This weekend’s mass shootings come as the country mourns the victims of its deadliest mass shooting this year. Days earlier, 18 people were killed in a shooting in Lewiston, Maine.
Guns, of course. But let’s don’t say to make them illegal or americans get mads telling you isn’t about weapons and everything can be a weapon. Well then try do a mass shootings with an hammer, a knife or a rock.
I didn’t know the onion did this.
They’ve been publishing almost the same article for something like a decade.
everything can be a weapon.
Those people are so annoying.
I usually ask them why we don’t replace the military and police’s guns with spoons. Save a lot of money. You can also kill people with a spoon.
I think there is a kind of obsession with violence and needs to feeling powerful. Really weapons should not exist at all, even the nuclears one. Wars make no sense as killing or wishing the dead of someone. In Europe even police don’t go around easly with guns, it is common sense.
Unfortunately, it largely boils down to “you first” type arguments. Countries won’t remove their nuclear weapons until everyone else does, and the same is true for military weapons and whatnot. As long as weapons exist, they’ll be needed as a deterrent to others who have weapons.
But I absolutely agree that we need to change our relationship with guns. Here are some actionable steps:
- split police forces into weaponized and non-weaponized officers; have the officers w/o weapons clearly marked on their uniforms; would mostly apply to traffic cops initially, who would also be dispatched for any low-risk call; they can still perform arrests, just aren’t authorized to use lethal force
- require regular inspections of secure storage of firearms; have the police, local national guard, or any authorized gun seller perform the checks; this wouldn’t require registration of all firearms with the state, just regular inspection, with stiff penalties if you’re caught not having an inspection done (and smaller penalties if you fail and don’t fix the issue in time)
Both are compatible with the Constitution AFAIK, and I think the first could reduce how many officers get shot in traffic-related interactions because they no longer present a lethal threat.
Yep, guns are a scary jump in easy ways to kill people.
I hardly believe in usa sometimes, thinking about common people who goes around with guns. Why? Why any should have an easy way to kill someone else? It does not make any sense.
Because when guns were a little harder to come by, and to kill people with, a bunch of rich white guys managed to start a new country. Quickly, they added the Bill of Rights to our constitution with the 2nd amendment that says i have the basic right to own a gun.
But its actual meaning has been debated ever for decades.
Think of it another way, why should I be restricted in my options to defend myself? I can understand if I have committed some crime or am otherwise a danger to society, but if someone comes at me with a knife or a gun, do I just have to accept that? The police aren’t going to protect me when seconds count.
I personally don’t own guns because I think the risk of my kids finding them and hurting themselves or others is too high, and the risk of someone attacking me or my family is really low (crime rates in my area are really low).
There are lots of cases where individuals have successfully defended themselves using firearms, so I don’t think they should be outlawed. Instead, I propose a few changes:
- split police force to have an unarmed group that mostly handles traffic violations and low-risk calls
- require proof of secure storage for all weapons, which can be done by police, national guard, or registered gun sellers; this is not gun registration, just verification of secure storage (fines for failure to maintain proof would be high, fines for failing a check would be much lower and could be waived if you pass a follow-up)
- require registration of any weapons capable of mass murder, with increasing restrictions directly related to the public danger the weapon presents (i.e. more secure storage)
- third-party sales must be performed in the presence of a police officer, national guard official, or registered gun seller (to ensure buyer is allowed to own said firearm), and the fee for this would be fixed (say, $20 per transaction)
I believe the first two have no Constitutional issues, and the last two should be compatible with the 2nd amendment, but it could depend on implementation.
I’ll just leave this here for anyone who’s like, it’s those high crime cities, etc etc and denies that guns are the problem. Other western countries are horrified by the US’s stance towards guns and don’t have to deal with this, because, and stay with me here, they have less guns, and guns kill people really quickly and easily compared to other weapons. There ya go.
Gun deaths aren’t as interesting here since it includes suicide. Sure, no access to guns makes suicide harder (and probably less likely), but the causes there aren’t related at all to mass shootings.
I prefer to track gun crime (and other violent crime) separately, such as:
- suicides
- homicides (individually targeted victims)
- mass shootings (untargeted victims)
- gang-related
- hate crimes (victims targeted by group affiliation)
The causes behind each are often wildly different, and the solutions should also vary. In some cases, taking away guns is part of the solution, but in others, individuals will use other tools.
Why isn’t the huge amount of gun suicide not interesting to you? They are victims of guns as much as anyone else. For most, suicidal ideation is a temporary state they recover from, and later regret attempting if they survive. Success rate with gun suicide is way higher than other methods, turning this generally temporary psychosis into permanent and untreatable death.
And what is this other killing tool that’s just as effective and easily accessible as a gun?
Of course easy access to guns isn’t the only problem. But I would argue it’s far and away the largest for most of these issues, and explains the massive divide you see between the United States and other countries that are otherwise quite similar. There’s no real solution to these things without reducing the amount and access to firearms.
Homicide specific chart showing the immense gap:
Source: Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (Global Burden of Disease 2019), Small Arms Survey (Civilian Firearm Holdings 2017)
It is interesting, it’s just interesting separately from other gun-related issues because the causes are quite different.
For example, simply requiring guns be securely stored (with annual checks by police or gun sellers) could drastically change suicide numbers because it would make guns less easily accessible. But that’s probably less effective in resolving issues with homicides, since those are often planned further in advance. Likewise, red flag laws are probably more effective with suicidal people or those who are likely to commit mass shootings (both tend to have more obvious mental health issues), whereas they’re probably less effective with homicidal people since those who would report them would be worried about retaliation (i.e. they’re probably already domestic violence victims).
So that’s why I think they should be tracked separately. Some policies could impact all, but most would probably only impact one or two metrics.
And what is this other killing tool that’s just as effective and easily accessible as a gun?
That really depends on the type of crime. For hate crimes and other forms of mass murder, cars are apparently relatively common. For homicides, knives are readily accessible and effective. For suicide, perhaps car exhaust? Self-hanging is also pretty common (my friend used a belt when he killed himself). Idk, I try to avoid thinking about such things.
They have some of their own unique individual contributors as well sure, but easy access to firearms is a contributor they all share. Better gun control would help some of these things in different amounts.
For the issue of suicide, there is extensive research on how the access to firearms in particular is a problem.
https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMsa1916744
I’m not saying it would prevent every suicide, but reducing access to guns would prevent many of them.
Too often when gun controls are discussed no matter what specific problem, people just say, “well this regulation wouldn’t have prevented this particular shooting so it’s useless and we shouldn’t even try any regulations.” Gun controls don’t have to prevent all gun problems to still have a big benefit and save many lives. We shouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good when it comes to solutions to these problems that America’s gun culture have made so much worse than they need to be.
Sure. My point is that lumping everything together doesn’t really tell anything interesting about gun violence/crime, it just says there’s a lot of gun-related deaths. It’s not really actionable.
We should be looking at groups of gun-related violence/crime and come up with solutions that target each one.
It’s absolutely actionable! With gun control. All these other countries have these problems too, but they’re way less of a problem without so many guns. There’s no such thing as a solution to gun violence that doesn’t address guns.
Right, but it’s how you address guns that’s interesting, especially when taking into account the 2nd amendment.
Damn, those bears in Alaska must have yoked bear arms.
But seriously, looks like Hawai’i and Massachusetts need to tutor the rest of the class.
Also this data is starting to turn green and grow mold. I’d be interested in what this landscape looks like now that it’s a decade later.
You can go back further than 20 years to gather thoughts and prayers. I think you need at least 100 years worth for something to start happening.
Between Friday and Sunday, 12 mass shootings took place,
that’s gotta be a fucking record, right?
I don’t think i want to know.
After some quick googling I think fourth of July weekend 2021 might be the record holder.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/shootings-gun-violence-180-people-killed-4th-july-weekend/
Mass shootings got the “covid bump” – people making up for lost time shooting each other bc they had to quarantine etc
It seems that COVID-19 had a significant impact on this, and this article has an interesting infographic that shows a distinct change starting in 2020.
This is just correlation, but I am interested if anyone has any better resources. My theory is that it’s a mixture of frustration w/ the government and some kind of long-COVID effects combining to push people on the edge into action. I’m also interested to know if there’s any change in apparent motive.
One thing the first study points out is that we’re not seeing an increase in urban cities, it’s mostly in smaller towns. Gun ownership rates also increased, but if it was just gun sales causing it, I’d expect incidents in cities to also increase.
This is the best summary I could come up with:
In Texarkana, Texas, three people were killed and three others were injured in a shooting at a party in the back room of a business a little after 9 p.m. on Saturday, police said.
At some point during this fight, at least two men there pulled out rifles and started shooting," read a statement from the Texarkana Texas Police Department posted to social media on Sunday morning.
Officers said they heard gunshots and saw a large crowd dispersing from the area, according to a statement issued by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department on Sunday morning.
The shooting was the result of an isolated dispute between two people that escalated into violence, Tampa Police Chief Lee Bercaw said during a Sunday afternoon news conference.
Police said at least 15 people were injured — two of them critically — in a shooting in the North Lawndale neighborhood on Chicago’s West Side early Sunday morning.
Chicago Police officers responding to the scene saw a man open fire at the site of a gathering just after 1 a.m., according to a news release from the department.
The original article contains 722 words, the summary contains 182 words. Saved 75%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
Not a good summary. Each paragraph is a different location. Not the bot’s fault, just the wrong application
This isn’t new, it’s gang and drug violence. Stop calling it mass shootings…
Americans so numb to mass shootings they think four people being injured or killed by guns in the same incident shouldn’t count as a “mass shooting.” Sane people reading this are horrified though.
America’s horrible relationship to guns isn’t new though I’ll give you that.
It’s about being honest in reporting. People involved in selling heroin on the corner getting shot is fundamentally different than people in a church/school/bar/mall getting shot.
It would be like calling every car accident involving more than one pedestrian or more than 2 cars, a mass ramming incident. There’s not an epidemic of people using cars to kill a bunch of people, but there’s enough drunk drivers and people texting to make it look that way if you try.
What’s with the obsession with “mass shootings?”
People don’t like getting shot I think. And this doesn’t happen in other developed countries to nearly this extent so it’s clearly preventable. I agree though, we should also be concerned with the overwhelming amount of gun violence that doesn’t involve four or more people too.
So people don’t count if they’re in a gang or do drugs? Mass shooting is the correct term if the shooter is “actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area. Implicit in this definition is the shooter’s use of a firearm.”
