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xchrom

(108,903 posts)
Sun Jul 22, 2012, 08:39 AM Jul 2012

Why Mass Shootings Have Become Commonplace in Our Country

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/1035720/why_mass_shootings_have_become_commonplace_in_our_country/

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***SNIP

A Brutal Culture Begets Violence

In the case of the Tuscaloosa shooter, we had some useful particulars. But sadly, this kind of actionable information is just too “big picture” for us to contemplate:

…There were signs Wilkins’ life was unraveling.

He divorced from his wife of 16 years around 2005 and a credit union last year tried to garnish wages at his then-employer, Capstone Oilfield Services, to collect a more than $15,000 debt but couldn’t because he had declared bankruptcy. And the co-owner of the FedEx store where Wilkins turned himself in said Wilkins talked about being high on drugs during the shootings.

From that, we can see that Wilkins was experiencing stresses and crises. And at least some of them are related to the economic difficulties most of us are facing. And those are caused, at least in some cases, by greed and relentless pressure for profits, irrespective of the harm to others. That is, stresses are not all our fault. The ruthless bottom-line priorities of our society and the lack of protections for consumers and workers are factors in people becoming alienated and enraged. (We wrote a bit about regulating financial excesses the other day—you can read that here.)

Gun violence is also due, in part, to the power of gun manufacturers—which constitute way too big an industry altogether. While it’s surprisingly hard to find accurate totals on firearms production, which in itself is troubling, according to a gun manufacturers’ association, even a decade ago American firms were pumping out more than 3 million combined rifles, shotguns, revolvers and pistols in a single year. And those numbers have been climbing.
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