Alwaght- A new study says the US was home to almost one-third of the world's mass shootings between 1966 and 2012, shuttering the so called 'American Dream'. This is despite the fact that the US accounts for just 5 percent of the world's population.
The research – titled 'Mass Shooters, Firearms, and Social Strains: A Global Analysis of an Exceptionally American Problem' – is the first quantitative analysis of all reported public mass shootings around the world. The study was presented at the American Sociological Association's annual meeting in Chicago on Sunday.
Analyzing data from 171 countries between 1966 and 2012, study author and University of Alabama Criminal Justice Professor Adam Lankford found that the US had by far the most public mass shooters, totaling 90 in the 46-year period – or 31 percent of the world's shootings.
That figure is five times more than the second-placed country, the Philippines, which had 18 mass shootings.
Those numbers are significant, considering around 300 million firearms are believed to be owned by the US civilians. A 2011 Gallup survey found that 47 percent of all the US adults are reported to be keeping a gun in the home.
It's a link that cannot be ignored, according to Lankford.
“Until now, everyone was simply speculating about the relationship between firearms and public mass shootings. My study provides empirical evidence of a positive association between the two," Lankford said in a statement.
Lankford also pointed to another reason for the high rate of mass shootings in the US, suggesting that citizens are promised the “American dream,” but quite often fail to achieve the high levels of success they were guaranteed.
“Unfortunately, due to some combination of strains, mental illness, and American idolization of fame, some mass shooters succumb to terrible delusions of grandeur, and seek fame and glory through killing,” Lankford writes in his paper. “They accurately recognize that the only way they can guarantee that their names and faces adorn magazines, newspapers, and television is by slaughtering unarmed men, women, or children.”
“Given the fact that the US has over 200 million more firearms in circulation than any other country, it’s not surprising that our public mass shooters would be more likely to arm themselves with multiple weapons than foreign offenders,” Lankford said.
Meanwhile under President Obama, gun production soared 140 percent, reaching 10.8 million firearms in 2013, the most recent year for which data is available.
Elsewhere over 6,000 people have been killed and over 13,000 people have been injured by gun in the US since January 1, 2015, according to the Gun Violence Archive.
About 4.5 million firearms are sold annually in the country at a cost of 2 to 3 billion dollars.
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A Zaidi Shiite movement operating in Yemen. It seeks to establish a democratic government in Yemen.
Shiite
represents the second largest denomination of Islam. Shiites believe Ali (peace be upon him) to be prophet"s successor in the Caliphate.
Resistance
Axis of Resistances refers to countries and movements with common political goal, i.e., resisting against Zionist regime, America and other western powers. Iran, Syria, Hezbollah in Lebanon, and Hamas in Palestine are considered as the Axis of Resistance.
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A regional political u n i o n consisting of Arab states of the Persian Gulf, except for Iraq.
Taliban
Taliban is a Sunni fundamentalist movement in Afghanistan. It was founded by Mohammed Omar in 1994.
Wahhabism & Extremism
Wahhabism is an extremist pseudo-Sunni movement, which labels non-Wahhabi Muslims as apostates thus paving the way for their bloodshed.
Kurds
Kurds are an ethnic group in the Middle East, mostly inhabiting a region, which spans adjacent parts of Iran, Iraq, Syria, and Turkey. They are an Iranian people and speak the Kurdish languages, which form a subgroup of the Northwestern Iranian branch of Iranian languages.
NATO
The North Atlantic Treaty Organization is an intergovernmental military alliance based on the North Atlantic Treaty which was signed on 4 April 1949.
Islamic Awakening
Refers to a revival of the Islam throughout the world, that began in 1979 by Iranian Revolution that established an Islamic republic.
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A militant Sunni organization founded by Osama bin Laden at some point between 1988 and 1989
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