The United States suffered its worst mass shooting in nearly a year when a gunman killed 10 and wounded 10 others in Monterey Park, a city near Los Angeles with a large Asian community, during the Lunar New Year celebrations.
In the nation's third largest city, Chicago, at least 30 people were shot and seven killed over the weekend, illustrating how routine gun violence has become across the country.
After the California lunar New Year massacre, when a gunman killed 10 and wounded 10 others, a Congressman described mass shooting as being “a uniquely American experience.”
The California gunman had symptoms of paranoia and mental illness which was untreated mainly due to the fact that for the last 40 years liberal economic measures have gutted not only health services.
These measures have in turn sent jobs overseas, eliminated anti poverty measures and fostered a climate of perpetual instability and insecurity.
People feel like it is every person for themselves and for some people, then the answer to that is going to be Yeah, it's worth the risk. It's worth taking the steps to engage in theft, carjacking, breaking into homes, you know, and ultimately you're going to have certain situations that will create incidences of gun violence and murder.
Dustin Spence, Socialist Alternative Party
Last year we had almost double the number of mass shootings compared with just four years ago.
In 2022 death rates from firearms reached their highest level in three decades. For many big city mayors, even democratic ones, more cops is the answer.
However, anti police sentiment has exploded most recently at a protest in Atlanta against yet another killing by police. And many say more militarism just isn't the solution,
Real community safety measures, which does not mean more police within the neighborhoods but actually means going through building real community bases of support that lean in the direction of violence prevention, but ultimately that can't be separated out from the real needs, you know, of housing, health care education that working people face on a daily basis.
Dustin Spence, Socialist Alternative Party
Following the California massacre, a congressman said that "mass shootings are a uniquely American experience".
With the termination of many Coronavirus era assistance programs, and another recession on the horizon, few expect that such experiences will decrease.