America’s gun problem, explained

Vox

The public and research support gun control. Here’s how it could help — and why it doesn’t pass.

A year ago today, on February 14, 2018, it happened again: another mass shooting in America. A gunman walked into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, and opened fire, killing 17 people and wounding 17 others.

The Parkland shooting inspired a wave of activism and protest, culminating in the March for Our Lives in Washington, DC, and sister marches across the country last March, as well as a wave of support for gun control candidates in the 2018 midterm elections.

But the Parkland shooting hasn’t led to major changes at the federal level for gun policy. We’ve seen this before: Despite outrage after a mass shooting, whether the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012 or the Las Vegas shooting in 2017, the chances of Congress taking major action on guns is persistently very low.

This has become an American routine: After a mass shooting, the debate over guns and gun violence starts up once again. Maybe some bills get introduced. Critics respond with concerns that the government is trying to take away their guns. The debate stalls. So even as America continues experiencing levels of gun violence unrivaled in the rest of the developed world, nothing happens — no laws are passed by Congress, nothing significant is done to try to prevent the next horror.

So why is it that for all the outrage and mourning with every mass shooting, nothing seems to change? To understand that, it’s important to grasp not just the stunning statistics about gun ownership and gun violence in the United States, but America’s very unique relationship with guns — unlike that of any other developed country — and how it plays out in our politics to ensure, seemingly against all odds, that our culture and laws continue to drive the routine gun violence that marks American life.

1) America’s gun problem is completely unique
No other developed country in the world has anywhere near the same rate of gun violence as America. The US has nearly six times the gun homicide rate as Canada, more than seven times as Sweden, and nearly 16 times as Germany, according to UN data compiled by the Guardian. (These gun deaths are a big reason America has a much higher overall homicide rate, which includes non-gun deaths, than other developed nations.)

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https://www.vox.com/2015/10/3/9444417/gun-violence-united-states-america