I'm upset with the Colorado shooting. The media mislead us with all Monica/James Holmes all the time- lots of smoke and noise but little analysis or illumination. Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker's book shows that violence was much more common hundreds of years ago than today. Federal homicide statistics show that murder rates have been falling for the last 20 years - we are almost back to the murder rates of 1950. Total numbers of killings and cop killings are down, but some pundits claim that rampage killings (like Aurora) have decreased, some say that they haven't changed and some claim that they are more frequent.
Murder rates are 4 times as high in the South as in New England. How can we understand all this, how can we make our state or country kinder and safer?
Is it possible that human society is less violent than it was a few hundred years ago? What about the fact that US homicides have decreased considerably over the past 20 years? Can we put it all together?
The history of violence is like the complex winds of our atmosphere- some blowing one way, others in different directions with changing velocities.
1. Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker's recent book, The Better Angels of Our Nature: The Decline of Violence in History and Its Causes reports a slow decline in overall human violence over decades and centuries. He gives much of the credit to the bad guys- governments, laws, and courts.
Pinker surveys lots of data, from ancient skeletons to homicide statistics from European coroners' inquests and local records dating back 800 years, to databases of modern interstate conflicts and civil wars.
He combines all this to estimate the likelihood of dying at the hand of another human being in a given year. He makes a strong case, noting that almost 20 percent of bones uncovered at excavations of prehistoric societies show evidence of violent trauma – a death rate unparalleled in even the bloodiest episodes in recent history.
With the emergence of the city-state – in pre-Colombian Mexico in the 15th century -- the rate of violent death fell precipitously, to 5 percent. Pinker cites estimates of war deaths (excluding violent crime) in two bloody periods : 17th century Europe, “with its bloody wars of religion,” and the 20th century, with its two monstrous world wars. Historian Quincy Wright estimated the 17th century death-rate by war at 2 percent, and estimates of that measure in the 20th century run as “low” as 1 percent.
Criminologist Manuel Eisner's study of European homicides dating back to 1200 CE, found a dramatic decline in one-on-one violence, at least on the continent. Eisner estimates that about 100 in 100,000 people were murdered during the Middle Ages, a figure that has fallen to around 1 in 100,000 today.
2. US statistics: consider these estimates from our 19th century Wild West :
Gila County, AZ 164 per 100,000
Denver, CO 105 "
Texas 1865-1868 75 "
Los Angeles County 34 "
British Columbia, Canada 25"
Yes, BC murder rates were less than those in CA, OR or WA but still significantly higher than in the US today, higher than the rate in the deep South, but only a bit higher than the current rate in DC
These numbers come from
Now, let's turn to US national homicide rates from 1950-2010.
3. Consider the regional differences.Although the rates bounce up and down as we've seen, the South and the West remain consistently higher (more dangerous) than New England.
Colorado is mountain region.
Only 22% of murder victims are killed by strangers; many involve intimate partners or gang violence. Shooting multiple strangers or co-workers (as in 'going postal', see part 5) by single individuals is less than 1% of all homicides. If you avoid bars and difficult intimate relationships (not so easy) your chance of being killed by a Holmes, Loughner or Cho is only slightly higher than the risk of being killed by lightning, as we'll see... However, a society that does so little to keep weapons of mass killing away from crazy or unscrupulous people is offensive and self-destructive. Much of our culture glorifies violence. It is is dominated by machismo (you must be tough and efficient, never be taken in by a moocher), cynicism and pathological individualism (our pattern of grandiosity, in fantasy or behavior, our need for constant admiration or adulation and lack of empathy for those less fortunate,
It is inconsistent for a Christian nation or group deny help, including medical care, to those who need it. One example of our hateful beliefs is the Philadelphia law that makes it a crime to feed the homeless- ministers who do so face fines. http://philadelphia.cbslocal.com/... Would feeding the homeless bring millions of homeless people to Philadelphia? No, but this assumption that “give ‘em an inch and they’ll take a mile” is typical of our American culture. Simply changing one gun law will be difficult and won’t do much if it happens. If enough people keep saying that our politicians make it harder to vote, easier to buy automatic weapons and high capacity magazines and harder to help the homeless we can produce some changes, but only if this is sustained and if we speak to our neighbors, not just in blogs.
I am saying that 1. rules inconsistent with our beliefs are generally not enforced or obeyed 2.we must reduce killing, not just homicide. What about suicide? Suicide has outnumbered homicide in this country since 1900. Only two states have more homicides than suicides: Louisiana and Maryland. Suicides are less frightening because nobody can talk me into suicide, whereas they may kill me or family members. However, many young people, and particularly LGBT people commit avoidable suicide, avoidable because friends and counseling could help them see a way to a better life rather than over-reacting to crises. Suicide is an increasing problem for the US military.
Most murderers are not obviously psychotic. Those who carry out rampage killings are somewhat older than "ordinary murderers" and more likely to appear obviously mentally ill. Don't think however that restrictions on gun and ammunition purchase by "known mentally ill persons" can be a solution.
James Holmes saw a University of Colorado psychiatrist, Dr. Lynne Felton. We don't know how much she knew of his fantasies and plans. I expect lawsuits against the University (it has the deep pockets, not Dr. Felton, who is no schizophrenia expert, contrary to the media babble. She has not published one peer-reviewed article on schizophrenia). I have; I don't claim to be a schizophrenia expert.
Why we can't rely on mental checks to screen gun purchases:
a. Laws protect the privacy of mental patients (with good reason)
b. Mental Health care is not widely available, especially to the poor
c. Many mentally ill patients refuse psychiatric care suggested by friends and family
d. Very few rampage shooters have had previous mental hospitalizations
4. Accept the fact that many of us have problems with impulse control that wax and wane; restrict military weapons to police and the military. This must be coupled with a push for attitude change "Neighbors must help and support each other, because it makes everybody's life better These obligations have limits. Follow the golden rule... it works 95% of the time" What is lost by restricting access to automatic weapons and high capacity magazines? Hunting- nothing, protection of your home or store against invaders-nothing. A double barreled shotgun is a powerful weapon at close range. I speak as a person who owned three guns before I was 18. Reducing gun access won't eliminate killing, but reducing it by 30% is feasible.
5. Now, are these murders increasing or not? it depends on how you count them. Consider Mother Jones mass murder listing, MJ mass murders The US averages 75-80 deaths from lightning strike each year. MJ lists three mass murders in 2011 and three so far this year - the death toll from those is less than the lightning death toll. However, I believe that the list is too restrictive. What about Nathan Van Wilkins, who shot 17 people in a bar in Tuscaloosa, AL on July 17th? He was unusual because of many previous arrests and because he had posed for pictures with an AK-47. You may not have heard of him because none of his victims died. He is a white male, said to be 44 years old and recently fired from his job because of a fistfight with a coworker. Then you have other pundits saying that rampage murders are increasing withoutguardian murder story data.
Do the media help us? They do not, and I don't limit myself to commercial media. PBS Newshour produced the typical cacophony about Aurora: Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) calling for gun control, University of Denver's Dave Kopel pushing the NRA line and the Pew Research Center's Mike Dimock telling us that polls show Americans now favor gun rights over gun control. The message is clear- same old same old ranting and constant polling, no analysis, no possibility of change. Change is possible but it will have to be bottom up- our political leaders won't touch this issue.