It’s the guns, stupid
un problem
In his Thursday letter, Robert Hodges concludes that the main cause of mass shootings in our country is mental illness and is unrelated to our gun policies. Really?
We currently suffer about 30,000 gun-related deaths each year. We have about 300 gun-related mass killings annually. This is more than all of our European allies combined. The rate of mental illness in the United States is no greater than other advanced Western nations (although, due to legislation passed earlier this year, we now allow people with mental illness to legally purchase guns).
So if the big difference between us and the other advanced Western nations is not the frequency of mental illness but the frequency of gun ownership and the ease with which guns can be purchased, the issue in the United States is not a mental illness problem. It is a gun problem.
