America woke up to the terror within school districts on April 20th, 1999 as Columbine High School was under attack by its own students. Since the start of 2015, there have been 52 school shootings in America and the number continues to climb. The death toll continues to rise decade after decade ever since the 1927 Bath School Bombing in Michigan. However, school shootings date as far back to 1860, but there's a fine line between a single killing and a mass killing.
School shootings have been weekly in the US in 2015 as in some countries it is completely unheard of. Originally, it would take four victims to be killed to be defined as a "mass killing" however, president Obama changed that to three. Columbine High School is infamous for being possibly the most significant mass killing in schools. They raided the school in their black trench coats with their shotguns and killed 13 and injured 21. Surveillance cameras capture explosives being thrown and the two charging in to kill. After the massacre, the two committed suicide. Although their motives are unknown, just like most mass killers, some claim they wanted to rival the Oklahoma City Bombing which happened 4 years earlier on April 19th, 1995, a day before the school shooting.
As seen in the graphs above, the days between mass shootings have greatly decreased, starting in late 2011. Keep in mind that "mass shooting" is a much broader term than "school shooting", which clearly specifies in educational institutions. Despite the fact, the number is frightening. Mass shootings this year have been in a total of 47 states, leaving a death toll of 462. The reason for the increase is still unknown, as mental illness is typically used as a reason for the killer's actions. Studies have been conducted, and mental illness has decreased over the years.
With the horrors of mass shootings, the issue of gun violence has taken the spotlight in politics. However, it has been three years since the Sandy Hook killings and still, nothing has been done to end the violence of mass shootings.
Virginia Tech (April 16th, 2007) - 33 dead - 25 injured
Sandy Hook Elementary (December 14th, 2012) - 28 dead - 2 injured
Umpqua Community College (October 1st, 2015) - 10 dead - 9 injured
All shooters committed suicide.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/10/mass-shootings-increasing-harvard-research
http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2015/12/03/458321777/a-tally-of-mass-shootings-in-the-u-s
No comments:
Post a Comment