Parental alienation often occurs in acrimonious divorces and BS's parents clearly had one hell of an acrimonious divorce. Of course, neither parent ever should disparage or bad mouth the other to the children involved; nor should they use said children or child as a messenger to the other. Unfortunately, this happens all too frequently. The "child" is the monkey in the middle and often is destroyed in the blame game process between the warring parents
As AS has been more than willing to blame his ex, BS's mother ("the Hex" as he fondly describes her in his get-rich-quick intended self-published 132 page book) for almost all of BS's problems, his actions, omissions, his tragic life and death, we know full-well that he was into the very destructive parental alienation game. While BS's mother has remained very quiet in her brief media communications, in my very humble opinion, she had to be playing her own part in the same destructive process. Am I allowed to say this? I can only point to the ongoing restraining orders, criminal charges etc. in support of this premise.
Lousy and horrible spouses can still be loving and supportive parents and no "child" should ever be urged or compelled to take sides against either parent. No, I am not a divorce or family law lawyer but I do speak the truth. One should never use a child of the unhappy marriage as a weapon or a foot soldier against the other parent.
AS is very vocal and loves pat phases such as one of his latest "failure to thrive" so blame Mommy, children's services, the social services, the RCMP, who ever provided the "boys" with "real firearms" and wheels etc. but do not blame me.
Sorry, all guys and girls on this website I have read with great interest and respect for all of your opinions and insights), I feel that some self retrospection and admission of responsibility or partial responsibility is required from the suspects' families. Thank you.
I do think that he had some good points in his interview which I talked about, such as:
*tons of signs were overlooked for years by many people
*Bryer was in the near-exclusive custody of his mom and grandma since age 5, and according to their own accounts, they never noticed any signs of him being troubled, which means he likely never got mental health treatment either (in fact I doubt he did since he was planning to join the army and he couldn't if he had a diagnosis of depression or something like that)
*he likely thinks the school could have done more to stop the bullying and make sure Bryer had the necessary resources to graduate
*Bryer's interest in militias and totalitarian regimes probably came more from his feelings of weakness and insecurity due to being bullied and having an unstable upbringing, than anything else (which I've been saying the entire time)
*it really was not great for the store selling Nazi memorabilia to be a block and a half away from the alternative school where troubled teenagers attended
*I think his gun comments are basically saying -- Bryer was clearly troubled and suicidal, even to the point of posting implicit suicide threats involving guns on social media, and is pretty much the poster child for someone who shouldn't have had access to firearms
But, I also do think -- and I've said this many, many times before -- that Alan himself also contributed to the situation that led to Bryer's mental state getting that bad. There are obvious, direct parallels between him getting arrested for -- according to his own account -- making Bryer's mom fear for her life, and Bryer just a few years later talking about killing his classmates (whether that was a joke, threat, or something in between). And the timing of the book vs. when the trip happened, seems like it would be a huge coincidence.
Now Alan supposedly has been diagnosed with a delusional disorder -- according to his own account -- so that raises the question of how much awareness or capacity he has about all this. I don't think he intended to hurt Bryer. But the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
We can't know how he was. We can't even know if he talked about that book to Bryer.
But I don't think he was constantly rambling, dissing his ex and explaning himself as he does in the interviews. The drama and grief make him act like that.
I think he had normal discussions with Bryer, too happy to finally have his son with him. I don't think that Bryer would have so much of a relation with him if he did. JMO obviously. I have no proof.
My impression is that Bryer had a pattern of bailing on any situation that made him uncomfortable. And his dad lived 2.5 hours away. If he didn't want to talk to him, he wouldn't have, or would have limited contact. According to his dad they talked almost every day, which seems pretty frequent to me for a teenager and a parent they don't live with -- I certainly didn't talk to my parents anywhere near that much when I was away at college. Either Bryer wasn't bothered by those discussions or -- more likely IMO -- it wasn't a frequent topic of discussion at the time.