I dunno if that’s the case, I mean, not to be cruel, but if his parents didn’t help teach him good coping skills, take him to a doctor when he seemed withdrawn emotionally, or if they abused him in some way, it IS their fault. I’m not saying he, as an adult, had no responsibility and that ONLY his parents are to blame. But, I do believe that parents must take some responsibility for their children’s actions. The boy wasn’t an island unto himself. His heritage helped shape him.

Amy.
I respectfully have to disagree with your comment. Yes, his heritage helped shape this young man. However, as many therapists have learned through the years, some of our patients are self destructive and violent, even if their parents did nothing wrong. They may have a chemical imbalance, they have been wronged by friends, they may have a huge feeling of self loathing - FOR MANY DIFFERENT reasons. We should not look to blame the parents, first.

I thought that Dr. Hoffspiegel gave some great insite into this young man. And I agree with the person who wrote this post. There are MANY reasons why this Cho self destructed. But looking to blame the parent/mother is simply wrong. Again, as we know, adult children are extremely difficult to control. With this family, we are also looking at cultural and ethnic differences.

So again, I am a huge advocate of looking at the big picture and not pointing blame on anyone, except the shooter. Hopefully, this country will wake up and embrace the mental health community. There is so much we CAN do, and such little support that we receive fromt he medical community and federal government. But that is a post for another time.

I agree that blaming Cho’s parents is at the very least premature.

Were he somehow abused or tortured by his parents, perhaps they could share some blame. However, there is no indication that this was the case.

If one is puzzled why his family did not seek professional help for their son (or why Cho did not seek help himself, though it is possible his activities leading to the shooting were attempts to provoke an intervention), it may help to bear in mind that cultural differences can greatly interfere with the ability of people from other countries to seek and obtain adequate mental health care in the U.S. and Canada.

Here are a few examples(there are many):

Many Asian cultures are collectivist in nature, perhaps leading to a tendency to hide individual or family problems to avoid disruption to others. Not all cultures consider “looking out for number one” to be an ideal, as we do. North American culture may also encourage more emotion-based coping (talking to acquaintances, friends, or family about problems) than other cultures, which may instead encourage stoicism.

Many immigrant families may not wish to compound the stigma of being visible minorities with the stigma of a mental illness. When help is sought, language barriers can decrease odds of successfully communicating problems.

The same issues are likely magnified when one considers the probability of immigrant families requesting police invtervention to deal with a family member.

There have been some attempts by the APA and CPA to account for cultural differences and issues in mental health diagnosis and treatment, and some attempts to include such issues in university psychology curricula, but a good deal more work needs to be done.

Those things being said, I don’t believe Cho’s South Korean heritage can be “blamed” for the incident more than any other factor. Cho’s internal state and reaction involved a convergence of hundreds of contributing factors. Changing any one of these MIGHT have led to Cho’s life taking a different turn had the people involved been clairvoyant.

Sadly, we cannot see the future. We can only look at the past and try to use the lessons learned to bring about positive change. In agreement with Theresa, making the mental health of all citizens a priority would help to assign some meaning to this otherwise senseless tragedy.

I think that is wonderful that you shared this post by Dr. Hoffspiegel. Thank you.