School Shootings - USA! USA! USA!
So far this year, there have been 18 school shootings in the United States, with the most recent one being especially deadly. One of the first things we really need to do is ask: Why is the United States the global capital of school shootings? Why do they happen here so frequently, but don't occur elsewhere with anything like that frequency?
The answer is pretty simple, really: We are a nation of firearms owners. Anyone who is at least 18 years old can walk into a gun shop in most states and buy a semi-auto rifle with a removable magazine. As long as that person doesn't have a criminal record, the cursory background check will allow them to pay a few hundred dollars and get their weapon. While they're there, they can pick up large-capacity magazines for it and as much ammo as they can afford. That's true in most states.
Nobody but the person in the gun shop and the buyer will know of the purchase. Loading and firing such a rifle isn't rocket science. There's a booklet that comes with most of them that describes that. There are thousands of YouTube videos designed to teach people how to fire such weapons, as well. A person wouldn't even have to actually fire it even once before heading off to the school to commit mayhem. These weapons are easy to use. In a typical school shooting, it's really just a point and shoot thing. You don't have to be an expert marksman to kill people in a crowded situation.
And here's the thing: In every large group of people, you'll find some who are angry, bent on retribution for something, or just plain off their rockers. Schools are no exception. That's true everywhere, even in countries and places where school shootings are unheard-of. Combine someone with that mindset with easy availability of lethal hardware, and you have a recipe for disaster. We see such disasters all too often in our country.
There's no real way to predict who will shoot up a school or other place or when they might do it. There's no proven strategy for identifying mass shooters until they act. Of all the pissed-off, angry people out there, only a few will take that final lethal step. We can't and won't lock up all the angry people. We can't identify the ones who will act, either, with any sort of accuracy.
So what do we do? The only approach that is going to work is to deny such people the firepower that leads to mass casualties when one of those angry, bent or broken people decides to take action. How do we do that? We make it much more difficult to acquire semi-auto rifles with detachable magazines. We put serious requirements in place for purchasing such weapons. We limit magazine size and amounts of ammunition one can buy at one time. We create serious waiting periods before a person can take possession of such a weapon. We institute mandatory professional training before purchase. We make it more difficult for angry, sick people to get the damned things.
It's pretty simple. The common denominator in these mass casualty shootings is just one thing: Semi-auto rifles with detachable magazines that can accept high capacity magazines. Those are the weapons of choice for mass shooters. They can keep shooting as long as they have magazines available, and changing magazines takes only seconds - not enough time for someone to rush the shooter and take him or her down.
Keep those mass casualty weapons out of the hands of the shooters and we won't have these mass casualty incidents. How? Well, there are ways to do that. Some of them are described above. Another way is to make the damned things illegal altogether and buy back the ones already out there. Since the common denominator is that type of weapon, that's where prevention must start. Nothing else is going to work, frankly.
And that's my opinion on this Thursday, as I contemplate another 17 (now 18) dead people in a school in Florida.
Enough already!
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