As America mourned the loss of 20 innocent school children and six staff members in the tragic Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, we all had one question in mind: Why did this happen?
This may have been the most harrowing mass shooting in recent history, but it's not the only one we've seen. With each tragedy, the desperation for answers grows. Can a killing spree be prevented? Can your genes make you murder? What does the science say? Is there an answer to the problem of gun violence?
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Hi everyone. Cara Santa Maria here. Is there a gene for murder? It's a question that's on a lot of people's minds lately. Newtown, Connecticut. Aurora, Colorado. Virginia Tech. Columbine. We wonder about the mental health, the motivation, the violent tendencies of the gunmen. We want answers. We're afraid. But would sequencing the DNA of Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza tell us anything?
Each new tragedy makes us more desperate for answers. Why did they do it? Could it have been prevented? What does the science say?
Unfortunately, very little. Gun violence is a complicated issue with no clear answers. And since the '90s, the CDC and NIH have had their hands tied when it comes to researching its causes. The National Rifle Association has an extremely powerful lobby, and it effectively froze any U.S. government-funded research into violent crimes associated with firearms.
But on Jan. 16, in the wake of the Newtown tragedy, President Obama signed 23 new executive actions. He explicitly asked the CDC to research the causes and prevention of gun violence, pointing out that public health research is not advocacy. And he asked Congress to approve a ten million dollar allocation to carry out this research.
Barack Obama: "We don't benefit from ignorance. We don't benefit from not knowing the science of this epidemic of violence."
Although I think that the president's 23 point plan is a bold step in the right direction, irresponsible scientific investigation is not. For example, in the immediate aftermath of the Sandy Hook massacre, Connecticut medical examiner H. Wayne Carver asked geneticists at the University of Connecticut to help look for clues in Adam Lanza’s DNA. But clues for what? A mutation that may cause aggressive behavior? Violence? A predisposition to mental illness? Is there such a thing as a mass shooter gene?
No. Of course we wish that it were that simple, but it's not. Although some geneticists say that we may learn some things from Lanza's DNA, what's the cost? Many experts agree that this line of research sets a dangerous precedent that's fraught with negative consequences.
It's bad science, plain and simple. For starters, analyzing Lanza's genome won't really tell us anything. Genetics doesn't work that way. Behavior's complicated. Expecting to find a point-to-point correlation between a gene mutation and a person's actions is incredibly naive.
Take a mental illness like schizophrenia. There's no one gene that codes for it. Even if hundreds or thousands of genes were involved, we're far from understanding how. Also, genes usually switch on or off due to some environmental circumstance. The interplay between nature and nurture is so complicated. Scientists can't predict whether or not a person will be this way or that way based on their genes. And as far as I know, nobody has identified a gene for snapping and going on a killing spree.
Aside from this being a futile endeavor, perhaps even more dangerous is the risk of harming others through stigmatization. What if researchers find that Lanza has a genetic marker associated with autism? Will all people with autism, a diagnosis that is not associated with violent behavior, be seen through a different lens? What if a number of genes are found to be aberrant? Will others with a similar genotype be feared as potential murderers? And where does it end? With eugenics?
It's happened before. In the early 1900s, thousands of patients and inmates were involuntarily sterilized for criminal behavior, mental illness, and even "feeblemindedness." Think this is ancient history? Not so fast. Compulsory sterilization continued until the 1970s.
Now I know you may think I'm committing a logical fallacy here--that this slippery slope won't happen because one violent criminal's DNA is sequenced. And maybe it won't. But we as a nation are no strangers to the witch hunt. And if Adam Lanza causes US to harm even one person because of his actions, then we are, in essence, letting this domestic terrorist win.
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