’s access to firearms, then they are culpable.
I don’t know if Mom tried to get him help or not, but I can tell you that it isn’t easy. Law enforcement doesn’t intervene until a crime is committed. Our mental health system is a joke. Unless the patient agrees to treatment, there is little a family can do.
She could, however, have made sure he didn’t have access to firearms.
I speak from years of experience. Our family’s situation is now solved by incapacitation unrelated to mental issues, but there have been many times in recent years that I’ve said, “There but for the grace of God go I.”
It's not all or nothing. He's responsible for his crimes, but she's responsible for her choices too. If she knowingly allowed her wacko violent son easy access to weapons, she is responsible for that choice.
He wasn’t violent before he chose to become a mass murderer, so she didn’t “knowingly” allow him to do anything.
....”Point the finger at Harper, a mother who most assuredly knew her son was not entirely stable”....
Though she did not pull the triggers she assuredly did nothing to discourage his interests, and in fact appears to have encouraged it fully knowing he wasn’t stable.
Perhaps she herself is unstable....I tend to think so.
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