What’s going on?  Over the Easter weekend, there were shootings that killed or injured four or more victims in ten different cities. Easter weekend, right? A time of quiet devotion and family moments celebrating good times. 

              Just several weeks earlier, ten people were shot by a crazy man on a subway in Brooklyn, and several weeks before that event, 6 were killed and at least 60 were wounded in another weekend of shootings where four or more were shot in the same place at the same time.

              Yesterday was Mother’s Day.  We celebrated the holiday by having at least 57 people wounded by gunfire and 12 people killed.

              I thought that what Grandpa would call the ‘chuchems’ (read: experts) were saying that last year’s spike in gun violence was due to the Pandemic, plus everyone was running into a gun shop to buy a gun.

              Meanwhile, the virus seems to be abating or at least contained in most locations, and April gun sales were down by almost 25% from April gun sales last year. So, what the f*ck is going on?

              The truth is nobody really knows. That’s what the f*ck is going on. Nobody really knows.

              And frankly, I’m getting a little sick and tired of saying that we don’t know why we have so much gun violence, since we have only been doing research on the issue for at least thirty years.

              That’s right.  It’s thirty years since Kellerman and Rivara published the first of two articles which found that guns in the home  created a risk for suicide and homicide. But most gun violence doesn’t take place in the home. It occurs in the street. And not only do the number of street shootings keep going up, but the shootings themselves seem to involve not only more victims, but – and here’s the important point – more shots being fired as well.

              Next time you watch the TV news and there’s a story about the latest shooting in your town, notice that the cops always mark where they find every spent shell with a little yellow plastic pyramid in the street. Note that the number of these little markers is usually many more than the number of bullets that end up in the bodies of the victims in a shooting event.

              There’s been endless debate over how to define a ‘mass’ shooting. Is it the total number of people who are killed and wounded in one place at the same time? Is it only the number of people killed? Of late, both numbers appear to be going up.

              I think the way we should define mass shootings is by the number of shots that were fired in a particular location because no matter how many people are killed or wounded, the only reason that everyone wasn’t killed is because the shooter didn’t shoot straight.

              I would be willing to bet you that if someone could get access to the data on how many shots were fired, and it exists in the documents of most police departments which cover murders and assaults, the number of rounds which go off in intentional shootings has gone up faster than the number of shootings themselves.

              Why do I say this? Because the kids walking around with Glocks and Sigs in their pockets want to shoot their guns. That’s the whole point of owning a gun. And all this talk about having a gun for self-defense or for protecting 2^nd-Amendment ‘rights’ is nothing but talk – doesn’t really mean anything at all.

              In order to commit gun violence, you have to make seven different decisions, and every decision has to be ‘yes.’ Here they are: (1). Interested in guns, (2). Get a gun, (3). Get ammunition, (4). Load the gun, (5). Carry the gun, (6). Point the gun, (7). Pull the trigger and – blam!  These decisions are usually made over a span of years, starting when a boy is 12 or 13 years old. But if at any time a kid asks himself one of those questions and answers with a ‘no,’ he won’t commit gun violence.

              And by the way, let me make one thing very clear.  The medical definition of violence, as defined by the WHO or the CDC doesn’t differentiate between offense and defense. If you try to injure yourself or someone else, you have committed a violent act.

              Why are guns used so frequently to commit violence? Because certain guns are designed specifically and only for the purpose of committing violence. Using one of these guns is an efficient and usually successful way to engage in a violent act, particularly the more rounds you spray around the location where the violence occurs.

              Most of the kids and young adults responsible for the recent wave of gun violence have absolutely no awareness of consequences no matter what they do. All they know is that last week someone else yanked out a gun and popped some caps (read: shot a gun) all over the place. And the odds that someone gets caught for committing gun violence is hardly a risk, in many cities less than one out of five are arrested for aggravated assault.

              We know why people who want to commit violence often do it with a gun. But why do they want to commit violence with or without a gun?