We have had guns for 200 years but mass shootings only became common in the last 30. So what changed?

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• nomecks@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  • A collapse of American industry
  • People being financially wiped out
  • The opiod epidemic
  • A general culture of greed and personal enrichment at all costs
  • The ever increasing transfer of wealth to the top

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  • carl_dungeon@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    • Closure of public mental health institutions

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    • protist@mander.xyz ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Almost no mass shootings were carried out by someone with a serious mental illness. Almost all of them made a conscious decision to do what they did and made a plan to do it. They learned to do what they did from internet forums, news reports of other shootings, abhorrent “influencers,” and the like, and they didn’t do what they did impulsively or based on a psychotic though process. Psych hospitals and deinstitutionalization have nothing at all to do with mass shootings

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    • jaspersgroove@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      • relentless fearmongering media coverage guaranteeing that shitty people are constantly being made famous for their shitty behavior

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  • somethingsnappy@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    This is the weirdest blend of far right with a tiny sprinkle of far left I’ve ever seen.

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    • Empricorn@feddit.nl ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Only a snowflake would see political affiliation in that list of deteriorating American problems! Don’t worry, I won’t let those mean facts hurt you…

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• Nonameuser678@aussie.zone ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Australian here. We had one really bad mass shooting and then our government (who was also one of the most conservative governments in the last 50 years) banned guns. Haven’t had one since. Guns just aren’t a thing here and we kind of think you’re a weird country for being so obsessed with guns. I also personally think it’s weird that guns are like the symbol of your freedom, yet you don’t have universal healthcare. Universal healthcare offers so much more freedom than guns do.

  In saying that a lot of countries have guns and don’t have the same problem with mass shootings. What the US has is a cultural problem in terms of your relationship with guns and violence. Unfortunately, doing a mass shooting is now a normalised way to deal with your problems. Not all of you, obviously. But enough of you that it’s gotten completely out of control. In Australia I don’t think it was just the banning of guns that has reduced mass shootings. We have a culture in Australia of ‘don’t be a dickhead’. I think when we had our mass shooting we all collectively just said yeah nah mass shootings are next level dickhead behaviour.

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  • MudSkipperKisser@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    American here. This is sadly very true and I find it unbelievably distressing. For me, after Sandy Hook happened (the mass shooting of over 20 elementary school aged children) and nothing changed, it became clear nothing would ever change. And I feel completely helpless about it. I used to be highly opposed to having a gun in my home but it’s gotten so bad that I’m starting to consider getting one for our safety…which pisses me the fuck off because then I feel like I’m forced to be part of the problem. I went to a big trick or treating Halloween event last weekend in a major part of town with lots of kids and adults, and in the back of my head I definitely had a little fear that this would be the kind of thing that would get shot up these days. It’s so far out of control, it’s so disgusting.

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    • Nonameuser678@aussie.zone ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I actually don’t blame you because I would feel the same way if I lived in America. I hate guns, but would feel the need to have a gun if I lived there. It seems like such a cycle of mutually assured destruction that just keeps escalating out of control.

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    • BlueEther@no.lastname.nz ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I feel sorry that your home (town) feels so unsafe, I don’t know how you (as a people/country) get somewhere back to ‘normal’

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    • Psychodelic@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      My reaction was, instead of feeling hopeless, I’ve started to call for abolishing the Second Amendment. I’m done trying to compromise with people that care more about guns than children.

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  • Mubelotix@jlai.lu ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Except that when a revolution becomes necessary we will all be fucked. Citizen’s most important duty is ensuring the State stays true to democracy

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    • SCB@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      You’re never going to fight in a revolution, and if you did you’d lose because you’re not a good fighter.

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    • Honytawk@lemmy.zip ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Revolutions are fought with torches, pitchforks and guillotines.

      Guns are far from necessary.

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    • cedarmesa@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      This is quite grandiose yea? I for one want to thank you for being a brave warrior for freedom whilst youre leaving panera at the strip mall.

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• berkeleyblue@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  A weird fetish for guns and a completely unregulated gun lobby.

  In Switzerland every male between 18 and 40 that hasn’t actively decided against it, has an assault riffle under their bed (for some that’s meant literally…). Althoughwe don’t let them have ammunition as well.

  Anyway, you can buy guns here and people do. It’s just not that we think we need them to defend ourselves against the government (which judging by the power of the us military is totally ridiculous anyway). We also don’t allow you to carry it around, let alone loaded ones.

  America is a ridiculous cesspool of stupidity, missed educational opportunities and weird, culty patriotism that guns are somehow a part of. The internet made it easier tk spread this and so conservatives have been more successful in spreading their crap around.

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  • JustZ@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    My two pennies: We had a generation of people raised by baby boomers, people notorious for their inability to manage emotions, or empathize with different or morally ambiguous people. It’s intergenerational trauma from such an upbringing, manifesting as mental illness and marked by delusions of grandeur, paranoia, victim mentality, and stunted emotional and social development. That, and obviously the proliferation of weapons has made mass murder accessible, and in the minds of some people as described above.

    Possibly also lead poisoning.

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    • jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      That, and obviously the proliferation of weapons has made mass murder accessible, and in the minds of some people as described above.

      Are you under the impression such things were ever not accessible?

      At what point did we start regularly testing and proving out water? When did we start ensuring school bake sale food must be store-bought? You seem incredibly short-sighted.

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  • BartsBigBugBag@lemmy.tf ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    The US military hasn’t ever won an asymmetrical guerrilla war, so it’s not as absurd as you think. In that Instance, millions of people would likely die, but it’s still more likely that guerrillas survive for decades than it is the US wins.

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    • HighElfMage@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      The US has won against guerrillas before. They won in the Philippines and had mostly won in Iraq before the Iraqi government pissed off their Sunni minority and ISIS spilled over from Syria. The US also crushed the Viet Cong during the Tet Offensive and most of the war after that was fought by regular North Vietnamese Army units not VC guerrillas.

      Most insurgencies fail Max Boot wrote a book called Invisible Armies where he analyzed insurgencies throughout the 20th century and determined that only about a quarter of them succeeded and more than half failed outright. Not only that, many of the successful ones took place in the context of colonization and the Cold Warz where they had weak imperial opponents, super power backers, or both.

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    • jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It’s also unlikely the US Military, being citizens of the United States themselves, would have a high degree of adherence to such orders to bomb and destroy their fellow man.

      That anyone thinks such is realistic is indicative of the depth of delusion.

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    • jaywalker@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I think it’s also more likely that the cops would be the main problem

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  • jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I’m not sure what you’re referring to as a “fetish” or an “unregulated” lobby. If you were referring to nonsense like the NRA and their fundraising efforts, you’d be obligated to highlight Everytown etc. and their blue-aligned fundraising. You can’t point out a wedge issue and one side without recognizing the other side and its equivalent benefit.

    If one has a clean criminal history, is a legal adult, and - in most states - has undergone some additional scrutiny or proof of proficiency, then sure - they can buy a firearm.

    Given how Afghanistan turned out, I’m not sure how you think the concept of resisting the armed forces of a government as a distributed and well-armed populace is somehow unthinkable.

    It’s fair to say we’ve a cesspool of stupidity - but only due to our politicians continued neglect of actual underlying issues in favor of partisan wedge-driving and profiteering of the ad revenue of sensationalized violence.

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    • hydrospanner@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It’s also worth noting (though Lemmy is a horrible venue for discourse on the topic) that the prevalence of firearm ownership in the US is itself a function (likely an intended one, by the framers) of 2A.

      So many of the measures that could, immediately or eventually, be used either directly or as a legal springboard, to move toward gun restrictions or confiscations see immediate and stiff resistance from the GOP, gun lobby, and most importantly big chunks of the population who are fun owners, who are basically given a personal stake and being incentivized to do so.

      So many of the gun control measures being proposed would be dead on arrival due to the dual truths that guns are already widespread in the country and that many such laws would make criminals out of law abiding citizens. This makes it hard or impossible for them to gain any traction whatsoever.

      While I agree that the “I need my guns for when the government turns on its people next week” crowd is delusional, I also feel that it’s a chicken/egg situation: part of the reason why that’s an unreasonable threat is because guns are so ubiquitous. The government doesn’t even attempt to go down that rabbit hole partially because it’s such an impossible feat.

      I also think that while yes, that doomsday scenario isn’t happening anytime soon, that it certainly could happen, after many decades of gradual change and gradual decline. And while personal gun ownership may not do much good against the government now, in the event that the course of the future took us down that dark route, personal firearms could very well do a private citizen a lot of good then in resisting any opponent, government or otherwise. But of course they wouldn’t be able to get their guns back in that scenario if they allowed them to be taken away beforehand…and prevalence of ownership and political resistance is the best and easiest insurance against all of that.

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  • endhits@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    If you’re under the impression that the military could win against the armed populace of the United States, you really shouldn’t be commenting on this topic due to your lack of knowledge.

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    • Colonel_Panic_@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      And you are going to do what exactly against an F-35 or drone strike with your guns? Please explain how you would stop the US military with any amount of guns.

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    • Skates@feddit.nl ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      You’re one nuke away from getting proven how shit your take is.

      This isn’t the 1900s. War isn’t just whose side has the biggest numbers or the fanciest guns. You will die in a confrontation against your government. You and your quickly propelled metal hold no power in the face of the type of destruction that has now been possible for decades.

      But yeah, go ahead and hold on to those guns, it seems like it helps you sleep at night.

      Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the mouth.

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    • berkeleyblue@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It’s statements like these that make me wish those morons actually tried to run into Area 51, just so we have a case of a) Military definitely shooting at their own citizens (your cops are quite good at this anyway I heard) and b) a demonstration of the sheer efficiency of a trained military squad against mostly untrained civilians who think they are the greatest of them all….

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  • JustZ@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Right on. Part of the weird fetish is that perceived need to defend themselves from the government.

    It’s as stupid as it is antiquated and was never a thing among patriots and decent Americans, among people who were literally rebels: slavers and separatists, the exact people the Second Amendment was written to protect against.

    The words “security of the state” are the express, states purpose of the Second Amendment, right there in the text, and rebellion was expressly cited at the Convention by the framers.

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    • jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      “decent” seems to be doing some heavy lifting here. A linguistic analysis of writings of the Framers cross-referenced against era culture and stats highlights the depth of your misunderstanding.

      right there in the text

      Ah - I see we’re not only cherry-picking, but we’re depending on a preamble e.g. a preparatory or introductory statement as somehow limiting of scope or indicative of audience to which a right was granted.

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    • endhits@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I guess the workers at Blair Mountain were “slavers and separatists”.

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  • guacupado@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Genuinely asking: what’s the point of everyone having a rifle if no one has ammo?

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    • telllos@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      It’s part of your army kit. As we have a mandatory military service. But, soldiers have now the option to leave it at their military Base.

      Which was introduced to lower the risk of suicide. No idea the impact of this policy though.

      One important point is that, swiss people aren’t strongly divided or proudly displaying their, political affiliations. I think their are fights, protest and riot. But never it would come in the mind of anyone to bring a gun to such events.

      Mass shooting are very rare and even though OP says people buy guns. I dont know anyone who has one. Beside for hunting.

      We also have a pretty good social security and different safety nets. So this help.

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• kromem@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Media coverage becoming a compounding factor.

  There weren’t many school shootings, and suddenly Columbine happened.

  The thing is - Columbine wasn’t really a school shooting.

  It was a failed bombing. The shooting was to get everyone into the cafeteria where they’d set up barrel bombs which luckily didn’t go off. In fact, the largest casualty event in a US school remains a bombing from 1927.

  As a school shooting, Columbine was also quite atypical, with two perpetrators.

  But as soon as you now had what was really a failed bombing being covered by the news as a school shooting, suddenly thereafter were a ton of school shootings (that fit the normal archetype of a mass shooting with a lone perpetrator).

  And each of those got a ton of coverage and the numbers of mass shootings went up yet again.

  If you suddenly prohibited covering mass shootings in media (impossible because of the 1st amendment, but hypothetically), I am certain you’d see mass shootings drop by double digit numbers.

  The fact that Columbine was so atypical of what events followed in its planning but was so close to what followed in how it was covered in the news tells a pretty damning story of the role of mass media in this phenomenon.

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  • nodsocket@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Finally a good response. Thanks for posting

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  • infinitevalence@discuss.online ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Thanks for citations!

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  • corsicanguppy@lemmy.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    As massive consumers of American news media that includes the extensive covering of mass shootings, I wonder what is keeping Canadians from a rise in shootings that is equally meteoric.

    Coverage - since so much media comes from America - would seem to be the same, but the results are different.

    Far from gun-avoidant, Canada boasts the longest rifle hit on a target, both for moving and stationary.

    Cold weather, maybe?

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    • kromem@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Access to guns. How many guns per person are in Canada vs in the US?

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    • jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Have you considered any of the underlying factors to such and how Canada might differ?

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• j4k3@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Shrinking middle class and people in an endless hopeless pointless life of stress and struggle. Over half the USA can’t read at a 6th grade level. Ignorance and stupidity are the primary leverage force used as a political power base. It is a negative feedback loop. Billionaires are a measure of effective democracy in the USA. Their wealth comes from the lack of laws and how they exploit loopholes. They in turn fund politicians that use misinformation and stupidity to maintain the laws at an inadequate level. No one intelligent would vote for these politician and therefore they thrive on a campaign of misinformation and strive to enact policies that keep the population malleable to misinformation. All one has to do is look for where the dumbest, poorest people are located and the lines are clearly seen. These areas are undereducated with poor opportunities because of their leaders who only work for the billionaire oligarchy at the expense of those the directly represent and everyone else they drag down with them. There are no honest billionaires on this planet.

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  • CosmicSploogeDrizzle@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    I agree completely but just so you know, it’s a positive feedback loop even if the outcome is negative.

    A positive feedback loop is one where the input creates an output that then increases the input further, which in turn further increases the output.

    A negative feedback loop is one where the input creates an output that then lessens the input, which in turn decreases the output.

    Shrinking middle class begets ignorance. Political forces capitalize on ignorance to misinform and manipulate the masses to elect people and enact policies that are not in their best interest. Doing so further erodes the middle class and decreases education, begetting further ignorance, misinformation, and political extremism. Positive feedback loop.

    (Sorry if this was pedantic but it reminded me of a very specific learning moment I had with an old science teacher of mine about this exact distinction)

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    • SCB@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Shrinking middle class begets ignorance

      We literally have the most educated populace in our history.

      brookings.edu/…/are-americas-rising-high-school-g…

      This isn’t about ignorance.

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    • EsteemedRectangle@lemmynsfw.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I’d argue that’s it’s a negative feedback loop because the outputs are less good things: like a well sized middle class and a learned population.

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• obinice@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  When I visited the USA, I was shocked at the number of clearly not sane people that were wandering the streets, shouting at things only they could see in their minds, etc.

  Those are just the visibly mentally ill people, a vast number of others go under the radar.

  In my country I’ve seen people like this maybe twice in my entire lifetime, in the USA I saw a dozen over a 6 month period. It was WILD. It’s something you should expect to almost never see in your lifetime, if you’re seeing it with any regularity? - There’s something very wrong.

  These people need to be in mental healthcare, be it a mental hospital for those in most serious condition, or varying levels of care and assistance further down.

  But… They don’t have a functioning healthcare system in the USA, let alone mental healthcare. All they have really are private companies acting like vultures picking at the dying masses pulling cash and misery out of them.

  They’re the richest failed state I’ve ever seen. The wide dissonance between their existence as a functioning first world nation and their existence as a state with a deeply crumbling failed interior that’s only further falling apart year after year is kinda wild.

  I really hope they can have a bit of cultural and societal revolution and right the ship, there are so many wonderful people there and so much to fight for.

  But I think for all their supposed cultural love of fighting for their rights and freedoms, they’re just too oppressed by the rich and the powerful to organise and fight for a better nation :-(

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  • 0x4E4F@infosec.pub ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    See, the problem is, they’re not used to thinking that the state should look after it’s people and their well being. The polititians hide this behind “free will” and so they leave indivudals to do whatever they like. This is all good, but everyone needs help once in a while… we’ve all had our ups and downs, but people there are used to dealing with any downfall by themselves. Sure, this strengthens some individuals, but others… they fall down a rabbit hole 🤷.

    Not a US citizen, just my 2 cents on your comment.

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• bouh@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Modern societies crush people. It breaks them. There are huge contradictions too: the idea of working to succeed when it is actually not working. The idea of freedom vs the wage slavery. The idea of being in a powerful and advanced country but still poor as fuck.

  And then you have this culture of guns and violence. They go togethet: you get guns because you believe it can fix problems. Because you believe that killing people can fix problems.

  Add 2 and 2 together: you have these life crushing problems, and guns as problem solver. Society provoque the problem. Kill them. Kill them all. Maybe they’ll understand after that and change something.

  Far right and conspiracy theory give a theoric foundation for people to focus their rage or despair too.

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  • Diplomjodler@feddit.de ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    And this is exactly how the system is designed to work. The purpose of the US gun madness is to keep the population scared. Scared people are more likely to agree to having their rights taken away in the name of “safety”. Having constant mass shootings just helps keep up the atmosphere of fear that authoritarians thrive on.

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    • SCB@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Hey Alex Jones, didn’t you lose a lawsuit over this shit?

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  • SCB@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    All these words and not one about having way better guns than before.

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  • Stumblinbear@pawb.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Modern societies crush people. It breaks them.

    The world has been pretty shit for the entirety of history. Working conditions are better than they ever have been. People make more than they ever have. Crime is dropping year-over-year.

    Arguing that this is occuring because everything is getting worse is just completely and utterly wrong. Quality of life is increasing greatly for the average person.

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• Nobody@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Cult of fame coupled with crippling hopelessness caused by late stage capitalism.

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  • crashoverride@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    And the 80s? ruling that guns were meant to be for self defense; up til then the 2nd amendment was not read that way

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  • Stumblinbear@pawb.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    laTe sTAgE cAPItalIsM

    I really hate that this is used as though it means anything at all to most people. It’s not an argument by itself.

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    • ClockNimble@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Late Stage Capitalism: Poverty is worse than anytime after slavery, wealthy people have never been wealthier, police brutality is at the highest since slavery, workers rights are trending back towards the second Industrial Revolution, politics recognizes corporations as people (thus robbing those who cannot compete with billions upon billions of dollars), civil rights are receding, basic necessities are becoming scarce, the environment itself is being poisoned for profit, etc.

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• qyron@sopuli.xyz ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Meanwhile, before mass shootings, murder was a lot more common and society was more prone to violence.

  Violence has been in a downwards spiral, regardless what is pushed to public forum.

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  • ByteJunk@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Not saying you’re wrong, but a source to go with that would be great.

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    • hedgehog@ttrpg.network ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Not the same person but here you go

      en.m.wikipedia.org/…/Crime_in_the_United_States has a few sources and an easy to consume table. Per its table, rates since 1960 peaked in the 80s at 10.2/100k population; Columbine was in 1999, when the rate was 5.7 per 100k, and until at least 2018, the rate has never exceeded that.

      www.macrotrends.net/…/murder-homicide-rate has slightly different data and shows that the murder rates increased past that rate during COVID. However in 2022 the rates dropped - source and were expected to continue dropping at that rate or even faster. www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2023/…/674290/ confirms that theory - rates for the 90 reporting cities were down 12% as of May of this year.

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    • qyron@sopuli.xyz ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Perhaps this?

      I’m not in the US but just a few weeks back I was listening to a podcast where, in my country, although violence against women still occurs (their were focusing on murder) while this year there had already been around 16 cases, thirty years back that would be the number for a single quarter. And from that point on, it was a general talk about violence in society.

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    • Mango@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      I’d like to point how polite I think your wording is. That’s probably the least offensive way to ask for a citation.

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• agitatedpotato@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Fox News was founded October 7th 1996.

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• Illuminostro@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Unadulterated hate and fear propaganda pumped into everyone’s heads every day an night

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• jeremy_sylvis@midwest.social ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Hyper-sensationalism of the violence and its impact gave those seeking revenge and suicide a convenient two-in-one option.

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• boletus@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  We haven’t had AR15s for 200 years. The real answer though is more likely cultural, because there are plenty of countries with permissive gun laws who have much lower rates of gun homicide than the US.

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  • Kroxx@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    While we haven’t had AR15s for that long, full autos were legal for private ownership prior to 1986

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    • Dark_Arc@social.packetloss.gg ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      And ARs go back to the 50s-60s IIRC

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• Blackmist@feddit.uk ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Columbine.

  The media went absolutely batshit. Who were they? Why did they do it? Interview absolutely everyone! The public must know. And they tuned in in their droves to find out.

  Incel types took note. If you’ve failed at life and want five minutes of fame, grab a gun and head back to school.

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• smco@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  The lack of mental health care for literally everyone.

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  • asdfasdfasdf@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Hasn’t mental healthcare been way worse in most of the past?

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    • imPastaSyndrome@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

      Nah we used to toss anyone with even a lisp into a room with padded walls until we could get the doctor to stab his brain or electrocute them until they’re “right” again or just left in there to get assaulted until they die

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• ryathal@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Reporting and tracking. Before the automatic weapons ban you had prolific bank robbers that shot their way out of many situations, but it wasn’t generalized to mass shootings.

  Rico was created to combat organized crime in the 70s. Lots of people were killed, but it was presented as an organized crime problem not a mass shooting problem.

  Since Columbine you have school shootings. One of the biggest predictors has become media reporting of a shooting. That’s obviously not the sole cause though.

  Essentially the US has always been violent, it just hasn’t always been lumped into a single mass shootings bucket. Rival gangs fighting is totally different than a school shooter, and a murder suicide is also entirely different.

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• Cheers@sh.itjust.works ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Misdirection of values. We tell children there’s a path, go to school, get a job, find a spouse, get married, get a house and have kids, but life isn’t that simple. As life introduces chaos into the path, people fall off and some have a hard time getting back on. We’ve spent so much time on developing social media and marketing platforms that idolize those that make it through the path that no one looks out for those that fall off, making them feel isolated and unheard. Niche social media and mass marketing for weapons has made it easy for lone wolves to seek revenge on the system that let them down.

  I think we can generally say the above is true across all political spectrums. The below might be rejected, but it’s my view.

  The right has made increasingly extreme statements to pull in these vulnerable people in order to make them feel heard, but it’s just for show and votes. We’ve seen how politicians like Trump are really just using them for his own gains and as the NRA funnels more money into the “system”, it really takes huge government action to curb this cycle.

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• kandoh@reddthat.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Bush let the Clinton assault weapon ban expire and then assault weapons began to flood the market over the next two decades.

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  • shalafi@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    AR-15s existed long before the ban and people didn’t much care for them. They use an intermediate round which hunters consider too low-power to be humane, and I believe it’s illegal to hunt with those rounds in some states. Anybody could get one, only few people did.

    So what happened? Democrats said, “You can’t have these!” and Americans, predictably, flipped out and bought tens of millions once available. Hell, I wasn’t interested until everyone was screaming BAN after Uvalde. Figured if I was ever going to get one, might as well get grandfathered in. The long-standing joke is that Democrats are the best gun salesmen of all.

    Also, the media hype. Have you noticed the media salivates over “assault weapons” given the opportunity? ALL long guns, of which AR-15’s are a subset, are responsible for only 4% of the killing. Our media has beat it into our heads that the best way to kill a bunch of people is the AR-15.

    There are so many other gun death related issues we should be beating the drum about. That’s another long post. :(

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  • CaptainHowdy@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    This is simply wrong. Many of the worst mass shootings in the last decade were committed with low power rifles and handguns. I’m actually pretty sure the two worst mass shootings (by count of those who were killed) in the US were done using .22 ammunition. Those weapons were not covered by whatever ban you’re talking about

    It’s not about “assault weapons” and it’s not even about guns. It’s about the inability of our government to pass meaningful legislation around gun ownership and mental health and especially where those two topics intersect

    The problem is that human suffering is normalized because the wealthy political class and those who fund them are not going to let things change for the better if it means less money for them.

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• aphlamingphoenix@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  A lot has been said already, but it’s worth mentioning that modern guns are much more capable of killing than guns 200 years ago. Back then, guns were very inaccurate and had to be reloaded one shot at a time and packed by hand. Now we have automatic weapons with large magazines that can be swapped out in seconds. They have less recoil and greater accuracy. Regardless of cultural and political issues, guns are just more capable of killing than they used to be.

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  • elscallr@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Most gun designs are 70 years old or so and they were as widely available then as they are now.

    Something besides the technology has definitely changed.

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  • naevaTheRat@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    blackpowder rifles were actually really good just hard to use. Modern reproductions are interior copies and modern black powder is worse (it’s optimised for different things) .

    For example many mid to late 1800s guns could hit point targets out to ~300 yards.

    My wife is really into this shit and apparently being a first grade rifleman required something like being able to shoot accurately from a field position to 1000 yards. It was very hard to get that good but many did.

    Keep in mind by this time they had all sorts of bells and whistles. Basic cartridges, specialised bullet geometries, progressively narrowing rifling etc.

    They were quite slow to fire, but loading a cartridge wasn’t that slow. you basically either breech loaded it or just pushed it down the end and lightly packed it (bullet expands when fired to lock with rifling).

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  • Amends1782@lemmy.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Has nothing to do with 200 years, he literally said in the title “the last 30 years”

    As another pointed out, we had “dealdly assault weapons” like the AR15 since 1956

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• kleenbhole@lemy.lol ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  how the hell are you going to shoot a big bunch of people with a musket?

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  • Rediphile@lemmy.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    The AR-15 was designed in 1956…

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  • c0mbatbag3l@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Semiautomatic weapons have existed since the early 1900’s and the AR-15/M-16 platform has been around for 80 years.

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• Omega_Jimes@lemmy.ca ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I would blame this, and a lot of the problems “western” countries face, on the proliferation of 24 hour cable news networks since the Gulf War.

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• Thorny_Insight@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  50 years ago you could shock the city, maybe the country. Now you can livestream it for the whole world and media makes a huge profit from these incidents I bet. So in short; attention. If you’re nobody and want everyone to know your name tomorrow - this is the way.

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• Treczoks@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  My theory: In the last 30 years, the topic “gun ownership” has been politicalized. Which in turn brought in people who mix up “enjoying freedom” with “being able to own a gun, the bigger, the better”. Those people are part of an extreme end of a policial spectrum. And guess what you also find at extreme ends of the political spectrum? People who want to cover up their insecurities, people with menatal problems, people with extremist worldviews.

  The political usurpation of the 2nd amendment by the right just to get a strong=fanatical voter base basically led to this rise in gun violence in the USA. Gun ownership as an “expression of freedom” is an artificial construct to harvest votes, just like “fear of immigration” (or worse: “replacement theory” bullshit) or abortion are artificial topics for the same reason. Although the abortion topic has the additional “benefit” of being a part of “supressing women”, which also appeals to certain voter bases.

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• TexMexBazooka@lemm.ee ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Our society is rotting

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• kleenbhole@lemy.lol ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  I think at the high level it’s the military industrial senatorial complex, the deregulation and reagonomics under Republicans, the neoliberalism under democratic, globalization, de-industrialization, the modern banking/credit system, the modern media complex, and personalized engagement algorithms… Downstream of that is a high rate of poverty, debt, illiquidity, a poor healthcare system, reliance on jobs for affordable healthcare, a lack of access to robust mental health treatment, modernization of weaponry, a radicalized and angry society, collapsing social cohesion, division along small tribal lines, lacl of patriotism, and upregulation of the average amygdala. Downstream of that you have homelessness, addiction, mental health crisises, violence, suicide, murder, and the institutional inertia that makes these intergenerational problems.

  We need a modern Robespierre. A charismatic leader to lead the public by uniting them rather than dividing them, who will make such massive changes that they’ll come for his head.

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  • space@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

    Australia had a problem with guns too, until the government stepped in. They had a program where people were paid for giving up their guns.

    Limiting access to guns is such a simple thing to do, and has such a huge impact… It’s not going to solve crime, but it will make crime less deadly.

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• satanmat@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  There are some really good answers here.

  I’ll add some additional things.

  The repeal of the fairness doctrine, tv news no longer needs to be actually fair.

  Back until the mid 80s there were really only 3-4 channels… everyone relied on the same news and we HAD to agree on facts. But there are almost no common facts today. There are 10000 sources and no matter where you are it can look like you’re correct, and very much in the center, and you can’t understand why those crazy “others” can’t see the truth.

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• zepheriths@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  The US defunded mental health hospitals.

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• randon31415@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Fox News was founded in 1996.

  The columbine shooting was in 1999.

  Maye it isn’t guns or mental health but fame.

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• FanciestPants@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  If we’re setting the calendar back 200 years, I’d have to guess that one of the contributing factors is records keeping and reporting. The definition of what is considered a “mass shooting” has also been fluid over the past 50 or so years.

  These are not likely to be major contributors, but from Hollywood’s depictions, mass shootings may have been pretty common around 150 years ago.

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• Skyrmir@lemmy.world ⁨11⁩ ⁨months⁩ ago

  Financial stress. Go take a closer look at the crime stats that right wing racists like to hammer the black community with. Then adjust them for poverty rates in the community. All of a sudden the racial divide in violent crime goes away. If anything, poor white men are the most violent, but not by enough to really be significant. The driving factor, by around 10 or 15 to 1, is poverty.

  We’re seeing declining standards of living across the country, while technology is hides the true depths of it. The whole, you can’t be poor if you have a wide screen TV and a refrigerator, is almost true. It’s just enough to make it look like having no bargaining power, being locked into your zip code, buried in debt, and renting everything you own, somehow represents wealth.

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