Mass killings occur in USA once every two weeks
Source: USA Today
"Mass killers target Americans once every two weeks on average, in attacks that range from robberies to horrific public shooting sprees like the massacre Friday of 27 people in Newtown, Conn., a USA TODAY examination found.
Using news accounts and FBI records from 2006 through 2010, the most recent years for which complete records were available, USA TODAY identified 156 murders that met the FBI definitions of mass killings, where four or more people were killed.
All told, the attacks killed 774 people, including at least 161 young children."
Read more: http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2012/12/18/mass-killings-common/1778303/
ck4829
(35,077 posts)I bet we'll be much higher than others, a very grim record.
Zoeisright
(8,339 posts)on any kind of regular basis.
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_wit_fir-crime-murders-with-firearms
Only South Africa, Colombia, and Thailand have more gun murders every year than the United States.
ck4829
(35,077 posts)politicat
(9,808 posts)Our low-level long-term civil war is mostly a Cold War, but it flares from time to time. Our high level of general social tension means we have less negotiating space, and easy access to very deadly weapons means that when a balance tips, it tips faster and further.
Compare per capita stats on very low level violent incidents (I.e. bar fights or scuffles) in the US versus Canada. They have 'em, too, but fewer and less intense. It's not just our guns.
Edited because iOS spell-checked badly.
Posteritatis
(18,807 posts)Angleae
(4,487 posts)Not to mention the data is from 2002 too many countries are missing.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate
http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita
http://chartsbin.com/view/1454
Aristus
(66,388 posts)rrneck
(17,671 posts)An eye-opening look at the phenomenon of school and workplace shootings in America, Going Postal explores the rage-murder phenomenon that has plagued and baffled America for the last three decades, and offers some provocative answers to the oft-asked question, "Why?" By juxtaposing the historical place of rage in America with the social climate that has existed since the 1980s when Reaganomics began to widen the gap between executive and average-worker earnings the author crafts a convincing argument that these schoolyard and office massacres can be seen as modern-day slave rebellions. He presents many fascinating and unexpected cases in detail. Like slave rebellions, these massacres are doomed, gory, sometimes even inadvertently comic, and grossly misunderstood. Taking up where Bowling for Columbine left off, this book seeks to set these murders in their proper context and thereby reveal their meaning.
libodem
(19,288 posts)And senseless. Just, NRA and weapons industry, collateral damage. Move along, nothing to see here.
ROBROX
(392 posts)The war thriving country now has home grown terrorists who shot people just because they have GUNS. This must SCARE the other civilized countries. I wonder how this will affect those who had planned to visit this fair country? There is not one area in this country that does not harbor a group of nuts who are ready to EXPLODE in anger and shot anyone & themselves.
I just hope there are no nuts in my community. There are guns everywhere it just depends if there are SANE people who own & handle GUNS..........
Dems to Win
(2,161 posts)happyslug
(14,779 posts)Last edited Wed Dec 19, 2012, 08:53 PM - Edit history (1)
The FBI reports the following Murders in the US in the following Categories:
Single victim/single offender 6,284.0 48.4
Single victim/unknown offender or offenders 3,766.0 29.0
Single victim/multiple offenders 1,641.0 12.6
Multiple victims/single offender 759.0 5.8
Multiple victims/multiple offenders 197.0 1.5
Multiple victims/unknown offender or offenders 349.0 2.7
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/tables/10shrtbl04.xls
Thus the total of multiple victims (I am assuming 2 or more) is 1305 victims in 2010. If we assume only 2 victims per incidents that comes to 652 incidents (one of which had to have had three victims).
Now Mother Jones seems to be the source, but they make it clear it is their study of reported mass killings NOT the FBIs:
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/mass-shootings-map
I do have to make a comment about the Mother Jones Article, a related article points out that NONE of the mass murders they counted were stopped by a person with a weapon (Most ended with the suicide of the shooter, or they surrender to the Police when they were cornered). They were able to "prove" this point by excluding cases where a Civilian stopped a mass murder attempt before more then one person was killed (The Penn State incident is the classic example, the shooter had opened fire, but a student then attacked the shooter from a blind side and managed to disarm the shooter after the Shooter had killed one and wounded three, but since the shooter only killed one, the shooter did not make the Mother Jones list of Mass Murders, but I should also point out that is the only incident I know of where a Civilian stopped such a mass murder attempt and then by physical muscle, the student who STOPPED the Shooter did NOT even have a weapon when the Student tried to stop the Shooter).
More on the Penn State Shooting of 1996.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetzel_Union_Building_shooting
Please note, the Shooter had the weapon to do a lot of killing, a 7mm Bolt Action Mauser may sound obsolete, but it is still a very good killing machine and if the shooter had NOT been attacked she would have killed a lot more Penn State Students.
Most Murders do NOT mean more then one victim, and most rates are DOWN except for Gangland killings and Rape (Others peak in 2008 or 2009 and subsequently dropped but most just dropped from 2006 onward), :
Circumstances.....................................2006......2007......2008...... 2009.......2010
Total................................................15,087....14,915....14,204...13,752....12,996
Felony type total:........................ .......2,472.....2,204.......2,115....2,052......1,923
Rape..................................................... 32.......32..............22........ 24...........41
Robbery.............................................1,053.....935............930.......857.........780
Burglary..................................................80.......86..............88......110............80
Larceny-theft............................................6........10..............18........13...........20
Motor vehicle theft...................................16........20..............20........23...........37
Arson.....................................................27........59..............27........38...........35
Prostitution and commercialized vice...........8..........11...............8..........6.............5
Other sex offenses.................................18..........10..............12........10...........14
Narcotic drug laws................................806.........590............500......496.........463
Gambling.................................................4............4..............15..........5............7
Othernot specified...............................412........447.............475......470........441
Suspected felony type.............................57..........67.............100........56.........66
Other than felony type total:...............7,328......7,165..........6,979...6,796.....6,351
Romantic triangle..................................104.........105............102.........88........90
Child killed by babysitter..........................27...........35..............50........29........36
Brawl due to influence of alcohol.............106.........118............130.......117.......121
Brawl due to influence of narcotics............53...........65.............70.........94.........58
Argument over money or property..........198.........192...........193........205.......181
Other arguments................................3,644......3,695........3,560.....3,364....3,215
Gangland killings...................................121...........78.......... 135........177.......176
Juvenile gang killings..............................864.........678..........700........715........673
Institutional killings...................................22..........11...........14..........12..........17
Sniper attack.............................................2............1.............7............1...........3
Othernot specified.......................... .2,187........2,187......2,018......1,994.....1,781
Unknown............................................5,230.......5,479......5,010......4,848.....4,656
http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/cjis/ucr/crime-in-the-u.s/2010/crime-in-the-u.s.-2010/tables/10shrtbl12.xls
aandegoons
(473 posts)Weren't we doing a good enough job ourselves?