Mass shootings are a largely American phenomenon

[Javaman]

http://www.cnn.com/2016/06/13/health/mass-shootings-in-america-in-charts-and-graphs-trnd/

From 1966 to 2012, nearly a third of the world's mass shootings took place in the U.S. This is according to a 2016 study that used the FBI definition of 'mass shooting' below. It surveyed 292 incidents and found 90 of them occurred in America. Put another way: While the U.S. has 5% of the world's population, it had 31% of all public mass shootings.


The number of 'mass shootings' changes depending on how you define it

The government has never defined "mass shooting" as a stand-alone category. So, depending on whichever informal definition you go with, the tally can drastically vary. According to the Gun Violence Archive, which compiles data from shooting incidents, a "mass shooting" is any incident where four or more people are wounded or killed. That number can include any gunmen as well. By that definition, we've seen 136 mass shootings in the first 164 days of this year.

Now, let's consider the several ways the government uses the term. Federal statutes define a "mass killing" as an incident resulting in three or more deaths. The commonly accepted definition -- the one the FBI used up to 2013 -- is a shooting that killed four or more people. Then there's Congressional reports, which sometimes exclude gang-related or domestic incidents and focus on "gunmen who select victims indiscriminately." Use that, and the total tally dwindles to single digits.


Regardless, the three deadliest shootings in the U.S. have occurred in the past 10 years

The Orlando attack was by far the deadliest shooting in U.S. history (49 killed), and it is not even 10 years removed from the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre (32 killed), and the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting (27 killed). In fact, of the 30 deadliest shootings in the U.S. dating back to 1949, 16 have occurred in the last 10 years.

lots of infographics at the link...

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with the amount of mass shootings in the U.S. one would think, that if the poor families that were effected by the shootings every banded together to form a political group or lobbying organization, I think they would have some massive influence at getting rid of assault weapons.

[JohnnyRingo]

1. As Michael Moore said...

"Guns don't kill people, Americans kill people."

Speaking about school shootings, he pointed out that Canadian kids have easy access to firearms, watch the same violent movies, and play the same video games as American kids, but they don't grab a gun and march into a school and shoot their classmates.

What's wrong with us that we seek revenge with a veritable river of blood?