- Nadine Yousif
- bbc news
image source,Getty Images
In the past week, there have been three mass shootings in California, USA, and the news is shocking. A gunman opened fire on two nurseries in Half Moon Bay on Monday, killing seven and wounding one.
Hours later, another gunman opened fire at a gas station in Auckland, 65 kilometers away, wounding seven and killing one.
Also, on Saturday, 11 people dancing were shot and killed on Lunar New Year’s Eve in Monterey Park near Los Angeles.
If the spate of shootings makes it feel like the gun crime problem is growing in America, it is.
There have been differing definitions of what constitutes a mass shooting, but the nonprofit Gun Violence Archive has counted 40 mass shootings in the U.S. since the start of 2023, and the agency’s A mass shooting is defined as a shooting in which four or more people, other than the shooter, are killed or injured.
It was the deadliest January on record for mass shootings, according to the group’s public records that track gun-related deaths and injuries in the United States.
This follows a total of 34 in January last year. Between 2014 and 2022, the number of mass shootings recorded in January has averaged 25.
Americans are all too familiar with the debate over gun ownership and related legislation, and it has also become a highly politicized issue. A spike in gun violence has reignited enthusiasm for those debates.
But this also made some people ask: What is the reason behind the increase in shootings?
Gun violence of all types is on the rise
All types of gun violence, from homicides to suicides to mass shootings, are on the rise in the United States, the data show.
In 2019, the total number of gun-related deaths in the United States was 33,599. In 2022, the number of deaths will rise to 44,290, an increase of 31%. The majority of these deaths were suicides with guns, followed by homicides.
While mass shootings often cause panic, they actually account for only a small percentage of gun-related deaths. Mass shooting victims accounted for 1.1 percent of all firearm deaths in 2020.
However, killings by active gunmen have increased dramatically in recent years: Nine of the 10 deadliest mass shootings in the United States have occurred since 2007.
Experts say it is difficult to pinpoint the exact source of the rise because of the often unpredictable nature of mass shootings. However, several factors may be responsible for the increasing frequency of such incidents.
Gun ownership is on the rise
One is that Americans now own more guns than they did before. U.S. gun sales reached a record 23 million in 2020, a 65% increase over 2019, and the figure remains high in 2021.
In times of instability, such as during the first COVID-19 lockdown in March 2020, the period of social unrest following the police killing of George Floyd, a black youth, and the riots at the U.S. Capitol in January 2021, The FBI apparently conducts more background checks on gun buyers, since U.S. law requires a check when someone buys a gun.
Josh Horwitz, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions, said the uptick in sales is related to “the fact that guns keep us safe, especially in difficult situations. stable period” idea.
Horwitz added that an increase in violence, particularly shootings in public places such as gas stations, dance halls and nightclubs, has fueled the fear that drives some people’s decision to buy a gun.
“People are scared and they want to overcome that fear by buying a gun,” he said.
Stress, law and social trends
Some experts also pointed to the increase in life stress as one of the reasons. These pressures include the pressure of daily life and the pressure caused by the new crown epidemic, especially the pressure related to money income, employment or family and marriage, and personal relationships.
Jaclyn Schildkraut, interim executive director of the Regional Consortium for the Study of Gun Violence at the Rockefeller Institute of Government, said the issues could lead some to “act or react violently.”
The trend was echoed in a Secret Service analysis of 173 mass casualty incidents, about three-quarters of which involved gun casualties.
The report, published Tuesday, found that nearly 93 percent of the attackers had dealt with divorce, health, school or work issues before the incident. Between 2016 and 2020, about one in ten of the attackers behind mass casualty incidents died by suicide.
Hildekraut also said that “toxic masculinity” may also be a factor: Nearly all mass shooting perpetrators (roughly 98 percent) are men.
“If we want to understand the root causes of gun violence, we need to start from the point of view of what motivates someone to shoot someone, no matter who they are hurting,” Hildekraut said.
Some experts say U.S. laws about who can buy guns may also play a role in the increase, though it must be noted that California has some of the strictest gun laws in the U.S.
However, Mr. Horvitz said federal law does not currently require background checks for private sales of firearms, including purchases at gun shows or online.
Some states also have lax laws on safe storage, despite research evidence that safe storage reduces the overall number of gun deaths, he said.
Mr. Horvitz said: “Comparing the United States with other countries, it is not difficult to find the difference. One thing that the United States does not necessarily have in other countries is: it is too easy to get a gun in the United States.”