Updated February 2016
A website, Shooting Tracker, examines the number of mass shootings in the United States. Shooting Tracker tracks the number of mass shootings which are defined as shootings where four or more people are shot but not necessarily die as a result of their injuries. All of the data is sourced from reliable media coverage of the events.
A website, Shooting Tracker, examines the number of mass shootings in the United States. Shooting Tracker tracks the number of mass shootings which are defined as shootings where four or more people are shot but not necessarily die as a result of their injuries. All of the data is sourced from reliable media coverage of the events.
Let's start with a list
of the mass shootings thus far in 2016:
So far in 2016, there have been 33 mass shootings in the United States with a total of 51 people killed and 131 people injured.
Rather than looking at
the details for 2013, 2014 and 2015, I will just provide you with a summary for each
year:
2015
Number of mass shootings: 330
2014
Number of mass shootings: 330
Average number of mass shootings per day: 0.90
Number of people killed: 367
Number of people injured: 1317
Average number of casualties per mass shooting: 5.1
2014
Number of mass shootings:
336
Average number of mass
shootings per day: 0.92
Number of people killed:
383
Number of people injured:
1239
Average number of
casualties per mass shooting: 4.83
2013
Number of mass shootings:
363
Average number of mass
shootings per day: 1.0
Number of people killed:
502
Number of people injured:
1266
Average number of
casualties per mass shooting: 4.87
In the past three years
alone, mass shootings in the United States have taken the lives of 1332 people.
Let's close this rather
sobering posting with a bit of data. Here is a bar graph from Open Secrets showing
how much the gun rights lobby has spent on lobbying in Washington each year
going back to 1998:
So far in 2015, the gun
rights lobby has spent $8.402 million. At its peak, the gun rights lobby
spent $15.292 million on lobbying in 2013. Here are the top 8 gun rights
lobbying clients and how much each has spent:
In sharp contrast, here is a bar graph showing how much the gun control
lobby has spent on lobbying in Washington each year going back to 1998:
So far in 2015, the gun
control lobby has spent $1.258 million. At its peak, the pro-gun control
lobby spent $2.218 million on lobbying in 2013. Here are the top 6
pro-gun control lobbying clients and how much each has spent:
Now we have some idea why it is highly unlikely that anything will change.
Posts
How many of these "mass" shootings took place in poor areas of inner cities? How many of these "mass" shooting took place outside of bars? How many of these "mass" shootings actually are planned events where someone planned out a columbine type of attack? Almost all of these shootings are not the type of attacks you are making them seem to be most are probably the type you hear about on the local news, Party in rough part of town ends in gunfire, 4 injured were treated at local hospital with non-life threating injuries.
ReplyDeleteAfter a random sampling of about 10 events, none of your assumptions are correct. They are nearly all (8 of 10, small sampling I know) multiple family members killed by father, mother or son.
DeleteFair enough didn't think about that my line of thinking was about murders that took place outside of the home. Being killed by a close family member is statically the most likely way to be murdered so it would make sense that 8 of 10 fit that mold. When you think about mass shootings you don't really think it taking place within a private home. At least that was my thinking at the time of the post. But I stand corrected.
DeleteThe FBI defines mass shootings as having four or more fatalities. Sorry, but this data is false.
ReplyDeleteYou are correct, however, the number "four" is still rather arbitrary. By changing the number or whether it includes injuries or not, in most peoples' minds it is still a mass shooting.
DeleteHmm, a freak shoots up a crowd at a mall with the only fatality being themselves at their own hand, while leaving 22 wounded, some of whom will require lifelong medical care.
ReplyDeleteNot a mass shooting? Bullshit.
In my view Pat Paulson advanced the best solution nearly 50 years ago in his celebrated run for President: "give everyone a gun and let him wear it, and lock up all the bullets." Alternatively we could go back to the founding fathers etc whose wisdom the gun nuts are always quoting re the 2nd amendment (which by the way the supreme court up to the 1960s would never have interpreted as giving "rights" to individual gun owners" and recognized that the drafters of the 2nd amendment could never have imagined semi automatic hand guns and assault rifles) and agree that the right to bear arms should extend to the kind of muzzle loaders available 200 years ago at the time of drafting and nothing else. This would do lots to prevent mass shootings, and sneak attacks and robberies by criminals, not to mention provide a great boost to the antique gun market. The real danger is that some Afro American carrying a long Tom in Chicago might be arrested by a white cop for carrying a concealed weapon. Oh, well, you can't have it all. Americans might not know that people living in the UK, Denmark or Japan (where gun violence is very rare) are convinced that Americans are either very stupid or quite mad to be manipulated by the gun lobby. You spend billions to stop home grown terrorists who kill at most a few dozen each year, and do nothing about gun violence that kills in excess of 30,000 annually. Disproportionate isn't it? More over all the home grown terrorists that have committed crimes are in prison; the NRA leadership is not. An oversight perhaps.
ReplyDelete