Guns

After the tragic shooting yesterday in San Bernardino which left 14 dead and 17 more injured, we are once again throwing around statistics about guns and posturing on gun rights and gun control. It's par for course after every mass shooting.

I'll have to give credit -- Vox.com, better than any media site out there -- mainstream and/or other wise -- gave the most fair and balanced take on gun control numbers, explaining the various methodologies employed in analyzing multi-victim shootings of 4 people or more. Vox, along with the Guardian, posted comparable firearm death rates in the United States and other countries around the world. But that is aside the point.

The New York Daily news, for its December 4th edition, posted a provocative cover late Wednesday night as a rebuke against politicians who posture with "Prayers for...", all the while not really doing much to combat the issue.

There's a far bigger issue than the availability of guns, and that issue gets amplified if you look closer at The Guardian's statistics of firearm ownership and firearm rates around the world. To understand gun violence, you ultimately have to evaluate the sociopolitical climate that readily accepts gun violence as a means to resolve and/or control conflict, whatever it may be.

From the gang-ridden streets of Chicago, to the domestic disputes of Houston, and the unspeakable tragedies of various mass shootings around the country, individual(s) have utilized guns to settle scores, assert dominance, or prove some sort of point. It is the decision-making process that concerns me more than anything, and it is an indication of culture.

Believe it or not, homicide rates in the United States are lower than they were 20 years ago. According to a poll that was sourced by Vox.com, only 12% of Americans actually know that -- most believe that homicide rates are as bad if not worse than years past. Media coverage and social media conversations largely skew perceptions in my opinion, and many may not really remember how bad homicide rates in the United States were.

In the early 1990s, New York would have 2,000 homicides a year; Los Angeles as late as the early 2000s had over 1000 homicides a year; Chicago would clock in anywhere from 600 to 900 homicides a year; and Houston would regularly exceed 500 homicides a year. However, intervention programs, stiffer sentencing, aging, peace, lack of a drug epidemic, and better policing has led to significant drops in homicides. New York and Los Angeles are pacing for fewer than 400 homicides; Houston is pacing for fewer than 300; and Chicago's homicide numbers will still be half of what they were 20 years ago. A lot of that is due to changes in cultural, sociopolitical, and demographic climates.

I never argue in favor of or against gun control. It's an argument that distracts from the real core issues -- social climate, the cultural acceptance of resolving conflict with a gun, and the actual decision-making process. Our discussion really needs to encompass what kind of intervention, outreach, treatment, and cultural changes would be necessary as effective forms of prevention, if any.