Those who love freedom and individual responsibility will never become defenseless victims of criminals and tyrants. If government policies created less-safe schools, they also helped create schools that discourage moral behavior. In today's government schools, inept bureaucrats constantly impose the latest teaching fads which conflict with real learning and leave students intellectually adrift. Children are forced to sit obediently in boring classes, and over four million of them are then issued the psychiatric drug Ritalin or Prozac when they get fidgety. Government schools must not teach the values of many parents.
Schools are gigantic, expensive, and impersonal.
Many students join social cliques which exhibit hostility toward others. Administrators have trouble even identifying students with behavioral problems, and a harder time ejecting them from school. Of course, only a portion of the responsibility for the tragedy lies with government officials and activists who empower them. The causes of the Columbine shooting are many and complex. The two young killers acted in nihilistic rage, refusing to take responsibility for their own lives and blaming random strangers for their troubles.