The 16-year-old boy who opened fire at an Oregon elementary school on Thursday, killing three children and a teacher, has given America yet another reason to argue about guns. He has also given it a reason to ask a question that has received little attention in decades of arguments about school shootings: why are the killers so often teenage boys?
There is an uncomfortable truth concealed inside one of the American gun lobby's most familiar slogans: guns don't kill people, people do. The phrase is an inadequate explanation for gun violence and an even worse argument against gun regulation but it points toward a fact that is worth examining: according to research, the overwhelming majority of perpetrators of targeted school violence are boys and young men.
At the moment, the Second Amendment remains firmly embedded in American constitutional law. Whatever one's views on gun ownership, a country in which firearms are widely available must reckon with the people most likely to turn them against their classmates. Perhaps, alongside the endless argument over guns and the Second Amendment, America should devote equal attention to understanding why boys and young men so disproportionately commit these attacks.
The Statistic Hiding in Plain Sight
The 16-year-old accused of carrying out Thursday's shooting at Silver Rail Elementary School in Oregon fits a disturbing pattern that has received far less attention than the weapons used in school attacks.
In a 2019 study of 41 perpetrators of targeted school violence between 2008 and 2017, the U.S. Secret Service found that 83 percent were male and their average age was just 15.
The study included attacks involving weapons other than firearms, so its findings cannot be applied to every school shooting but the pattern is difficult to ignore.
A deduction: millions of American teenagers grow up in a country where firearms are widely available, yet the perpetrators of targeted school attacks are overwhelmingly boys. Why?
One possible explanation lies in how some adolescent boys experience rejection and perceived threats to their status, and in the ways they have learned to express anger. Researchers studying targeted school violence have repeatedly identified grievances, interpersonal conflicts and experiences of bullying among attackers. But those experiences are common among teenagers of both sexes and only an extraordinarily small minority become violent. The harder question is why certain boys come to see violence as a way of answering those grievances.
This suggests that alongside the debate over access to guns, America should devote more attention to understanding the boys who use them. Restricting access to firearms may prevent shootings, but understanding why certain boys become violent could help prevent the desire to carry them out in the first place. Why can’t we carry out both battles at once?
A Problem Older Than the Smartphone
Another fact is worth considering: school shootings predate the technologies routinely blamed for adolescent distress. Namely, social media.
The Secret Service was investigating patterns of targeted school violence long before TikTok and the modern smartphone existed. These technologies may intensify humiliation and isolation, sure, but they cannot explain a phenomenon that preceded them.
Nor does the broader crisis in adolescent mental health explain why the violence is so disproportionately male. According to CDC figures released Thursday, 43 percent of high school girls reported persistent sadness or hopelessness in 2025, compared with 24 percent of boys.
Girls report considerably more emotional distress, yet boys account for the overwhelming majority of perpetrators in the Secret Service's study. The statistics measure different things and sadness is hardly a reliable predictor of violence but the contrast raises a question: if girls report greater emotional distress, why are boys so much more likely to carry out targeted school attacks?
Perhaps the missing piece lies partly in how a small minority of boys learn to respond to rejection and anger. If so, understanding those responses deserves as much serious investigation as the weapons that make their consequences so deadly.
The Attacks That Never Happened
Why spend so much time examining who commits school attacks when the guns themselves are so readily available? Because understanding the people behind the violence may help prevent it—and there is evidence that intervention can work.
In a 2021 study of 67 disrupted school attack plots, the Secret Service found that in 94 percent of cases, someone had learned of the plans before violence occurred.
The implication is practical. If researchers can identify patterns among those who plan school attacks, schools may be better equipped to recognize warning signs before violence occurs. A boy who is struggling socially or withdrawing from classmates may need support. If he begins making threats, talking about revenge or revealing plans to hurt others, those concerns need to be taken seriously. Encouraging students to report such behavior, and giving schools the means to respond, could help stop an attack before it happens.
Gun-control advocates have a compelling point: access to firearms can turn an individual's violent intentions into a mass-casualty event. Reducing that access, particularly among people who pose credible threats, remains an important preventive measure.
But there is another opportunity for prevention: understanding how a small minority of boys move from ordinary adolescent grievances to thoughts of killing.
As investigators in Oregon seek to understand what led a 16-year-old to attack an elementary school, the questions should extend beyond how he obtained a gun. What happened before he picked it up? Were there warning signs? Did anyone know what he was contemplating?
The answers may tell us something about how to prevent the next shooting. By the time a gun enters a classroom, the chance to intervene may already have passed.
Newsweek’s reporters and editors used Martyn, our AI assistant, to produce this story. Learn more about Martyn here.