Every day, 120 Americans die at the end of a gun, including suicides and homicides, an average of 43,375 per year. According to the latest available analysis of data from 2015 to 2019, the US gun homicide rate was 26 times that of other high-income countries; its gun suicide rate was nearly 12 times higher. Mass shootings, defined as attacks in which at least four people are injured or killed excluding the shooter, have been on the rise since 2015, peaking at 686 incidents in 2021. There have been 632 mass shootings in the US in 2023 as of early December, including the Las Vegas shooting, and at the current pace, the US is set to eclipse the 2021 record this year.
December 8th, 2023 at 2:05PM
You could apply the greater good theory here: These deaths, 0.01% of your population per annum, are the price you pay for the right to bear arms and overthrow oppressors. Or in about a year’s time, opponents.
Much of the world sees it as a small penalty against the misery the US causes outside its borders.
December 8th, 2023 at 4:58PM
Dmitry: I do think that many, many Americans – lots of whom are high-profile and very powerful – are not merely pro-gun, but pro-violence and death. Freud’s death drive is, as it were, strikingly alive in contemporary America, where passive voyeurism of violence is clearly tipping over into participation. The country is likely to elect a violent, nihilistic president in the next cycle. He excites Americans. So do bloody, dismembered children in Uvalde. Bring it on!
I think the days of the lone maniac shooter are fading; I think it can’t be long before groups (fascist drug-running motorcycle clubs, fascist militias, Abortion Clinic Bombers for Jesus) of violence-lovers organize themselves and shoot our already impressive gun death statistics right out of the water. Blood lust, ho!
December 8th, 2023 at 7:27PM
Despite errors, Mr. Biden has been on the correct side of most issues. Americans do not respect competence, preferring to be told of their supposed greatness. Bodes ill for the rest of the world given your arsenal.
December 8th, 2023 at 7:41PM
I agree. Biden is the embodiment of the decent, competent, experienced politician. God forbid America has to live under such tiresome nonsense.