We had another mass shooting in Indianapolis again killing eight more people. Mass shootings have made the mass media obsession du jour, off and on since the Atlanta shooting in mid-March; however, the media still fails to report on the vast majority of contributing causes of these mass shootings, or all other murders, which comes to an average of forty-five per day, and how to recognize leading causes of them and prevent them. For example, when the Atlanta Spa shooting happened, the mainstream media spent an obsessive amount of time discussing whether they should charge the shooter with a hate crime, even though it would do nothing to deter future violence, or even increase the penalties, since it was already either life without parole or the death penalty, so it couldn't get any worse. Don't get me wrong, I'm not opposed to stopping racism, but this doesn't do it. Ironically, one of the leading causes of escalating violence, is child abuse, and when it's accompanied by a racist background, it's also a leading cause of racism, so stopping this will reduce violence and racism.
There should be no doubt that there are dozens, at least, contributing factors to crime and violence; yet the mainstream media is rarely willing to discuss more than one or two at any given time and they practically never do a good job covering those. The only subject that they do discuss following each shooting incident is typically gun control and they don't even do a good job at that; while they ignore many other contributing factors that are as important, if not much more important, including early child abuse leading to escalating violence, abandoned inner cities where the vast majority of violence happens, often unreported, income inequality, inadequate educational or economic opportunities, poverty, homelessness and much more.
Even though they do cover gun control they don't cover the best research on the subject, or at least not very often, although they have mentioned some studies briefly in the past before quickly forgetting them, instead repeating appeals to emotion over and over again. One example showing how much of an impact the assault weapons ban may have on mass shootings, but not necessarily most murders, is US Mass Shootings, 1982-2021: Data From Mother Jones’ Investigation updated 04/01/2021. This shows there were eighteen mass shootings killing at least ten people after the assault ban expired, as of April 2021. Columbine, with thirteen dead, plus the two shooters, was the only one with ten or more deaths that took place while the assault weapons ban was in place. Between 1982 and 1994, when the assault weapons ban was in place there were four mass shootings killing ten or more according to this list. The clear implication is that this ban made mass shootings much less common, although the same can't be said for the overall murder rate.
I went into this subject myself almost seven years ago and explained that although reasonable gun control does reduce murder rates in states that have them, it's not nearly as important as other contributing causes in most cases, as explained in How does gambling and gun control impact violent crime? The studies I reviewed in the past showed that reasonable gun control had a much larger impact on suicide rates in states without it than they did on murder rates. A semi-educated guess might be that reasonable gun control might save dozens of lives over a decade or so from reduced mass murders, hundreds if not thousands of lives from suicide, but only a moderate percentage from most murders.
Reasonable gun control almost certainly has a big impact on mass shootings and suicides, but it's till not the only contributing factor, by far, nor do I think it's likely to be the most important contributing factor. In addition to the review I did on gun control, I also reviewed at least eight to ten other potential contributing factors, including early child abuse and corporal punishment which was part of a series, Ignored evidence linking corporal punishment, poverty and crime grows. This was followed up with a more recent review, based on updated FBI statistics Research On Preventing Violence Absent From National Media. This article, and statistics from the FBI accompanying it, shows that at least since 1991, if not much earlier, the states allowing corporal punishment in schools, and presumably using it more at home, have always had higher murder rates, on average, than those not using it. In 1992 the difference was only about two and a quarter percent, which is as close as it ever got, and it's been breaking records since then, getting bigger.
Since then, the states that banned corporal punishment in schools, and use it less often at home, have seen their murder rates drop much faster than those still allowing CP in schools. In most cases, even those states still allowing it don't use it as often. The gap between the two broke a record in 2018, then another one in 2019, when the murder rates for the nineteen states still allowing CP averaging 6.07 per 100,000, while it was only 4.22 on average for the remaining states not allowing it. The same goes for either shooting and killing police or police killing civilians; in both cases, even though the nineteen states still allowing corporal punishment in schools only have about 41.5% of the population, in any given year they have between 50% and 65% of either the police murdered in the line of duty or civilians killed by police. One of the recent mass shootings, killing three, was by an ex-cop who had been fired within the past year, and this happens to be in Texas, which is a CP state.
There's no doubt, in the academic world, that reducing child abuse will lead to a large reduction in all violence later in life; but there's no effort in the mainstream media to inform the public about this, nor are political decision based on this research. The same goes for many other major contributing causes of violence, including abandoned inner cities, which often have murder rates at least twice the national average and sometimes four to ten times the national average. And the difference is even greater when you compare it to European countries that do a much better job addressing social services, including education, child care, banning corporal punishment at home as well as in schools, and many other social problems; in some cases our worst cities have fifty times the murder rates of theirs, yet the media refuses to research why, when the information is available, and it could teach how to reduce violence.
About forty years ago Hollywood produced "Escape from New York" which was a dystopian example of what not to do, abandoning inner cities and letting them turn into a war zone or walled in prison. This is just one of many Apocalyptic movies that Hollywood is constantly putting out; and in each case, no matter the subject, whether it's research on reducing violence, protecting the environment, or many other social problems, there's almost always, if not always, good research to show how to avoid these disastrous scenarios in libraries, academic journals, or other alternative media outlets; but all of this research is ignored by mainstream media and politicians don't use it to base their political decisions, instead catering to the fiscal ideology of campaign contributors.
In the summation for my previous series on leading causes of violence, Politicians increase crime; Grass roots efforts reduce crime; Politicians steal the credit, I pointed out that in addition to child abuse and corporal punishment being major contributing factors for violence, other factors include poverty, lack of education, income inequality, gambling, and numerous other factors, many of which hit abandoned inner cities far more than most of the country. Many of the leading causes of violence, besides child abuse or corporal punishment, are often directly linked to the fiscal ideology of the wealthiest people in this country, yet they're practically never discussed by the mainstream media!
Furthermore, when ever the fiscal ideology of the wealthy contradicts the best interest of the working class, including research to reduce violence, politicians cater to the interests of their donors, and this has done the greatest damage in abandoned inner cities, often dominated by minorities, including African Americans. A lot of this is described by Jonathan Kozol in "Savage Inequalities" 1991 and many of his other books. He focuses mostly on education, showing how the political establishment has been relentlessly trying to cut educational funds for poor people, often so they only get enough education to do menial jobs for low wages. Perhaps the most brazen example where the political establishment has opposed one of the most effective ways to reduce violence was San Antonio v. Rodriguez, which Jonathan Kozol reports on in his book. in 1971 a three-judge federal district court ruled that Texas, and San Antonio, were in violation of the equal protection clause of the Constitution; unfortunately, this was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court with Lewis Powell, who had a major conflict of interest, writing for the five to four majority, and Thurgood Marshall writing a scathing dissent.
Lewis Powell never should have been allowed on the Supreme Court do to a brazen conflict of interest which most of the public didn't learn about until after he was confirmed as shown in the Machiavellian Lewis Powell Memo: A Corporate Blueprint to Dominate Democracy. Some critics have tried to down play the importance of this memo by dismissing it as the "myth of the Powell Memo," or something like that; however, if you read the full memo and study the history of politics since then, there's little or no doubt that the recommendations in this memo have clearly been carried out since then. One of the best sources to review this was "Who Stole the American Dream?" by Hedrick Smith, who goes into a lot of detail confirming his sources, unlike the critics of what they try to call the "myth of the Powell Memo," which avoids fact checking enabling them to make many false claims that don't stand up to scrutiny.
The Powell Memo certainly isn't the sole cause for our political and economic problems, nor is it entirely new; it actually describes a restoration of the fiscal ideology adopted by the wealthy in the nineteen-twenties, which led to the Great Depression, and the nineteenth century, before or after the Civil War. Frederick Douglas wrote about how they suppressed education to African Americans intentionally in his autobiographies in 1845; 1855; and 1892. In the nineteenth century those that opposed education for slaves or working class people hardly tried to hide it; now it's widely recognized that people should have a right to good education so those that want to suppress it, including Lewis Powell, try to pretend otherwise, although if you look carefully, that's exactly what they want.
The same goes for Niccolò Machiavelli's recommendation that rulers "keep the citizens poor," which was written at a time when the vast majority of citizens didn't even know how to read, so they wouldn't have known he wrote it. Machiavelli advised rulers on the most effective tactics to control the masses and keep them in their place, and the Powell Memo elaborates on this, and clearly seems to be the method they're using to corrupt the political system, even if it means ignoring the most effective research to reduce violence and look out for the best interests of the majority. This also includes increased control of the national media, although I doubt if Lewis Powell, or his allies at the time of the memo, could have known how successful they would be at controlling the media.
The consolidation of the media escalated under Ronald Reagan, and it reached it's peak, at least for now under Bill Clinton when national media consolidated so much that six corporations were able to control over 95% of national media, and many of the remaining media outlets, including the Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times, Time Magazine, the Boston Globe and many more are owned by billionaires, ensuring that a fraction of one percent control almost all national media, and they rarely if ever cover the best research about how to reduce violence.
Fortunately there are other sources, including library books, academic journals, or other alternative media which do show the most effective ways to reduce violence, and they often also show that good programs to reduce violence are often much more cost effective than increased reliance on policing, courts, and prisons. I've covered some of this research in past articles including Ten Ways To Reduce Violence, Backed Up By Research which discusses several studies that reduce violence, and at least a couple that show it also saves money, including Zagar's study cited by Professor James Garbarino, which shows that for every dollar spent on non-punitive intervention with at risk children at least six dollars are saved in other related social costs, including crime and violence related costs.
Another previous article, Burying Solutions to Prevent Gilroy, Dayton and El Paso Shootings, covers a similar study, also cited by Professor Garbarino, covers a home visiting program which also saves more money than it costs, and this was confirmed from numerous other good sources. I've also found at least a couple studies from other countries that show that it's far more cost effective to treat drug addiction and house the homeless instead of ignoring both these problems, which I reviewed previously in Machiavellian Ideology Ignores Real Science. This article discusses Finland's housing first program, which almost completely eliminated their homeless problem, and Portugal's decriminalization of drugs, accompanied by effective treatment of addition, which has led to much less addition and reduced costs. In both cases there are smaller studies
Christopher Berry-Dee, a researcher into serial killers and author of "Monster: Aileen Wuornos' True Story," has also come to the conclusion that early intervention makes serial killers much less likely to turn violent. He writes about how Aileen was abused as a child throughout the book, but in the last thirteen pages, he reports about how many good schools have intervention programs that would recognize how badly abused Aileen was and recommend counseling or other intervention. Both James Garbarino and Dorothy Otnow Lewis have also come to similar conclusions; all three of these researchers, and more, have come to the conclusion that most if not all serial killers or spree killers have all been abused much more as children than most of us. Many people have argued that most abused children don't grow up to be serial killers, which is, of course, true; however, the abuse for most killers is often much worse, and even if most abused children don't become killers they often do have many other emotional problems and they should receive help with it as well, most importantly would be to stop the abuse in the first place.
Professor Garbarino and many other teachers and researchers around the country go into much more detail about these programs, although in most cases it's not reported much outside of schools or the academic world. In all fairness, the programs that Aileen Wuornos would have needed to help her were almost certainly far less common in the sixties, when they would have done the most good; and they would have been even worse in the forties, when they might have helped prevent Charles Manson from being violent, in fact the reform schools that he went to did far more harm than good where the so-called councilors were often very violent and allegedly involved in raping and abusing the troubled boys they were supposed to help. There's been an enormous amount of evidence to show that this was much more common throughout the United States, not just where Manson went. There's little doubt that these abusive reform schools are far less common and that programs that reduce violence are far more common, but it's hard to tell how much without good reporting on the subject.
If I can find this much good research, without the help of traditional media, then I have no doubt that there's far more available; but even if there isn't that much more, we need a much more effective way to inform the public; and since traditional media refuses to report on this it has to involve more diverse media including people that actually want to do a good job. Since there are many more of these programs operating around the country, it provides more research opportunities to find out which are more effective.
Unfortunately instead of reporting on research that could reduce violence, the political establishment has developed a routine for expressing self-righteous indignation without actually doing anything to solve the problem, perhaps believing these appeals to emotion will convince people they care or that they're doing something. In all fairness, one aspect of the 1994 crime bill, the ban on assault weapons, did help with a modest reduction in murders, a larger reduction in mass shootings and a much larger reduction in suicides; however, this was the only aspect allowed to lapse, while mass incarceration portions of the bill are still in place and little or nothing has been done to address the long term causes of violence.
To this day, little or nothing has been done to address most long term causes of violence, especially if they impact the fiscal ideology of the wealthy; the most important exception is teaching how child abuse leads to escalating violence and banning corporal punishment in most schools, but all these efforts were done at the local level. Neither the media or politicians have acknowledged the leading causes of violence, including Joe Biden's most recent emotional response to mass shootings as reported in Opting for Massacre in America, a Public Health Emergency: Top U.S. Health Officer 04/19/2021 where he says, “This is a national embarrassment and must come to an end.”
Joe Biden has been saying that he "trusts the science" on one subject after another, especially his response to the pandemic trying to tell us what to do and to get vaccinations without question. I don't have the medical background to challenge or refute most of what they say about the pandemic, and hope they are right; however, I do know enough about Single Payer Health care, or Medicare for All, to know that it would help handle medical crisis's like this much better; and I also know that government money is routinely used to finance research including into the vaccines, yet they give patents to drug companies so they can gouge people, and often deprive them of medical care. Furthermore, the pandemic is only a little older than one year but the vaccines are still less than a year old, so there have been few if any long terms studies, which they don't discuss, raising more doubts about the science. The same goes for addressing Climate Change, pretending to trust the science, but still increasing the burning of fossil fuels, fracking and many other things increasing profits for his campaign donors at the expense of the environment.
The same goes, of course, for research into preventing violence in the most effective way possible, at best he trusts the science, only when it suits the best financial interests of his campaign donors, or perhaps, when he's under an enormous amount of pressure from the grassroots, like when he investigated a handful of police shootings. If he was concerned about the leading long terms of violence and how to prevent it he would recognize that improving education, reducing poverty, income inequality, and white collar crime, are all major parts of the solution; however, his campaign donors all benefit from policies that ignore this.
Joe Biden has been a leading part of the political establishment that has been rigging the economy for the rich, shipping jobs overseas to suppress wages, while also blocking increases in the minimum wage, suppressing funds for schools, even though research shows this is far more effective at solving many social problems, including reducing violence, and many other policies enabling epidemic levels of fraud, and indirectly increasing other crime and violence. He's also been a leading supporter of increased militarization of the police and mass incarceration, even though evidence shows it's not nearly as effective at reducing crime and violence as educational programs, many of which save far more money than they cost.
Joe Biden and the rest of the political establishment have little or no interest in the best "science" or research on any given subject unless in increases their profits or they can use it for a campaign slogan. The Republicans, of course, seem even worse, hardly even pretending to care about good science, which enables the Democrats to pretend to be the lesser evil. And of course, this is much more effective when the media refuses to cover the best research or anyone that points out these flaws.
The mere fact that many European countries have a fraction of the violent crime that we do and far fewer mass shootings should show they're doing something much better than we are, and that we should look closer at it to figure out what it is so we can reduce our social problems as well; but the media refuses to even look at it. If I can find this much research showing how to reduce violence, often while saving money at the same time, I have no doubt that there's much more; however the most powerful institutions refuse to even look for it!
As long as this continues we need to support alternative media outlets that actually try to do a good job and find the best research ourselves, exposing the fraud of traditional media. We also need to provide far more support from the grassroots for honest candidates that the traditional media refuses to cover. As long as only crooked candidates catering to corrupt corporations get name recognition, the only politicians with name recognition needed to get elected will be crooks!
Austin police chief IDs suspect in shooting that left 3 dead near The Arboretum 04/18/2021 Records show Stephen Broderick, a former Travis County sheriff's office property crimes detective, is charged with sexual assault of a child. Broderick was booked into jail in June and spent 16 days behind bars prior to posting bail, which was set at $50,000.
The following are additional sources or related articles:
Mother arrested after three young children found slain in Reseda 04/10/2021
Suspected gunman in Texas shooting held on $2.2 million bond 04/09/2021
Suspect in mass shooting that killed 5 in South Carolina played in NFL 04/09/2021
Lone survivor of SC mass shooting has now died, coroner says, bringing death toll to 6 04/10/2021
At least 20 mass shootings have taken place in the two weeks since the metro Atlanta spa attacks left 8 dead 04/01/2021
He shot at 'everyone he saw': Atlanta spa workers recount horrors of shooting 04/02/2021
Here's what we know about the Boulder, Colorado, mass shooting suspect, Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa 03/24/2021
US Capitol attacker posted online about gov’t “mind control” 04/02/2021
Suspect in Capitol car attack posted about govt. 'mind control' and 'terrible afflictions' by CIA, FBI 04/03/2021
MASS SHOOTINGS IN 2021
Wikipedia: List of mass shootings in the United States in 2021
The 10 Deadliest Mass Shootings in Modern U.S. History 10/03/2017 Does not include El Paso shooting in 2019 with 22 dead; or Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in 2018 with 17 dead; or Texas First Baptist Church in 2017 with 26 dead. Six out of the ten worst mass shootings were in the past ten years. Seven of the worst thirteen were in the past ten years. Nine out of those thirteen were after the ban on assault weapons expired, the other four were all from before the ban on assault weapons was put in place, but there were far fewer assault weapons available at that time even though it wasn't officially banned. The five worst mass shootings of all time all happened after the ban on assault weapons expired.
US Mass Shootings, 1982-2021: Data From Mother Jones’ Investigation updated 04/01/2021 There were eighteen mass shootings killing at least ten people after the assault ban expired, as of April 2021. Columbine, with thirteen dead was the only one with ten or more deaths that took place while the assault weapons ban was in place. Between 1982 and 1994, when the assault weapons ban was in place there were four mass shootings killing ten or more according to this list. 18/60
At Least 36% of Mass Shooters Have Been Trained By the U.S. Military 03/24/2021
1 dead, officer injured after gunfire erupts at high school in Knoxville, Tennessee 04/11/2021
TIMELINE: Austin-East community rocked by another shooting 04/12/2021 CNN referred to this as "East-Maga School" while it's actually Austin-East Magnet High School
Maryland trooper shoots, kills teenager who had airsoft gun, police say 04/15/2021
‘You’ve Done Nothing Wrong’: Leaked Data Shows Cops Are Donating to Kyle Rittenhouse’s Defense Fund 04/16/2021
‘We demand justice’: Emotional vigil held for man fatally shot by Birmingham police 04/15/2021
Why America's Schools Have A Money Problem 04/18/2018
Politifact: Marianne Williamson "We are the only advanced industrialized nation that bases our educational funding on property taxes." 07/31/2021 Half-True
School funding: A review of existing models in European and OECD countries 2005
Jonathan Kozol "Savage Inequalities" 1991
When Joe Biden Collaborated With Segregationists 06/06/2019 The candidate’s years as an anti-busing crusader cannot be forgotten—or readily forgiven. By Jonathan Kozol
Shooting in Kenosha Wisconsin leaves 3 dead, at least 3 injured at Wis. bar, person of interest 'located,' officials say 04/18/2021
Not just “a few bad apples”: U.S. police kill civilians at much higher rates than other countries 06/05/2020
Police shoot unarmed gay Black man 10 times when he called 911 for help 04/21/2021
Man in North Carolina fatally shot while deputies served warrant, authorities say 04/23/2021
Killed by police 2017 archives.
Delano Ca. almost double; Castle Rock Colorado less than 1/2 average; rural Texas well below average; Los Angeles Ca. just over 1-1/2 times average; Redwood City Ca. just under 1/2 average; Columbus Ga. more than double; Elkhart Ind. about %120 above average; Birmingham, Alabama almost seven times average; South Gate Ca. 20% above average; Wichita Kansas 40% above average, LA also above average; Philadelphia Pa. close to four times average; Dover Township slightly below average crime rates, bordering York with more than five times average murder rates; Chester Va. below average crime, suburb of Richmond with four times average; Farmers Branch Tx. less than half average, bordering Dallas with more than double; Boring Oregon half average? or less; Desert Hot Springs Ca. three or four times average; Yakima Wash. almost double; Tulare Ca. more than 50% above average; Roswell NM over three times average; Rural area bordering Kentucky and Tennassee, with little crime; Indianapolis, Ind just over triple average; Spokane Wash. moderately below average; Yakima Wash. almost double (double report, doesn't count XXXXX); Tulsa Okla. almost three times average; Progreso Tx. less than half average, small border town; Phoenix Ariz. almost double; Fairbanks Alaska almost double national average; Tracy City, Tenn well below average, very small town; Los Angeles Ca. just over 1-1/2 times average; Canaan, NH very rural nonviolent area; Spartanburg SC about 135% above average; 9 more than double including 6,4,3,3,3,3; 18 total above average; 3 of remaining below average cites border much more violent cities.
Conclusion: based on this small sampling and the fact that at least one other violent city, Columbus Ohio, has more than their share of police killing civilians, it's reasonable to assume that if we reduce the long term causes of all violence, not only will that violence be reduced, but so will confrontations with the police and killing of civilians by police, or killing of police. This small review reinforces what we should have been able to figure out anyway.
Teenager Ma’Khia Bryant is 34th person fatally shot by police in Columbus since 2015 04/21/2021 Over twice average murder rate, about 70%-80% higher rate of civilians killed by police.
Deputy who shot Black man appears to mistake phone for gun 04/24/2021
Homicides in N.J. soared 23% in 2020. What caused the spike? 12/31/2020 In Newark, the state’s most populous city, 51 homicides occurred in 2020 as of Dec. 30 — the same number the city had in 2019, officials said. https://www.facebook.com/vic.hurtowy/posts/10218032513275408 Community organizations are doing great things on the ground in Newark... (Newark NJ, Richmond Ca. and even New Orleans were among the most violent cities in the country, however, following major reforms they all had large improvements, although they still have a lot more to do, especially New Orleans.)
Newark NJ cops, with reform, didn’t fire a single shot in 2020 | Tom Moran 01/11/2021
US policing is far less about fighting crime than controlling the poor 04/25/2021 By Kenan Malik https://www.facebook.com/groups/691191591636851/permalink/952184098870931/
Joe Biden declares 'enough prayers' in announcing new gun control plan 04/08/2021
3 Ways the 1994 Crime Bill Continues to Hurt Communities of Color 05/10/2019
The 1994 Crime Bill Continues to Undercut Justice Reform—Here’s How to Stop It 03/26/2019
The Complex History of the Controversial 1994 Crime Bill 04/14/2016
Mass shooting surge reaches at least 20 since the metro Atlanta spa attacks left 8 dead 04/01/2021
