Why are Americans shocked by mass shootings?

[V_Man]

I don't understand why so many Americans claim to be shocked by the lastest mass shooting.
Which aspect of it was shocking to Americans? Was it the fancy dress?

The USA averages 20 mass shootings every year.
100,000 people are shot every year in the USA. About a third of them fatally.
That is more than 10 times 9/11 every year.
America has 10 times the homacide rate than other developed countries.

So why are the majority of Americans claiming to be shocked by this particular incident? Or is it that they are not shocked at all but that they think that the are supposed to be shocked so they just go along with the general expectation to make the appropriate noises?

Please don't bother telling me that not every American is shocked. That goes without saying.

Why is this incident shocking to Americans?

[innerperson]

Why don't you break down your numbers a little more.  What shootings are a result from criminals killing other criminals compared to a nut job going into a movie theater and trying to kill everyone?

Once you break this down further we might be able to get to the bottom of your ignorance.

[Buckmarston]

Once you break this down further we might be able to get to the bottom of your ignorance.

Ignorance doesn't do this sorry poster justice.  Why would a foreigner to America care so much to write such a inane topic?  He must think he is cool because he isn't  shocked by the pure carnage in Colorado.     

[V_Man]

I disagree. There are plenty of people in the USA and in the US media that are asking the same question.
http://rt.com/usa/news/mass-year-people-massacre-710/
http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/329111
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2012/07/mass-shootings-map
http://theglobal99movement.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/jokers-mass-murder-at-batman-film.html#links
http://washingtonceasefire.org/
http://theglobal99movement.blogspot.com.au/2012/07/jokers-mass-murder-at-batman-film.html#links

 

the Aurora incident is already the sixth mass shooting in the month of July alone. Only three days earlier, 17 people were injured in Tuscaloosa, Alabama after a gunman opened fire in a downtown bar. One week prior, three people were killed and two were injured after another rampage erupted during a Dover, Delaware soccer tournament.
In Chicago, Illinois, where the homicide rate for June 2012 was 50 percent higher than just a year earlier, three separate outbursts in only the last 20 days have left four people dead and at least another 13 seriously hurt. So far in 2012, more people have been killed in the metropolitan Midwest city than the number of US servicemen in Afghanistan.
Earlier this month, two suspects fired at least 61 bullets in an outburst in Queens, NY that, while yielded no fatalities, left several people injured — including children. At the time, the Wall Street Journal reported that the NYPD recorded 730 shooting incidents this year alone, showing a 12 percent increase from the same time in 2011.
"Children are becoming victims more and more in these communities," Rev. Taharka Robinson, founder of the Brooklyn Anti-Violence Coalition, told the Huffington Post after the NYC mass shooting weeks ago. "If you can have an individual spray bullets where children are playing nearby, there's something wrong. We need to get to the root of the problem."

However rather than discuss this topic you insult me.
Yes I am ignorant. If I knew why most people in the USA were surprised by such acts then I would not have asked. Isn't that self evident?

Rather than being so self defensive, how about a mature discussion?
You are shooting the messanger. I simply asked the same question that most of the rest of the world is wondering. You lot travel, so you can't be unaware that most people in the world are wondering the same thing. This is why I asked you guys. You are much more worldly and can see things from different perspectives than people who never leave their own country. Also as I pointed out there are plently of American's asking this question as well.
So rather than a flame war. How about accepting that I have a valid question?

As far as criminals go, in the vast majority of the world any civilian that shoots another civilian is a criminal. In any case as you can see in the links above there have been plently of mass shootings of innocent bystanders in the USA in July alone. So that comment does not explain much to me at all.

[DesmondID]

meh..

lets see.. the murder rate for 2010 (latest I could find) ran at 4.8 per 100,000 .. Which by the way is about as low as it has been since 1960 (could find no data before that). Compare that to 10.2 in 1980.. The actual number of murders topped out in 1993 and have fallen steadily since then.. The murder rate has fallen 50% since 1993.

Europe as a whole was at 5.4 in 2004 but are down to 3.5 in 2010.. Oceania was at 4.0 in 2004 and has also fallen to 3.0 in 2010.. If we break out the western countries we can get to the 1.xx numbers.. But if we get to do that then I get to break out my state - 2 million people and a lower crime rate than almost any other western country - the murder rate has fallen 2/3 since 1996.

So yeah we are high but nowhere near the 10 times that was stated (where did that number come from?) and rates have been falling for almost 20 years now..

Anyway.. As to why people are shocked: The people killed were random innocents.. Most people have the perception that murders happen to those who are involved in dangerous activities (selling drugs, robbery, gangs, etc) or doing something stupid (cheating on a spouse, drinking late at night and shooting of their mouth in a bad neighborhood, etc).

[fathertime]

I don't understand why so many Americans claim to be shocked by the lastest mass shooting.
Which aspect of it was shocking to Americans? Was it the fancy dress?

The USA averages 20 mass shootings every year.
100,000 people are shot every year in the USA. About a third of them fatally.
That is more than 10 times 9/11 every year.
America has 10 times the homacide rate than other developed countries.

So why are the majority of Americans claiming to be shocked by this particular incident? Or is it that they are not shocked at all but that they think that the are supposed to be shocked so they just go along with the general expectation to make the appropriate noises?

Please don't bother telling me that not every American is shocked. That goes without saying.

Why is this incident shocking to Americans?

The way you framed your questions with your own conclusions posed as additional questions was designed to make Americans feel like hypocrites or fools.  You can claim it was unintentional, but that wouldn’t be true, now would it?  There was a lot more respectful ways that question could have been posed and without trying to indirectly denigrate Americans, and you damn well know it. 
Now to answer your ‘question’ in a fitting way, anyone asking how somebody can be shocked by the senseless killing of all those innocent mothers, fathers, and children, while they were innocently enjoying a movie, has got a few screws loose.  You must be missing something inside you if you aren’t at least somewhat shocked by this crime and how it destroys so many families.   


Fathertime! 

[utopiacowboy]

What is shocking to me is why there isn't a massacre like this every day. I guess most Americans are too fat and lazy to get out of their lazy boys even if they're deranged enough to do something like this. So go ahead, V_Man, insult the US all you want - you won't find a better target when it comes to stupidity and hypocrisy.

[braziliangirl]

Brazilians are pretty shocked by that too. But my question is why isn't everybody shocked by all the other mass shootings? I don't know how things are in the US, but poor, homeless, innocent people, including kids get massively killed here quite frequently and the public don't get as shocked.

Maybe it was V_man's question too, he just phrased it in a different way...

[Bob_S]

Wait.  What is the question?  Why are we shocked? Why are we not shocked? Or why we feign being shocked?   

[V_Man]

yeah sorry, you are right I phrased it badly.
I really meant isn't it predictable that this would happen? I don't mean exactly this in every detail of course. I mean that mass shootings happen in that country a lot and it is predictable that more will occur in the future. Of course nobody thinks it will happen to them and it's a big country so to anyone involved it will be a surpirse and a shock. And of course it is always shocking to see innocent people killed for no reason. That's obvious. But as a country, and after a few days reflection is it really a shock to so many that this event occured? Will they be shocked next time as well? Does anyone think there will not be another one? Really?

Also when I said that many people claim to be shocked - what I was getting at is that these same people will resist any meaningful change to lessen the likelyhood of a similar event happening in the future. Isn't that true? To me it isn't enough to say you are shocked when you have no intention to allow any change to occur to address the issues that we know will lead to it occuring again. That just seems quite hollow to me.

Anyway.. As to why people are shocked: The people killed were random innocents.. Most people have the perception that murders happen to those who are involved in dangerous activities (selling drugs, robbery, gangs, etc) or doing something stupid (cheating on a spouse, drinking late at night and shooting of their mouth in a bad neighborhood, etc).

This I understand but it isn't very realistic is it? I mean there are what 300 million people in the USA? We can't predict that someone, somewhere next month is going to completely loose their marbles? But yeah I understand that preception exists and it does answer my question.

[Ray]

Also when I said that many people claim to be shocked - what I was getting at is that these same people will resist any meaningful change to lessen the likelyhood of a similar event happening in the future. Isn't that true? To me it isn't enough to say you are shocked when you have no intention to allow any change to occur to address the issues that we know will lead to it occuring again. That just seems quite hollow to me.

WTF are you mumbling about anyway? What "issues"?
 
 
Come on, spit it out already...
 
 

 
 

 
 
 

[DesmondID]

yeah sorry, you are right I phrased it badly.
I really meant isn't it predictable that this would happen? I don't mean exactly this in every detail of course. I mean that mass shootings happen in that country a lot and it is predictable that more will occur in the future. Of course nobody thinks it will happen to them and it's a big country so to anyone involved it will be a surpirse and a shock. And of course it is always shocking to see innocent people killed for no reason. That's obvious. But as a country, and after a few days reflection is it really a shock to so many that this event occured? Will they be shocked next time as well? Does anyone think there will not be another one? Really?

As you said 300 million people.. This was the story of the day and with 300 million people the press can always find someone shocked about any given story to put on the news. Sometimes the stories gain wind / go viral / etc for the previous reasons stated..  There was nothing about it on the news today... Yesterday it was all about Penn State and people upset about the statue being taken down.. Today on NPR it was about the 14 Mexicans all stuffed in a truck that were killed when the driver lost control.

I read a story Monday that three of the men that died in Colorado took a bullet for a loved one by blocking the gunman with there bodies.. The writer tried to put a negative spin on it.

[Ray]

Today on NPR it was about the 14 Mexicans all stuffed in a truck that were killed when the driver lost control.

I think the story I read said they were from Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico. Out of 23 illegals in the pickup, 14 died so far and 9 are still hospitalized.
 
These type of incidents are far too common near the border...
 
 
Ray
 
 
 
 
 

[Bob_S]

Yesterday it was all about Penn State and people upset about the statue being taken down..

Upset?  Pfht.  Got off lucky, if you ask me.  I would have been much much more harsh.  Demand public sepuku for the entire football staff to start, and then get mean.