Thread by @d_feldman

The younger folks may not know this, but: before Columbine in 1999, school shootings were not a thing anyone worried about.

There were 2 school shootings in 1998, killing 5 and 4 students. But before that, to find one with more than 2 victims, you have to go back to 1992 (when there were also two school shootings, killing 3 and 4). Then 1991 (6 killed at University of Iowa)...

There were a handful in the 80s, most by adult strangers (not students) and killing a couple of students each time

Then before that, one in the 70s (again at a university), 2 in the 60s (both at universities), zero in the 50s, 1 in the 40s, 0 in the 1900s-1930s...

A couple in the 1890s by adult shooters...

Then before that you have to go back to *1764* when 11 students were killed in a war with the Lenape in Pennsylvania (and the US didn't exist yet, and it was an ongoing war)

Of course there were occasional incidents where students were murdered -- usually part of gang violence, and usually not IN school but near school, and usually only one. Still unacceptable, but not as scary for kids in general.

Post Columbine, there have been 31 school shootings that killed more than 2 people. More than one a year.

I was in school when Columbine happened. Within a year, the school put in locking metal doors that automatically closed, and a two-way intercom system to every classroom. The school didn't have enough *chairs* for every student so this was a massive expense.

The anniversary of Columbine was a very scary time. Some random kid graffitied a message that he was going to do a repeat. For an entire *WEEK*, 3/4 of the students didn't even show up to school. It took a lot of coaxing over more weeks to get the school functional again.

There was no shooting, fortunately. Just a threat. But that illustrates how disruptive the threat can be.

So why does this keep happening?

Every single time, conservatives have blamed some random cause. Violent movies like The Matrix, video games, music, ambiguous "mental health", SSRIs, phones....

But every other country has those things. And they don't have school shootings.

The difference is that kids have access to guns.

Not just any guns, but high-powered rifles that can kill a large number of people very quickly.

Assault weapon sales were banned from 1994-2004, which probably delayed the onslaught a few years.

So how do we stop school shootings?

The NRA (funded by Russia) and the Supreme Court (funded by billionaires) have made any gun control impossible for the forseeable future.

You can increase the penalties for parents who let their kids have guns (and we should)

and require rifles in particular to be locked up. But that's trying to prevent a rare but devastating event through half-measures. Like if we tried to stop house fires by banning candles. It might help a little, but it's probably unenforceable and won't help a lot.

I don't have any answers.

I do know that other countries look at us in horror and wonder how we could do this to our kids. (Not just the shootings but the constant fear of them.)

And if we ever do find a solution, history will judge us too.

BTW, please don't reply with conspiracy theories or non-factual comments. I'll just block you.

If you want to argue that we really need to hunt deer more effectively using AR-15s, and that is worth the price of a bunch of dead children every year, that's fine.

There is literally zero evidence that SSRIs or trans kids are related in any way to school shootings. That is a hateful conspiracy theory.

If you want to blame the media... eh, it probably is responsible for part of the problem, but we have a First Amendment too.