Robert Agnew General Strain Theory

On Thursday, November 20, 2014 at 12:25a.m, a 31 year old male by the name of Myron May, according to the San Bernardino Sun Newspaper, decided to walk into the Strozier Library (located at Florida State University in Tallahassee, FL) where students were studying for their midterms and opened fire, letting off five to six shots from his .380 semi-automatic gun. By 12:30a.m, Myron May was shot dead by the police. Within just five minutes, three students were wounded. Two of these students were transported to the hospital and the third was only grazed by the bullet.

This particular crime can be explained through the general strain theory by Robert Agnew. When Agnew presented the general strain theory, he was introducing strain to a micro level. The general strain theory assumes that people of all social classes and economic positions deal with frustration in a routinely daily life. Agnew believed that when it comes to strain and frustration, there are three categories that build up to it. Just like the other strain theories, it focuses on

failure to achieve positively valued goals, but unlike the other theories it also focuses on a presentation of noxious stimuli as well as the removal of a positively valued stimuli. These three categories are what lead to stress, thus leading to anger. Agnew focuses on the anger “because anger lowers inhibitions, encourages blaming others, and motivates behavior” (Agnew, 1992, p. 59-60). Thus meaning that anger is the primary factor when it comes to criminal behavior.
Although anger may be the primary factor to criminal behavior, there is also another important factor that he believes contributes to crime as well. When it comes to this theory and criminality the other important factor is a coping mechanism which is how one copes with the stress and frustration that may be brought on by these three factors when being introduced to one’s life. There are three types of coping mechanisms which are Cognitive, Behavioral, and Emotional and most of them can go one of two ways.
The Cognitive coping mechanisms involves only one reaction which is a legal coping mechanism and involves ignoring/minimizing the strain, denying it, and accepting it. The Behavioral coping mechanism has a legal and illegal way to cope. The legal behavioral coping mechanism involves: if the strain is failure to achieve goals, then use legal means to achieve goals; if the strain is presentation of negative stimuli, then escape or avoid the strain or terminate the source; and if the strain is removal of positively valued stimuli, then prevent the loss, or retrieve the lost stimuli. However, the illegal coping mechanism involves: if the strain is failure to achieve ones goals, then use illegal means to achieve goals; if the strain is presentation of noxious stimuli, then escape or avoid, terminate, or seek revenge against the source; and if the strain is removal of positively valued stimuli, then prevent the loss, retrieve the loss stimuli, and/or seek revenge against those responsible for the lost stimuli. The last coping mechanism is Emotional and this type involves a legal and illegal way to cope as well. The legal way is to simply exercise, meditate, relax, or even just laugh. The illegal way to cope would be to manage negative emotions through illegal drugs.
Most people tend to use positive and legal coping mechanisms such as laughter and yoga, to get rid of the stress and strain, however, if one does not know how to apply these positive coping strategies to their life, then they tend to engage in crime instead as a coping mechanism. “That is, some forms of crime and deviance may be used to escape the strain (e.g., drug use), retaliate against the strain (e.g., violence), or generate revenue to overcome the strain (e.g., property crime)” (Higgins, 2011, p. 1275)
This Florida State shooting is a perfect example of this theory seeing as all three of these categories are present in Myron Mays life. The first category, which is failure to achieve positively valued goals, is present because May was recently struggling financially and he was about to file for bankruptcy. Bankruptcy, itself, means that May failed to achieve economic status thus leading to a somewhat denial of power seeing as the suspect did not have the means to support his freedom. This is what led to another category which is removal of positively valued stimuli.
Since May was filing Bankruptcy, he was no longer able to afford the life he was living which is the reason as to why he had to move from Las Cruces, NM back to where he was originally from which was Wewahitchka, FL. Not only did he have to move, but he also had to resign from his current job as an associate at a law firm. Both of these are known as removal of positively valued stimuli. Another thing to contribute to this removal of positively valued stimuli is that just a couple of weeks before moving, four of his relatives (two aunts, a cousin, and an uncle) passed away and his long-term girlfriend had broken up with him and filed a harassment complaint against May. The reason as to why these are all categorized as a removal of positively valued stimuli is because these are all positive things that he once had and all of a sudden he was losing them.
All of these events are what sent May back to where he started. His foster family that originally took him in and raised him from when he was 13 years old was kind enough to let him stay in one of their spare cabins until he was able to get his life back together again and rent his own place. The reason as to why he was raised by this foster family is what leads us to the third category. May was born to a poor family that neglected and abused him as a child, then he moved in with his grandmother, and from there he moved into the foster home. The third category that I am introducing is presentation of noxious stimulus. The noxious stimuli that was presented to May was the neglect and abuse that he unfortunately fell a victim to when he was a child.
Now when looking at Mays’ life and trying to compare it to the general strain theory it is important to remember that May was born a poor man to an abusive family.

Agnew believes that “individuals that who experience poor parenting are more likely than others to engage in crime, although not all individuals who experience poor parenting engage in crime…Poor parenting is more likely to lead to crime among irritable individuals, those low in self-control, and those in aversive social environments.” (Agnew, 2005, p. 110-111). May graduated from FSU with honors and got his BA in science. From there May moved on to Texas Tech University where he earned his degree in law. He seemed to have achieved his goal which was to be a lawyer and have a good life with a good girlfriend. However, this didn’t stick and he ended up right where he began, a poor and abused person. This is where Agnew says the coping mechanism comes into

effect.
There are many ways that May could have reacted to this change in his life. For instance, May could have accepted the bad luck that he had and moved back to his hometown. Once he moved back, he could have went back and taken his bar exam to practice law in Florida and then open up his practice. He may have lost four of his family members, a girlfriend, and a job he had worked so hard to earn, but he still never lost the degree that he earned which in a way is a goal, but to too many people the main goal is economic wealth such as obtaining lots of money. If only he had stuck to the plan of practicing law in Florida then he would have been able to reach that goal.
May cognitively responded to his bankruptcy with accepting responsibility and moving back home. May also responded emotionally to this stress through trying to invest his time in god where he was shown putting up a verse of the bible a day on Facebook. However, these two coping mechanisms did not help and his behavioral coping mechanism stepped in. Myron May became severely depressed and started to become delusional by believing that the government was spying on him. May also became disappointed at himself for letting it get so far as to lose all that he had accomplished, he felt fear from being spied on, and frustrated at the fact that he kind of had to start all over again. The only thing left that seemed like a rational final conclusion to end this crisis of strain and frustration was to terminate the source and seek revenge from those responsible for his lost stimuli. May had to go bankrupt due to his student loans and living arrangements, however he put the blame primarily on his student loans and sought revenge from FSU where he took out the student loan for his bachelor’s degree. Not only did he decide to seek revenge by FSU but the three victims he chose to shoot were all male which shows that he may have blamed the male figure and thought that by trying to end their lives he was in the long run terminating the male who may have put him in this particular state of mind.
Finally, as mentioned before, it seems as if May had experienced all types of negative emotions which is exactly what Agnew argued that an individual would do when experiencing strain. One thing that was not mentioned earlier was that May actually told the cops on a separate occasion that he believed there were cameras in his apartment (this was when he was still in New Mexico) which should have been a sign to the police that he was experiencing strain. His girlfriend even filed a complaint because she believed he had a psychotic breakdown. According to Agnew, “the best way to control crime is to address the direct cause…that is reduce irritability...” (Agnew, 2005, p. 196)