Mass Shootings: Events Have Risen Over the Past Three Years as Have the Death Rates

More shootings than days to date

(Still six months remain in 2023)

America, land of free and home of the brave and well … plenty of gun violence – 2022 looked like a record year, and now 2023 has more shootings to date than days in the year thus far. Two source reports follow below:

NPR REPORTS HERE (May 2022) & HERE (November 2022):

“America has seen at least 601 mass shootings so far in 2022”

ABC NEWS REPORT FOR 2023:

“There have been more mass shootings than days in 2023, database shows”

On May 14, 2022 a racist attack at a Buffalo, NY Supermarket snatched the lives of 10 people and left three more injured. It was the deadliest mass shooting of the year in the United States for just over a week.

Ten days later, a gunman targeted a 4th grade class at an elementary school in Uvalde, TX killing 21 and injuring 17.

That was the deadliest school shooting in America since Sandy Hook.

Mass shootings happen in the U.S. with depressing regularity. The nation has seen at least 26 mass shootings since the start of November 2022, with the latest at a LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs, CO.  At least five people were killed in that shooting, and 18 others were injured.

This is day 324 of the year, and the country has already experienced at least 601 mass shootings so far. This averages out to more than 13 a week.

That tally comes from the Gun Violence Archive, an independent data collection organization. The group defines a mass shooting as an incident in which four or more people are shot or killed, excluding the shooter. The full list of mass shootings in 2022 can be found here.

Mass shootings, as is well known by now, are a common recurrence in the United States. Mass shootings over the last three years is reported on here also from the Gun Violence Archive:

·  In 2021: 690

·  In 2020: 611

·  In 2019: 417

Mark Follman, who has been researching mass shootings since 2012 told NPR: “The massacres don't come out of nowhere even after a gunman killed 12 people at a movie theater in Aurora, CO. This is planned violence. There is, in every one of these cases, always a trail of ... behavioral warning signs.”

Follman, author of the book “Trigger Points,” went on to say that the role of mental health is also widely misunderstood, adding: “The general public views mass shooters as people who are totally crazy, insane. It fits with the idea of snapping, as if these people are totally detached from reality. That's not the case. There's a very rational thought process that goes into planning and carrying out mass shootings.”

For example: The Uvalde, TX school shooter was a high school student who bought at least two AR-15-style rifles shortly after his 18th birthday and shot his grandmother before going to the elementary school (officials said).

The Buffalo super market shooter left behind a racist screed, donned body armor, and livestreamed the attack.

On and on it goes …

My 2 Cents: Let me say up front (as 30-year retired Marine with two infantry combat tours in VN) I support the 2^nd Amendment. 

Plus, I have always said that we need with common sense gun control policy, which right now is sorely missing and sorely needed. 

Strong policies like (1) strong national background checks, (2) age limits, (3) number and type of guns per person/household, and (4) documented gun training for self-defense.

Protecting ones family and property is critical, too, but NOT OPEN CARRY laws like see in many states lately as the photos below show - to me  that is total insanity and zero common sense:

Strict lawful standards are needed to enforce the policies more than now, like in NYS with rational policy.

Laws and rules to protect our self and family & property in the safest most-legal ways possible to stop leading the world in gun violence are critical across the board.

Thanks for stopping by.