The gunman was horrendously bullied at school.

It's one of the underrated and underreported factors at play in all of this. Though I bet nobody would be surprised if they hear this. But he was such a quiet man.

That he was registered republican and donated a small amount of money to a progressive group are less important features than than a nihilism and misanthropy developed over long periods of daily and constant humiliation.

This is something he has in common with almost all of the mass shooters and gunmen. Alt- right race warriors to British Muslim jihadists all share an alienation from the culture around them and a rejection of a world that has rejected them. A desire to make their life matter, some way some how..

I'm not condoning the violence but if we are serious about looking at the causes of this, then what we call politics is only part of the story. There is also the politics of atomised, individualistic and ultra competitive societies in which a minority of young men feel that they have no value.