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Has the rate of random mass shootings in the United States increased?
Over the past 30 years, the answer is definitely yes. It is also true
that the total U.S. homicide rate has fallen by over half since 1980,
and the gun homicide rate has fallen along with it. Today, Americans are
safer from violent crime, including gun homicide, than they have been
at any time since the mid-1960s.
.........................
Why the increase? It cannot be because gun-control laws have become more
lax. Before the 1968 Gun Control Act, there were almost no federal
gun-control laws.
.............................
Nor are magazines holding more than 10 rounds something new.
..................................
Back in the mid-1960s, in most states, an adult could walk into a store
and buy an AR-15 rifle, no questions asked. Today, firearms are the most
heavily regulated consumer product in the United States.
....................................
Since gun controls today are far stricter than at the time when "active
shooters" were rare, what can account for the increase in these
shootings? One plausible answer is the media. Cable TV in the 1990s, and
the Internet today, greatly magnify the instant celebrity that a mass
killer can achieve. We know that many would-be mass killers obsessively
study their predecessors.
..........................................
A second explanation is the deinstitutionalization of the violently
mentally ill. A 2000 New York Times study of 100 rampage murderers found
that 47 were mentally ill.
.............................................
Finally, it must be acknowledged that many of these attacks today
unfortunately take place in pretend "gun-free zones," such as schools,
movie theaters and shopping malls. ....active shooters are.....
predominantly weaklings and cowards who crumble easily as soon as an
armed person shows up.
.............................................
The media rarely mention the mass murders that were thwarted by armed
citizens at the Shoney's Restaurant in Anniston, Ala. (1991), the high
school in Pearl, Miss. (1997), the middle-school dance in Edinboro,
Penn. (1998), and the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo. (2007),
among others.
...............................................
People who are serious about preventing the next Newtown should embrace
much greater funding for mental health, strong laws for civil commitment
of the violently mentally ill?and stop kidding themselves that pretend
gun-free zones will stop killers
Has the rate of random mass shootings in the United States increased?
Over the past 30 years, the answer is definitely yes. It is also true
that the total U.S. homicide rate has fallen by over half since 1980,
and the gun homicide rate has fallen along with it. Today, Americans are
safer from violent crime, including gun homicide, than they have been
at any time since the mid-1960s.
.........................
Why the increase? It cannot be because gun-control laws have become more
lax. Before the 1968 Gun Control Act, there were almost no federal
gun-control laws.
.............................
Nor are magazines holding more than 10 rounds something new.
..................................
Back in the mid-1960s, in most states, an adult could walk into a store
and buy an AR-15 rifle, no questions asked. Today, firearms are the most
heavily regulated consumer product in the United States.
....................................
Since gun controls today are far stricter than at the time when "active
shooters" were rare, what can account for the increase in these
shootings? One plausible answer is the media. Cable TV in the 1990s, and
the Internet today, greatly magnify the instant celebrity that a mass
killer can achieve. We know that many would-be mass killers obsessively
study their predecessors.
..........................................
A second explanation is the deinstitutionalization of the violently
mentally ill. A 2000 New York Times study of 100 rampage murderers found
that 47 were mentally ill.
.............................................
Finally, it must be acknowledged that many of these attacks today
unfortunately take place in pretend "gun-free zones," such as schools,
movie theaters and shopping malls. ....active shooters are.....
predominantly weaklings and cowards who crumble easily as soon as an
armed person shows up.
.............................................
The media rarely mention the mass murders that were thwarted by armed
citizens at the Shoney's Restaurant in Anniston, Ala. (1991), the high
school in Pearl, Miss. (1997), the middle-school dance in Edinboro,
Penn. (1998), and the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo. (2007),
among others.
...............................................
People who are serious about preventing the next Newtown should embrace
much greater funding for mental health, strong laws for civil commitment
of the violently mentally ill?and stop kidding themselves that pretend
gun-free zones will stop killers