Mass Shootings

In the wake of the most recent mass shootings in the U.S., some people are claiming we are the worst nation when it comes to such violence, and often blame President Trump for helping to inspires that violence through his rhetoric.

I agree that his rhetoric is often objectionable, but blaming him for the violence goes too far. Moreover, the U.S. is not the worst nation for mass shootings. Depending on what's being measured, we actually rank around 10th or 11th in Western nations.

According to a report in the World Population Review, Norway is the worst nation of those studied for death rate due to mass shootings. The top 10 includes France, Switzerland, Finland, and Belgium. The U.S. ranks 11th. In another study cited, worldwide in 2015 the U.S. ranked 66th. For overall shooting deaths in the Western Hemisphere, the U.S. ranks 10th - with Honduras, Venezuela, and El Salvador topping the list.

Lots of numbers to deal with in this report, but the bottom line is that as terrible as the mass shootings in the U.S. are, we are clearly not the worst nation for such violence, and it's erroneous to blame Trump (or, for example, Sanders or Warren, who had supporters involved in other shooting incidents). He clearly is not involved in the violence in other nations that rank ahead of the U.S.

One problem we have is that we have wall-to-wall media coverage of such incidents here. We often don't hear about the incidents in other nations - or only hear about them in passing.

We still need to address the problem here in the U.S. But we need to be honest and have the facts to help us in that effort.

Pax et bonum