The number of mass shootings in the United States is increasing once again, and other nations are taking note.
At least seven countries have warned their nationals against visiting the United States, citing grave safety concerns in recent years. Due in significant part to gun violence, New Zealand, Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom, France, Venezuela, and Uruguay have all advocated caution for visitors to the United States.
In the first weekend of May, a 33-year-old shooter opened fire at a crowded mall in the Dallas area, killing eight people and injuring at least seven others before being shot dead by police. According to authorities, a convicted sex offender shot and murdered his wife, her three children, and two of their acquaintances the weekend prior before turning the gun on himself in Oklahoma. And just two days before to that, a family begged a guy to cease shooting shots in the air as a baby attempted to go asleep. The man then fired and murdered five neighbors, including a 9-year-old kid. After a protracted search that lasted many days, the alleged shooter was captured.
Is there an issue with guns or crime?
According to the Gun Violence Archive, which classifies a mass shooting as an occurrence in which four or more people are hurt or killed, excluding the gunman, there have been more than 200 mass shootings in the United States so far this year. Although the number of mass shootings decreased marginally in 2022, since 2018 the number of mass shootings has increased by around 100 year. In reality, there have been more than 600 mass shootings in the United States during the last three years, or approximately two per day.
“A reason to be concerned”
Simon Hudson, a professor of tourism at the University of South Carolina, said to Yahoo News that if people feel unsafe in the United States, they won’t go there. The United States is ranked 129th out of 163 nations by the 2022 Global Peace Index, which evaluates 23 quantitative and qualitative variables to determine how peaceful a nation is. This places it just above Brazil.
As a result of this rating, Hudson said, “it is a cause for concern for any country seeking to attract people to live, work, and play.”
