By John Lawrence
We live in a sick society where little kids play violent video games, you can’t flip through the channels on a TV without seeing drawn handguns, and hunters use automatic weapons to kill innocent animals. It’s a culture of violence in movies and TV, a culture of violence in video games and a culture of violence in terms of unending wars and people blown to smithereens every night on the nightly news.
It was disheartening to me to see a few days after the horrific mass murder at Umpqua Community College, pro gun demonstrators protesting the American President as he landed there to give comfort to the families who had lost loved ones. Where were the anti gun protesters? Where were the ones who protested the taking of innocent lives by sick minds who are bolstered every day of their lives by a sick culture, a culture which glorifies and celebrates gun violence. It’s ubiquitous. It’s celebrated and it’s done in order to make money from “entertainment.”
That’s right. We’re entertained by people killing each other with guns. Is there an action movie in which there are no guns? I don’t think so. How many video games don’t involve the player or shooter not pulling a trigger. We train them up young with hand/eye coordination. Then we send them to schools in which there is no recess so that their energy and anger builds to the point that they feel justified in blowing people away for no justifiable reason.
Let’s face it folks. We’re more in danger from Americans with sick minds blowing children away than we are from terrorists. Yet we spend hundreds of billions of dollars a year defending ourselves from terrorists and hardly anything defending ourselves from ourselves. As Pogo said, “We have met the enemy and the enemy is us.”
Why wasn’t the FBI monitoring websites for the “involuntarily celibate”? These are the websites that Elliot Roger and Christopher Harper-Mercer telegraphed their intentions on. Why wasn’t the FBI tracking them? And why are violent young men, who willingly state online their murderous intentions, allowed to purchase guns regardless of the fact that they’ve never before been convicted of a crime?
In a recent post on Love-shy.com, a forum for the dateless and sexless, a man wrote, “I am seriously thinking about just getting a gun and shooting everything up. I fantasize about it everyday … that’s how fucked up my mind is.” The truly “fucked up” thing is that this isn’t another newly discovered online posting from Elliot Rodger, the 22-year-old who went on a shooting rampage in Isla Vista, killing six people. These are just the words of yet another angry man on the internet expressing rage at society — especially women — over his own celibacy.
President Obama should have had a hundred anti-gun demonstrators waiting for him when he got off that helicopter in Roseburg. Instead he was met by a bunch of yahoos who all they can think about is their freakin guns. These people are a bunch of angry a-holes who have nothing better to do than to be worried about their guns right after 10 people from their own community, Roseburg, have just been rubbed out, their young lives lost forever, in a hail of bullets. Their answer is to arm everyone?
Preachers in pulpits are now carrying guns. Principals in schools are now carrying guns. Anger and guns. They now characterize American society. Oregon is one of seven states with provisions, either from state legislation or court rulings, that allow the carrying of concealed weapons on public postsecondary campuses. How friggin convenient for Harper-Mercer!
Do I have to detail all the tragedies perpetrated by sick individuals who not only had possession of but were even encouraged by their parents to possess guns? There was Adam Lanza at Sandy Hook who fatally shot 20 children and 6 adult staff members. Surely he was affected by a culture of violence which makes it seem “routine” to off people. President Obama has said that mass killing of Americans by Americans has become routine. “Somehow this has become routine. The reporting is routine. My response here at this podium ends up being routine, the conversation in the aftermath of it … We have become numb to this,” he complained. During his presidency, President Barack Obama has had to deliver statements on gun violence 15 times.
No longer can we “wonder at the gunman’s motives” or think this is a”rare occurence.” It’s routine, folks; it’s happening every day. Get ready for the next one. Your children could be next. In fact it already happened just 8 days after the shootings in Roseburg. Gunmen opened fire on campuses in Texas and Arizona. Copycats? Perhaps. Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold got the ball rolling at Columbine. They paved the way for the others. That’s their legacy. They were first.
The others: Dylan Roof, who killed 9 people at a black church in Charleston, SC; Elliot Rodger, who killed 6 people in Isla Vista, CA; Aaron Alexis, a Navy contractor and former Navy enlisted man, who killed 12 people in Washington, DC; John Zawahri, who killed 5 people in Santa Monica, CA; Radcliffe Haughton, a 45-year-old former Marine, who killed 3 people in Brookfield, WI; Wade Michael Page, an Army veteran, who killed 6 people at a Sikh Temple in Oak Creek, WI; James Holmes, who killed 12 people and injured 58 others in Aurora, CO; One L. Goh, who killed 7 in Oakland, CA; Scott Dekraai, who killed 8 in Seal Beach, CA; Jared Lee Loughner, who killed 6 in Tucson, AZ including the attempted killing of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords; Omar S. Thornton, who killed 8 in Manchester, CT; Amy Bishop, a neurobiologist and assistant professor at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, who killed 3; Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, an Army psychiatrist, who killed 13 and injured 32 at Fort Hood, TX; Jiverly Voong, who killed 13 in Binghamton, NY; Steven Kazmierczak, who killed 5 in a geology class at Northern Illinois University in Dekalb, IL; Robert Hawkins,who killed 8 at a shopping center in Omaha, NE; Seung-hui Cho ,who killed 32 on the Virginia Tech campus; Sulejman Talovic, who killed 5 at a Salt Lake City shopping mall …. And the list goes on.
A rather long sentence, isn’t it, the preceding? Many of the perpetrators were students, many were former Marines or Army vets.
They all had grudges; they all had violent uncontrollable anger. They all had access to guns. They all purchased their guns legally. They all had Intermittent Explosive Disorder.
According to Wikipedia: “Intermittent explosive disorder (sometimes abbreviated as IED [what an apt acronym!]) is a behavioral disorder characterized by explosive outbursts of anger, often to the point of rage, that are disproportionate to the situation at hand…” There is no need to probe these people’s minds any further, to ask ad nauseum “what was the gunman’s motive.” They were all sick and they all had legally purchased arsenals at their disposal. They all planned their killing sprees. Most of them telegraphed their intentions on social media. Some were even cheered on.
Can we learn nothing from other countries which have strict gun control and far fewer gun deaths than the US? Why is there even a debate as to whether more guns or less guns is the solution?
Does the FBI even read the Washington Post, which had a really informative article: “Incels, 4chan and the Beta Uprising: making sense of one of the Internet’s most-reviled subcultures”? Incels are INvoluntarily CELibateS by the way. Maybe society should just get them all girlfriends or sex workers. It might just solve a lot of problems.
The following is from the website, dailymail.com in the UK:
Chris Harper-Mercer wrote the anonymous message on bulletin board 4chan: ‘Don’t go to school tomorrow if you are in the northwest’ 9 hours before the killing began. It was written at 1.19 AM yesterday morning and the first shots were fired at Umpqua Community College at 10.38 AM.
Under the disturbing message, many users encouraged the person to go ahead with their threat and even advised the poster on the best ways to kill people. One user wrote: ‘I suggest you enter a classroom and tell people that you will take them as hostages. Make everyone get in one corner and then open fire.
‘Make sure that there is no way that someone can disarm you as it is possible. I suggest you carry a knife on your belt as last resort if someone is holding your gun.’ While another user wrote: ‘You might want to target a girls school which is safer because there are no beta males throwing themselves for their rescue. ‘Do not use a shotgun. I would suggest a powerful assault rifle and a pistol or 2x pistols. Possibly the type of pistols who have 15+ ammo.’ ‘If you are suicidal and hate people, then do it. If not then stay away from what will ruin your life,’ another user wrote.
A user wrote: ‘In this very clearly hypothetical situation you actually shoot people in your high school or college, try to aim for s***** people at least. Spare the kind fools, humdrum druggies, and churchies and go for he whom really terrorises the populous: Chads and Stacies who have scorned many and yourself. The post continued: ‘You’ll do the world a favour by purging part of the population that only exists to consume resources and act for themselves.’ In 2013, 18-year-old student Neil Allan Macinnis shot dead two women at a Virginia college – before the killing he posted on 4chan asking users to ‘wish him luck.’
Some of the posters on the site even tried to contact the FBI tip line. Evidently, they were asleep at the switch. I guess they’re only interested in foreign terrorists, not domestic ones. They better wake up that this is a phenomenon that is not going away. Prevention is the only alternative at this point in a nation that is locked and loaded and ready to pull the trigger over the slightest grievance especially at schools and on campuses.
How many remember San Diego’s own mass shooting on campus in 1996? Next year will be the twentieth anniversary of the killing that took the lives of three San Diego State professors.
Wikipedia sums it up nicely:
The San Diego State University shooting was a school shooting that occurred at the San Diego State University (SDSU) engineering building on August 15, 1996 in San Diego, CA. Three professors were killed by master’s degree student Frederick Martin Davidson. Three months later, a copycat threat flier was sent, with threats against professors and racial insults.
Davidson, the three faculty members, and three other engineering students assembled in the classroom shortly before 2:00 p.m. The three students were there to support Davidson, and to witness a Master’s thesis defense. Liang stood, formally introduced Davidson, stated the purpose of the meeting, and sat back down. Davidson then handed Liang a printout of an e-mail, from a prospective employer who was interested in hiring Davidson, that stated that his future employment with the company hinged on a successful Master’s thesis defense.
Without time for comment from Liang, and without saying anything himself, Davidson turned to the first aid box on the wall, removed a 9 mm handgun, and immediately started firing. He hit Liang first, killing him while he was still seated at the faculty table. Lowrey and Lyrintzis were also hit. However, Lowrey tried to escape out the only main access door to the room. There were other doors in the room, but only one door led out to the hallway, and other parts of the third floor of the Engineering building.
Davidson was between the main door and the faculty table, and shot Lowrey several times; he died on the floor in the main doorway. Lyrintzis fled from the main door and Davidson, into an adjoining classroom, and hid under a table. After killing Lowrey, Davidson reloaded another magazine into the handgun, and pursued Lyrintzis into the other room. There, he shot and killed Lyrintzis while the latter was still under the desk. Overall, Davidson fired 23 rounds, with 16 rounds hitting the professors.
The three students attending the thesis defense were not shot, and escaped without injury. One of the students made it out through the main doorway, and notified the third-floor students and faculty to evacuate. Davidson later commented that he was not angry at the students, and had no intention of killing them.
After the shooting, Davidson himself called 911. Police arrived to find Davidson in the third-floor hallway still holding the handgun. He was reportedly sobbing and begging for police to kill him. He soon surrendered to police without further incident. Davidson had intended to kill himself after the shootings, but could not due to “pure cowardice”. Davidson had left a murder-suicide note in the hallway for the police to find, detailing the location of evidence and computer files in his house.
Guns and angry people. To say they have no impulse control would be an erroneous statement. They had to purchase guns in the first place, laying the groundwork for future misdeeds. They had to work up a head of steam about some real or perceived mistreatment or grievance, and, finally, they had to load up the guns and take them to the killing field. At any point in time along the way, they could have turned back. They not only had a preconceived plan; they probably fantasized about it for months.
Many Americans are so obsessed with the Second Amendment that they can’t even imagine that other societies might be doing things differently with much better outcomes. See A Cultural Comparison: Gun Violence in the US and Europe in 3 parts by Frank Thomas and myself for alternatives to the violence and gun-ridden society of Amerika and for some alternatives that actually work, that is if we can give up our love affair with guns.
John Lawrence
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Tragedy as it was, Where was campus security? Does anyone in their right mind think a NO GUN ZONE placard actually does anything but disarm the law abiding citizen. To make such a politically correct presumption as to remove ones constitutional guarantee in a commercial environment, it was a commercial venture of education however wrapped in sanctity, is to assume responsibility as the attractive nuisance, i.e. private swimming pool.
The ‘O’ attitude and interesting detail little publicized is that the man was a first generation immigrant from England. The Kerry/ ‘O’ team have already made public notification of saintly open arms to ‘Syrian refugees’ among whom blind-eyed infiltration of extremists.
Too many walk around with such open minds to such a degree as to allow their brains to fall out.
It’s scary. As I mentioned over a year ago in another article here about guns I have several female neighbors who went out an purchased handguns in the wake of sexual assault increases in North Park. A couple of them were themselves actually assaulted so their fear is certainly justified, but their attitude is a bit on the disturbing side. They carry the guns when shopping, going to a restaurant and even to the bar. They are fully aware that after several drinks they may make a wrong decision and they simply don’t care about the possibility of hurting or killing an innocent person. One (who is also a former Marine) just said “collateral damage”. We’ll see how that pans out if something does actually go down and they are faced with prison time. Also my wife and I reminded them that even if they successfully fend off an attacker, if they do so under the influence of alcohol that in and of itself is a crime. Personally, I am not in favor of an all out gun ban but I do think we need reasonable controls and people who own them need to be a bit wiser about when and where to carry them (like bars).
Hunters should be able to own hunting rifles, but they and the rifles need to be registered, and they shouldn’t be automatic to give the animals somewhat of a fair chance.
I thought they did already. If not then that needs to change. And yes I agree about the automatics.
Hunting guns are not automatic. Some are “semi-automatic”, which still requires one trigger pull per shot. Hunters typically have great control, imtimate understanding of their arms and an ethical approach to hunting.
What is ethical about killing for fun.
An important article. I’d like to add that at least gun culture has “hit home” in America with these suicide-shooting terrorists.
We might want to remember that the U.S. is the largest arms supplier to the world. We’ve been creating this kind of violence abroad for decades.
Maybe it’s time to start taking a hard look at the companies who manufacture weapons. Maybe we need to be scrutinizing their business models, (and everything that goes on at these companies) in the same way we have taken a look at oil companies, tobacco companies and even the food industry.
John, the first to respond to your excellent article is so incoherent we can’t address him. He is the one who owns the gun, no doubt. I’m afraid that the gun is now “the equaliser” for people whose swollen self-images are way out of proportion to their abilities. What’s so scary is, as more and more people slip into poverty and anonymity the gun may become their perceived means of “evenning the score.” Common sense, like this line from the article — “To say they have no impulse control would be an erroneous statement. They had to purchase guns in the first place, laying the groundwork for future misdeeds” — can only appeal to the thoughtful and, I hope, the lawyers and politicians and law enforcement. So far, we’ve even seen these people shrink back from their responsibilities. It’s beyond sad. It borders on lunacy on a mass scale.
Thanks for the comment, Barbara. We need to remember that the US is one of the larger, if not the largest, supplier of guns to Al Quaeda. Most of the armaments we supplied to Libya and elsewhere ended up in their hands.
And for goodness sake, stop telling us all that the 2nd Amendment protects individual rights to own guns. It’s simply untrue as well as a gross and upsetting misunderstanding of our Constitution… but I won’t say more here, because it’s like trying to have a reasonable debate with someone who is quoting the Bible, making all sorts of claims based on what they are reading, but they don’t even know which language the Bible was originally written in, the number of translations it has gone through to come to us, or its historical context.
In all fairness, we are not the only country that is entertained by violent movies involving gun violence. Not by a long shot. Plenty of people from other countries (including European countries) enjoy American action movies, not to mention the fact they extremely violent movies of their own. Perhaps most people in those countries have a better sense of separating reality from entertainment? Same with violent video games.
Off topic a bit as this has nothing to do with guns, but Italy has what is possibly the most violent sport on the planet (that doesn’t involve killing animals). And this is not even considered low brow over there:
I guess your rationale is that the rest of the world sucks as much as we do so we’re not so bad after all. Sweden had a censorship board that until recently cut out violent scenes from any movie shown in Sweden. But they did away with it on the grounds that people could watch any movie they wanted to in their homes.
I’m not rationalizing anything, just pointing out a fact. If Sweden really did something like what you described don’t’ you think that’s taking things too far? Anyway my point was that people in other countries are perhaps better at separating fantasy/entertainment from real world actions.
No, I don’t think so. From 1911 to 2011, while the US was censoring sex in movies, Sweden was censoring violence. However, if you wanted to see the scenes that were cut, you could make an appointment and go see them. So the censorship wasn’t absolute; they merely made it more difficult to view violent scenes.
When Sweden eliminated the old censorship board, a new one was established which recommended different age limits for films. The age limits are 7, 11 or 15 years old.
Generally movies where people are killed or assaulted have 15 as the age limit, and movies with acts of sex (even if not shown in detail) have 11 as the age limit. This differs significantly from the practice in the United States of rating films with sex more harshly than films with violence.
Yes, an excellent and important article. I only wish you hadn’t used an entire extended paragraph to memorialize, by name and in bold type, those sick persons who perpetrated their mass murders.
Michael-Leonard, I think it’s important to keep those mass murders in mind so we don’t forget about all the harm they caused and it just fades away until the next mass murder brings it back fresh in our minds. Keeping it in historical perspective reminds us that we can look forward to the same thing happening again and again until enough of us get so fed up with the taking of innocent lives that we are determined on a mass basis to do something about it.
I understand and respect that view. You could have cited the incidents without actually naming them.
Oh, by the way you missed one — a local one, at that. San Diego’s “own” school shooter came way before Columbine’s. Remember Brenda Spencer?
I’ve often wondered if the persons who so adamantly oppose gun-control legislation are simply afraid they couldn’t pass close scrutiny. Personally, I do not think I would have any trouble obtaining a gun legally if I chose to carry. The only valid argument I have read is the one that states licensing is the first step to confiscation, and maybe that wouldn’t be all that terrible.
I am Dutch but have lived in Africa for a long time. One has only to read about the “canned” hunts to know that not all hunters are in control, know their arms and are responsible towards the environment. Since the majority of the “canned” hunters come from the USA this lack of responsibility does apply to American hunters. I hope that Mark refers to hunters who are still prepared to track animals and not to hunters who set up hides and go “Bang Bang”.
Having said that I do believe that everybody in principle should be able to own guns. But it should be controlled. There should not just be licensing; there should also be a requirement to be proficient in the use of these guns. And perhaps a medical. That is maybe one step too far!?
In a country like the USA it should really be easy to set up a system of gun control that registers every gun and that the owner is proficient in using that gun. And otherwise a person cannot buy a gun. Besides the owner should be able to demonstrate, say every 5 years, that he is still proficient and responsible.
Oh, John. I don’t know where to start! Your first sentence said it all for me.
On the TV news this morning, a Boston area high school kid was arrested for plotting to “shoot up the school” the next day, but they caught him. How many more kids are there out there plotting a Columbine-style episode that they haven’t caught yet? I quote from the local news station’s website: “Police said they received a report Monday that a 16-year-old student told another student that he was going to “shoot up the school” the following day. Police say they searched two homes connected to the student and found tactical gear as well as bullets. Police did not recover any guns. The suspect was taken to the hospital for a mental evaluation.”
Last year a 14-year old boy murdered his math teacher in school and left her body behind the school!
What? Yes, that’s right, a kid murders his teacher and another plans to shoot up his school. And then there are the constant reports of someone being arrested for indecent exposure or pedophilia or rape…
Meanwhile, my 27-year old daughter watches “Friends” re-runs and plays video games in which she constantly shoots the “enemy”, who dies over an over with an electronic grunt.
Does anyone think even for a second that this culture isn’t sick?
Paul, I got upset after I realized my 7 year old Grandson was playing violent video games involving a lot of killing and blood spurting. I spoke to his parents and I noticed last time I visited that they had removed the more violent games. Still a lot of shooting though.
Hi John,
My son is now 32 and the daughter I referred to earlier is 27. When he was young my son played with “Transformers” and Ninja Turtles. My daughter played Sims, which has taught her some tough lessons about life, by her own admission. Our kids went to a democratic school near here, our daughter transferring to public school after our son graduated from the democratic school.
I tell you this because (unless I am an ostrich with my head in the sand), both our kids seem pretty well balanced, despite our daughter’s current habits. Don’t understand why she is interested in these things.
Russia they sure start them off early: http://www.cyclelicio.us/2012/russia-bike-biathlon/
The biathlon is an Olympic event. This sport has its origins in an exercise for Norwegian people, as an alternative training for the military. It debuted in the Olympics in 1960 in Squaw Valley. The biathlete carries a small bore rifle, which weighs at least 7.7 lb. The rifles use .22 LR ammunition and are bolt action or Fortner (straight-pull bolt) action.
And your point is …?
I’m fully aware of the biathlon’s history. Actually I am surprised and relived that you don’t equate it with “gun culture”.
Biathlon as a sport mirrors hunting in the Norwegian winter; ski a bit, shoot an animal — for food. The rifle closely approximates a true hunting rifle.
There really isn’t a point to this. I was just curious to see if and how anyone would respond.
If there is a point, it’s just that not all people who shoot guns are right wing hardcore gun nuts. I personally do not own a firearm and have no intention to. When I was in the Navy there were bi-annual gun quals we had to do, which were nothing more than shooting a still target. I did enjoy doing that. I didn’t imagine I was shooting any living thing, just enjoying the challenge of getting a good score. And yes there was a certain thrill discharging the weapon.
Try darts.
I like darts also.
John,
I couldn’t agree more with you that the U.S. has become a structurally violent country so saturated with guns of all types and power, violent films and video games and the money that comes from it that we may well have reached a point of no return. Gun homicide levels (excluding terrorist acts) are illuminated in my paper, “Guns & Non-Gun Homicides in U.S. and Europe,” published Jan. 2013 by Will Blog For Food.
In 2010, Switzerland, England, Canada, and Norway had 46, 6, 31, 31 guns per 100 people, respectively, versus 89 for U.S. Despite this, gun homicides in Switzerland, England, Canada, and Norway were 16, 58, 173, 2 (although Norway had its first mass killing of 68 young people in 2011) respectively, versus 9,960 U.S. gun homicides. In 2010, EU-17 gun homicides (adjusted for population differences) were a TINY 884 or 11 times higher than America’s 9,960 gun homicides! In 2010, U.S. gun homicides comprised nearly 70% of total homicides versus 28% for EU-17 countries.
U.S. extreme levels of violent crime are due as much to intransigent social-cultural factors as to easy gun availability and an exceptionally high gun ownership levels. Since 1982, U.S. mass killings have reached 560, most of whom apparently have been killed by mentally disturbed people. The 560 number compares to far lower +-160 EU-17 mass killings since 1982 (including 2011 first-time mass killing by a very lucid young man of 68 boys and girls in Norway). The 160 number is low given fact the EU level of mental illness corresponds to that of the U.S. Yet the statistics for gun homicides (and suicides) are much higher in the U.S. than most of Europe.
Clearly, many confounding U.S. social and cultural factors, in addition to mental illness and multiple gun availability – including racism, violent films and video games, high robbery/assault crime sub-cultures, alcohol/drug abuse, self-destruction, income inequality, jealousy, anger, physical abuse, joblessness – are contributing root causes of high U.S. gun homicide rates and injuries … much more so in America than in Europe.
This means solving our violence dilemma lies in the social, cultural, psychological determinants of violence as much as it does in the widespread ownership of automatic pistols and rifles that release dozens of bullets in seconds. But, at the same time, one cannot deny that the multiple quasi-military semi-automatic guns easily available for civilian use have also become a major contributor to a culture of violence and fear in the U.S. As H. Rap Brown declared in the 1960s, “Violence is as American as apple pie.”
After many centuries of human killing, European countries have come to view guns as anathema. They do not see gun ownership as a constitutional right. One hears little of the facile NRA pro-gun arguments that “Gun controls disarm law-abiding citizens;” “It’s not guns that kill people,but people who kill people.” “If you outlaw certain guns, only outlaws will have those guns.” “Since there are so many guns, especially in the hands of criminal sub-cultures or the mentally unbalanced, we need more guns.” Like Trump just said, “Arm the the school officials and teachers; give them guns.”
This spurious propaganda feeds a self-fulfilling spiral towards the acquisition of more guns for self-defense. This in turn translates into allowing high gun cartridge capacities for semi-automatic firearms of all sorts to roll off producers’ production lines. This in turn opens up a murderous playing field for homicidal maniacs to go on indiscriminate but well-planned shooting sprees and element of surprise … killing innocent school children, adolescents, adults.
In recent years, this dynamic has led to a horrific increase in mass killings of young people in America:
U.S. MASS
GUN KILLINGS-1982-2015
………………………Total Gun Deaths….Deaths Per Ave.Year
1982-1991…………………….108………………10.8
1992-2001…………………….123………………12.3
2002-2011…………………….189………………18.9
2012-2015…………………….140………………35.0
TOTAL………………………..560………………16.5
Source: “More Guns, More Mass Shootings – Coincidence?” by Mark Follman, Published by Mother Jones, Dec. 15, 2012. (http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/09/mass-shootings-investigation)
In just the four years 2012-2015, America’s 35.0 average annual death rate from mass gun killings is nearly DOUBLE that of the 2002-2011 period … and TRIPLE that of the 1992-2011 and 1982-1991 periods! Something at work besides guns and many levels of criminality is determining America’s out-of-sight gun homicide rates and growing mass killings. If mental illness were the key root cause of the multiple gun homicide carnage, one would expect other countries to have a similar level of carnage. But they don’t.
Studies by the National Institute of Justice conclude that greater gun availability increases the rate of murder and felony gun use, but does not appear to affect the general U.S. violence level. In other words, the fact the U.S. is a violent society is not primarily due to guns. The fact that our violent crime is so DEADLY has much to do with guns.
As stated, mental illness is quite comparable across U.S. and Europe. Nevertheless, most EU countries – including Switzerland and Norway, two of the world’s most armed household nations and much less-armed other European countries – have low absolute levels of violent crime and gun homicides. In sharp contrast, England gas an exceptionally low gun ownership level AND also an exceptionally low gun homicide rate.
One researcher explains this dichotomy well: “The bottom line is one of social attitude. Populations with training in civic virtue though heavily armed like Switzerland or lightly armed like England and other EU countries generally do not experience massacres or high crime rates.” Gun controls in place are strictly enforced to limit the availability of firearms manufactured or obtained illegally. Strict selling, permit, and safety training regulations are constantly being improved. Result? England and Switzerland (rest of Europe and Canada) are among the safest, murder-free places to be although each has an entirely different approach to gun control and gun use.
To sum up: if the NRA continues to have the power to control and undermine federal, state, and local laws aimed at forbidding civilian semi-automatic high cartridge load guns of all sorts and laws aimed at implementing strict mental fitness checks and controls banning guns for the mentally disturbed, then our ‘frontier nation’ is doomed to continue having the highest gun homicide and mass killing rates in the world.
Thank you, Frank, for your cogent remarks. I think there is a typo though in the following sentence:
” In 2010, EU-17 gun homicides (adjusted for population differences) were a TINY 884 or 11 times higher than America’s 9,960 gun homicides!”
Don’t you mean “11 times lower”?
Typing Correction: 2nd paragraph next to last sentence … TINY 884 or 10 times less than …
The English Bill of Rights of 1689, which predates our Bill of Rights by 100 years, codified an ancient self-protection right with the words, … “Subjects who are Protestants may have arms for their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by the law.”
This gave birth to the English common law right to keep and bear arms for self-defense. But the vague wording is a far cry from the absolute wording of our 2nd Amendment: “A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed.”
Unlike America, the European individual and collective right to bear and keep arms is NOT entrenched in constitutional law. Our neighbor, Canada, also has no constitutional right to bear arms. The fundamental purposes of the U.S. 2nd Amendment have come to represent: (1) the individual right to protect oneself against other individuals and (2)the collective right to protect oneself against a tyrannical government. These 2nd Amendment protections are seen to be anachronistic by European standards for a number of reasons.
In Europe, having guns – except for hunting and shooting festivals and except for an extremely well-controlled Swiss assault weapons as a retired civilian-militia protection against invaders – is simply NOT built into the psyche of Europeans. In general, Europeans have little interest in nor do they see the necessity of owning guns as a defense against criminals or their governments.
The challenge for America is where to draw the line between the rightful normal gun means to defend oneself as opposed to the use of modern murderous weaponry and magazines. U.S. anti-gun regulation paranoia abounds in the thought that any restriction is the first step to the banning of guns. This possibility is outright ridiculous and far fetched as it would make citizens more unsafe against criminals who will never give up guns and mental misfits who should never have a gun.
Complete gun control in America is never going to happen under the 2nd Amendment. There are too many guns already in circulation – +300 million in a nation of redundant, overlapping gun statutes. Australia’s buy back of civilian guns some years ago would be impossible in the U.S. – a nation armed to its teeth with automatic big-cartridge weaponry purchasable almost at will by the teenager, the novice, the mentally and emotionally unstable, the criminal and non-criminal (e.g., crimes of passion)
We have created a climate of gun protection and resort to gun violence that is inherently cultural and self-perpetuating. And it is leap years worse and more ingrained than in Europe (Canada, Australia, northeast Asia) by any statistical measure.
YAHOOOOOOOO! Too many people here want to return this country to the “wild west”, a land where guns rule, for the rest of us to live in a non-violent society, seems to me. However, you reap what you sow. So, the gun lobby has made our bed (fostered this gun culture), now we have to sleep in it.
YAHOOOOOOO! Isn’t Amerika great?