Richard Fausset and Campbell Robertson in the New York Times report on some potential mass shootings that were recently and fortunately averted. For the article they interviewed Jillian Peterson, an associate professor of criminal justice at Hamline University in St. Paul, Minnesota. Dr. Peterson offered the suggestion that
…mass shooters, they have this grievance with the world where they feel like they haven’t been given what they were due and everybody else has these things that they wanted to have. And then they find a specific thing to blame for that anger.
During the pandemic the shared suffering perhaps mitigated the sense of individual suffering and grievance, but now:
This sense of shared suffering has already begun to dissipate, and psychologists are concerned about what awaits. So many of the known risk factors for mass shootings -economic hardship, exposure to family violence, isolation, time spent online, a surge in weapons sales – were exacerbated over the course of the pandemic.
All these things have been increasing, but we just haven’t had the opportunity there,” Dr. Peterson said. “I’m worried that once we create the opportunity, we’ve got all these people kind of ready to boil over.”
This suggests that perhaps we should shift our focus from “gun control” to “gun violence” and its causes. Perhaps we need greater attention to the economic and social causes of the suffering and grievance that lead some to lash out — with guns — at others.
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