For a number of years, I have read about the number of children in the U.S. taking the drug Ritalin (and like drugs), the current number has sky rocketed to 8million! Many of the articles have pointed out the unusually high number of kids involved in school shooting/ murder/ etc. have been taking these type(s) of drugs. Albeit these kids were "under the care of a physician" and their drugs were prescribed, and being taken IAW the law, the possible link to this type of behavior need further study. A study NOT funded by the drug companies that make billions on the sale of this stuff. On a personal note, I find it hard to believe that 8 million of our kids need to be on a psychotropic drug, for years at a time. Where did this come from? As more and more kids are placed on these drugs, the test scores as compared to other civilized countries slips, as well as our "own" testing, ACT for example. There may, in fact be a link.
I'm editing this post to add, the as the number of un-wed mothers rises, the number of young males growing up without a man's influence increases. In areas where this is most prevalent, so does all manner of violent crime-and the criminals are starting their life of crime younger and younger. Gangs actively recruit kids, serious violence, murder being the top of the list is far toooooo common in most of our large cities. This too, happens to be where we find the largest concentration of single parent families , drug dealing and where the gangs are concentrated. The gangs are primarily funded by illegal drug sales, it's hard to tell kids drugs are bad, when a large number of their classmates are taking psychotropic all day every day! The way they may see it is, as long as certain people are making money on the drugs, they are good, if we (the gangs) try to make money on it, it's bad! In short, there are a number of factors destroying our society, the break-down of family, as we have known it for so long, it at the core, it is in a large part both the cause and the effect.