Most Americans are still reeling from the recent shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
Perhaps the only thing more horrifying, is that it was the 27th school shooting to happen in the United States in 2022.
And even worse, at least eight further mass shootings occurred in the wake of Robb Elementary.
Though far too many of our most prominent politicians refuse to acknowledge it, gun violence is a systemic problem which seems to be uniquely American.
A problem which politicians seem unwilling to even try to solve.
Redditor hostofanimus was curious to hear from his fellow Redditors what they think it would finally take to finally put an end to mass shootings in the USA, leading them to ask:
"What will it take for it to stop mass shootings in America?"
It will never happen.
"Impossible."
"The amount of guns in the country + root individualistic society + rampant access to the internet breeding highly radicalized echo chambers + media sensationalism + poor financial and mental health opportunities = disaster."
"I'm all for doing something new, but there is no clear cut answer."
"Einstein couldn't solve this one."- gandaalf
"If nothing happened after Sandy Hook, nothing will happen now."- sokratesz
"Nothing changed the last time children barely older than toddlers were shot."
"Nothing will change this time."- good_god_lemon1
When people pay up.
"When stopping mass shootings can be monetized."- Ezaccly
When people get up off their butts.
"Nothing that anyone is actually willing to do, obviously."- tigerpayphone.
A universal rebirth
"A complete culture change."- Puzzleheaded-Pipe-39
When we start properly educating our children.
"I grew up in South Africa and went to some pretty crap schools filled with some of the dregs of society."
"We had underpaid teachers who didn’t really care etc."
"I was skateboard kid who was seen as a freak due to skating and liking metal and 'other; music."
"I took my fair share of beatings from the bullies at school and outside of school but I never ever had a desire to walk into school and murder the bullies or teachers or anyone else for that matter."
"I think the problem in America is much bigger than a weird kid going mad."
"It’s got to be societal for anyone to harbor that much hate for life."
"Just my honest opinion and from my perspective."- eary_Violinist_3610
Coupons.
"They used to handout free personal sized pizza coupons for reading books when I was in elementary school, maybe we can do something like that?"- anonymous152839.
When it starts being reported like the problem it is.
"First and foremost, stop treating it like a soap opera."
"The news channels detail and go over so much on these shootings it isn't reporting, it's entertainment."
"It's become so mainstream that at this point I just shrug and go 'oh, another one, whatever'."
"I'll hear about it for another few months, then some other kid will glorify it cause tv and do it himself because he needs the attention and monkey see monkey do, it's obvious how to get that attention from as many people as possible all at once."
"The problem is much deeper than this and takes people more qualified than I to solve, but this is where it starts."- shippwnyo
When people actually see the damage done.
"This will sound horrific, but photos of the crime scene."
"Yes, of the dead children."
"Vietnam’s trajectory was heavily influenced by the press being able to capture the atrocities committed/experienced by our own."
"Think about the most famous photos- we all know the ones."
"I’m thinking of the gun to the man’s head in the street as I type,or the teenage girl screaming over her dead friend at Kent State."
"Compare that to what photos we have of Iraq."
"Very little."
"And how does this difference in documentation affect the American psyche?"
"We see one war, documented well, with few secrets. the other shrouded by 'heroic' photos of soldiers with children in their arms."
"Right now, the photos we have of shootings are at a distance in the aftermath, or are of memorials where people cry together."
"It creates a distance in everyone’s mind, even a sense of inevitability because we have seen it so many times."
"Both in our collective minds, and that of politicians."
"We can ignore dead children because we have never had to see them actually lying dead, covered in blood, perhaps eyes open and staring at nothing."
"Its horrific for me to even type, the reality of what it might look like."
"But yet we openly wax philosophically online about the horrors that the families experience in the aftermath, not about a five-year-old, covered in blood, with a bullet in their chest."
"Why?"
"it's too horrific to even say, right?"
"And it will keep happening until we actually have to literally look at it."- plots4lyfe
That one horrific school shooting wasn't enough to legislate change over gun control in this country is shocking.
Making it very dispiriting indeed to wonder if this change, which must happen, will ever come.
Want to "know" more?
Sign up for the Knowable newsletter here.
Never miss another big, odd, funny, or heartbreaking moment again.
@LeeMerrittesq/X
@bob_moss/X
@jelanijones/Bluesky
@Aurkayne/X
@sadcommunistdog; @froglok/Bluesky