I realize this is a divisive issue, but it’s clear that these horrific incidents are going to keep happening with shocking regularity. It seems we’ve all collectively shrugged our shoulders and accepted it as the reality going forward.
I realize this is a divisive issue, but it’s clear that these horrific incidents are going to keep happening with shocking regularity. It seems we’ve all collectively shrugged our shoulders and accepted it as the reality going forward.
No, you have both.
Mental health crisis + no private gun ownership = mass shootings exceptionally rare.
No mental health crisis + private gun ownership = mass shootings exceptionally rare.
Mental health crisis + lots of guns = mass shootings are common.
It’s both factors together that cause the problem. Now the question is, which factor is the easiest to change?
It’s closer to who has to change. The millions of gun owners, or the thousand families at the top of the economy (cause every therapy session boils down to “you need more money”)
Its not about what’s easiest, its what is needed to make people stop wanting to harm others. A gun is a tool. You can easily make a bomb from supplies from a hardware store if you don’t have access to a firearm
There is a huge difference though.
It’s the same reason why people start flame wars on the internet: it can be done quickly. People used to start arguments over the mail too, but they were much rarer because by the time you’ve written a letter and walked to the mailbox your temper has cooled down and you decide not to do it.
Guns make it really easy to do harm in the heat of the moment. You can flip and immediately go on a rampage. If you have to go to the hardware store, buy shit, drive back home, assemble the bomb, etc. you have plenty of time to think it over and cool down.
This is the very reason there is a waiting period when buying a gun in some states.
Except most mass shooters plan for months and write whole ass manifestos. These aren’t “oh no the grocer is out of oreos and I really wanted them” situations, these psychos put serious thought and time into this shit.
Waiting periods are for “crimes of passion,” yes, but mass shootings ain’t that, they’re two different facets of gun crime.
A comment above cited that there’s been ~545 mass shootings so far this years.
Do you have a source for your claim that most of those were planned for months and had accompanying manifestos?
I’m not going to dig through all of them (especially since that number includes gang violence, which is a lifestyle choice, and falls outside the scope of what most rational people would call “mass casualty events” or “active shooters” etc,) but yeah th Nashville shooter had one, the grocery store shooter had one (buffalo iirc,) columbine, parkland iirc, the list goes on. They plan them for a long time. Same with McVeigh, Kaczynski, the Nashville bombing guy, the guy who shot up the republican baseball game, these people don’t typically “just snap,” it has been brewing for months and they’ve been planning.
The “just snapping” thing has historically been associated with family annhialators (as rare as they are) if any mass killers, usually just “single murderers” who kill the spouse, but even then if no gun is present they’ll “just snap” and kill their family in another way a la Chris Benoit. Guns don’t have to “make it easier” when you can drug people you’re more physically fit than anyway, tie em up, choke them with cords. If my ex wanted to kill me for instance all she’d have had to do is stab me in my sleep, seeing as we slept in the same room and all.
If access to guns is not a major factor and these people would just go out and make their own IEDs or whatever, why doesn’t that happen outside the US at anything even close to the same rate mass shooting happen in the US?
Do you think that US is the only country in the world where people have mental health issues?
Well, let’s think critically for a second, could there be any other differences at all, like cultural differences or access to health services?
Furthermore, did any of those countries have 600,000,000 guns im 50% of the country’s hands with no registry to say where they are and a culture of complete unwillingness to give them up, and trillions of rounds of ammo, actually more than most country’s police and mil combined, before their attempted bans? It just won’t work here.
Yeah, you covered it below
Which is why
Not that it can’t, but it won’t. Because the general population of the completely unwilling to do anything at all about it.
Hence the meme. It’s a uniquely American thing to be that selfish.
So, should we continue arguing for what “won’t work,” and bicker in perpetuity, or should we maybe attempt to focus on the root causes of violence that actually could make a meaningful impact, at least first?
So what’s the fix for this “root cause”, and how is it easier to achieve than some basic firearm restrictions?