The United States has another "bloody weekend" with gun violence in many places
□ Wang Yitong
A few days ago, the United States experienced another "Bloody Weekend". According to the website of the non-profit organization "Gun Violence Archives", there were about 220 shooting incidents in the United States over the weekend of June 18-19, resulting in about 90 deaths.
mass shootings
According to the "Gun Violence Archives" website, as of June 21, local time, 20,600 people have been killed and 17,492 injured by gun violence in the United States this year.
According to CNN, according to this trend, the number of mass shootings this year is likely to surpass last year's and become the "worst year" on record.
Since June, mass shootings have occurred in the United States.
Over the weekend of June 18-19 alone, there were about 220 shootings in the United States, killing about 90 people.
According to the "Washington Post" report, on the 18th local time, a large shopping mall near Washington, D.C., was temporarily closed due to a shooting incident.
On the evening of the same day, in San Antonio, Texas, a gunman opened fire while passing a family barbecue party in a car, killing two people and injuring five others.
According to a report by CBS local time on the 20th, on June 18, Philippine lawyer Reiro and his mother came to the United States to travel. They were shot on the way to Philadelphia Airport. Rero was shot in the head and his mother was glassed. Fragment scratches.
Leroy's mother said: "We came to travel together, we should have gone back together, but now, I have to go home with his ashes." At present, the police have not yet notified the relevant details, only saying that the current investigation shows that the shooting case It's not against the lawyer himself, it's a random incident, possibly related to "Road Rage".
According to the "New York Post" news, in the early morning of the 19th local time, a shooting occurred outside a restaurant in Queens, New York, USA, killing one person and injuring two others.
On the same day, a shooting occurred on a street in Las Vegas, killing one and injuring one.
On the evening of the same day, a shooting occurred at an open-air music festival in Washington, D.C., killing a boy.
Three other people were injured, including a policeman.
According to the Washington police report, the deceased was named Chase Lorenzo Poole, only 15 years old.
Witness Daniel Dyson said in an interview with the media that Poole was next to him when he was shot and fell to the ground.
Dyson tried to help the African-American teenager, and his clothes were covered in blood.
"He was screaming for his mother, and it was very distressing to hear," Dyson recalled. "No one could save him but to watch him lose his life, and I was very sad."
minors caught
In response to the death of a 15-year-old minor in the shooting at the Washington Music Festival on the 19th, Lindsay Watts, a reporter for a US TV station, wrote on social media on the 20th, "Why is our reality like this? Our children should be safe."
The United States is the country with the most serious gun violence in the world. The probability of children and adolescents dying from guns is 15 times that of the other 31 high-income countries combined. Gun-related injuries have become the leading cause of death for children and adolescents in the United States.
According to the US "Gun Violence Archives" website, in 2021, a total of 44,750 people will die from gun violence in the United States, of which 1,533 will be adolescents and children under the age of 17.
According to an investigation by The Washington Post, more than 311,000 children in the United States have experienced school gun violence in the aftermath of the 1999 shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado.
The gun culture in the United States is deeply rooted, and the idea of "making guns with guns and violence with violence" prevails. Some parents try to protect their children from shooting by encouraging them to carry guns.
A study published in the American Journal of Pediatrics in April 2022 showed that between 2002 and 2019, the rate of gun carrying among 12- to 17-year-olds in the United States increased by 41%.
Due to the proliferation of guns, some American teenagers have even gone astray and become the perpetrators of gun-related injuries.
On May 24, local time, a shooting occurred at Rob Elementary School in Uvalde, southern Texas, USA, killing 21 people, including 19 children. The shooter was an 18-year-old student.
It was the deadliest school shooting in the United States in a decade.
Adolescents are the future and hope of a country. Innocent childhood should not be full of gunshots, and minors should not be exposed to gunshots.
However, the US government and politicians talk perfunctory and talk about gun control, but it is difficult to take concrete actions.
Gun Control Act in Name
In fact, the United States has not passed a major gun control bill for more than 20 years.
The last major federal gun control legislation passed in the United States was in 1994, banning the private production, possession and import of semi-automatic assault weapons and high-capacity magazines.
The bill expires 10 years after it passed, and despite rising gun violence, it has been slow to see positive reform.
On June 12, local time, U.S. President Biden confirmed previous rumors from many media: a Senate special group of 20 senators, after about two weeks of consultations, finally passed the first federal accusation in more than two years. Consensus on gun bill.
Since these 20 senators include 10 Democrats and 10 Republicans, the current Senate has exactly 50 of the 100 senators from both parties, and the threshold for major votes in the Senate is 60 votes, that is, as long as the Democratic As usual, a party-wide unanimous vote on gun-related bills will likely pass the bill.
Democratic negotiator Senator Murphy hailed it as "the most important anti-gun violence bill in nearly 30 years."
"This bill will save thousands of lives," he said.
Biden also hailed the bill as a "major progress" on the road to gun control in the United States.
However, some analysts pointed out that the bill is a "breakthrough without a breakthrough".
The bill, described as a "breakthrough", contains almost nothing directly related to gun restrictions and gun control. Even Democrats and many gun control groups have called for "banning the sale and possession of semi-automatic firearms, banning the use of large capacity magazines, raising the minimum age limit for the purchase of guns from 18 to 21” and so on, let alone “complete gun ban”.
It is reported that the outline of the agreement only includes provisions such as strengthening background checks on gun purchasers under the age of 21 and providing funds for school safety measures. ".
In this way, the Republican Party can use this to show that it is "willing to engage in bipartisan cooperation in the public interest", while the Democratic Party can return with "a rare legislative breakthrough" after giving up attacking those "mountains that have never been gnawed."
94% of Americans believe gun violence is an urgent problem, but their will cannot be translated into law.
American politicians' "hold back" on the issue of gun control is completely ignoring the voices and even the lives of ordinary people.