Murder Rates are Rising Sharply! Is Gun Reform the Answer?

 

By: Renaldo C. McKenzie, And Jennifer Caine. April 10, 2022, The Neoliberal Post/ renaldocmckenzie.com

Gun-related deaths (murder via the use of firearms only) are not at their peak levels since 1979- 1981: 6.3 percent (per 100, 000 people) of the population of the US and 7.0 percent between 1988-1992. However, the data suggests that gun-related deaths are climbing back to their peak levels since 2014/2015, from their low levels of 4.0 percent between 1996-2013/14. Prior to that there were some sharp fluctuations in the murder-rate between 1981-1996 where the rates fell drastically from 6.3 to around 4.8 percent between 1981 to 1984, followed by a steady rise to 7.1 percent from 1984 – 1994/5. In 1996, the rates started to fall again and by 1999, the gun-related murder-rates fell to an all-time low of about 3.9 percent (per 100, 000 people) of the population, which carried over into 1997-2013 with no major rise or fall. Until 2016 to now, where murder rates are rising and are climbing back up to their peak levels. 

Nevertheless, the Pew research article, and study that I am referencing, suggests from their study a skewed conclusion based on a misreading of their study and data, or probably it’s bad analysis. According to John Gramlich of the Pew Research Center: “More Americans died of gun-related injuries in 2020 than in any other year on record, according to recently published statistics from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That included a record number of gun murders, as well as a near-record number of gun suicides. Despite the increase in such fatalities, the rate of gun deaths – a statistic that accounts for the nation’s growing population – remains below the levels of earlier years,” (Gramlich, John, “Gun deaths in the U.S.: 10 key questions answered | Pew Research Center,” Feb. 3, 2022).

It is true that the 2020 levels are below the earlier years, but what years is he talking about… 1998 – 2018? Because the data he presents here suggests as outlined above that the murder-rate in that period was around 3.5 – 4.5 percent. Unless he is referencing 1988-1994 where the rates rose steadily (with slight fluctuations) from 4.5 to 6.0 percent between 1985 – 1987/88. And we will not include years prior to 1979/1980, as those years data were inflated to include the use of explosives, and as the data notes suggested, the CDC and FBI do not include that in their data since 1979 and only include the use of firearms. 

In fact, and what is alarming is that the data suggests something that has not happened in the past, a sudden and sharp upward trend with a graphical line that isn’t sloping but is almost vertical in terms of the graphical representation of the increase in murder rates today. If you look at the graph, prior to 2017-2018, the changes in murder rates are represented by a steady or curvy slope. But between 2017/2018 to 2020/21 the increase is sharp and sudden and represented by a straight line that is almost vertical rising from 4.5 to 6.2 percent in just 2 to three years and climbing. (Interestingly enough, Suicides accounts for most of the gun-related deaths in the US.) 

Therefore, Gramlich’s conclusion here that “Despite the increase in such fatalities, the rate of gun deaths – a statistic that accounts for the nation’s growing population – remains below the levels of earlier years,” (ibid) is misleading as it does not account for periods where the rates were lower and even years where the data included other weapons, explosives, which must be accounted for when making judgments based on comparative analysis about the data. 

This brings us to the question, as to how we were able to bring and keep the rates down between 1998 to 2016? What policies on gun reform did they apply?

We can answer that question, for the policies regarding gun reform, have not changed much, as this issue has become a political issue between democrats and republicans, liberals and conservatives, moderates and extremists, gun owners and victims-of-gun-related-crimes. Depending on where or which side you’re on in these groups, will determine your position on gun reform. But the divide is exemplary and gun owners are unwilling to give up or adjust their Second Amendment right, “the right to bear arms.” Which is an American right that is derived within a time when their independence was threatened by England. Thus, the amendment ensures that every American was able to protect state, country and their new national sovereignty and freedoms. (In retrospect, in war time, countries arm their citizens as a means of and to provide an extra layer of military defense. For example: in Ukraine, so to protect them from the Russian invaders who are advancing on their territory, the government armed their citizens making weapons accessible.) 

Comparatively, America is not at war, however, Americans have become in love with their guns and guns have become no longer a thing to protect country, but to sport, hunt, make profit or to commit gun-rated crimes. Therefore, before we rush to any action to apply gun reform, we may need to revisit those years and explore any correlational factors on the ground that may have caused the change as gun reform laws were not one of them. 

Yet, Gun reform and liberal lobbyists are still pushing for gun reform. In fact, a recent Politico article entitled: “A Year In, President Biden’s Bold Gun Reform Agenda Remains Largely Aspirational,” written by Chip Brown Lee suggested that “Gun reform advocates who supported Biden have been frustrated by the president’s failure to get any significant reform legislation through a Democratic Congress,” (Lee, Year In, President Biden’s Bold Gun Reform Agenda Remains Largely Aspirational, Jan. 5, 2022, What Happened to Biden’s Progressive Gun Reform Agenda?).

The article goes on to say that: “Many gun reform advocates say they are disappointed by how little Biden has accomplished in his first term. His record pales in comparison to the expansive agenda he ran on in 2020. He had promised, amid a surge in gun violence, to enact sweeping overhauls that gun reform advocates like Oliver supported. Biden’s gun agenda was central to his campaign, and distinguished him from competitors like Senator Bernie Sanders, which raised expectations even higher. Leaders of major gun reform groups predicted that his first year in office, with Democrats also controlling Congress, would be an unprecedented period of progress. Now Democrats are expected to take losses in the House and Senate midterm elections — and Biden could be running out of time,” (ibid).

But Biden has been slow to apply any more gun reform that already exists because he shares my opinions and the opinions of many others who believe that: “Gun Control Reform Does not Control Crime and Violence; It Only Makes People More Creative!” In fact, that’s the title of an article/blog I published in https://RenaldoCMckenzie.Blogspot.com, April 9, 2021. I stated that:

WASHINGTON –  President Joe Biden unveiled his first major steps to address gun violence on Thursday, directing his administration to tighten restrictions on so-called ghost guns, or untraceable weapons that can be constructed from parts purchased online (Read the Executive Action Here). However, no more gun reform that limits the access to guns can stop or reduce gun violence. All this will do is to create an underground gun—market that will drive up the price of guns and criminalize more (black) young men whose “gun love” is facilitated by the video game #GrandTheftAuto. Visit Jamaica and see what their restrictive gun control policy has achieved; nothing but an underground market where guns are exchanged for drugs, and or make—shift guns become the new method of obtaining or using a gun. If you want to reduce gun—violence, limiting gun access either reduces gun-related killings done by a legal weapon and increases the use of illegal weapons in killings so that the authorities will now experience more difficulties to track down perpetrators of gun violence, since any new gun control policy creates an informal and an underground industry (Black Market).

Solution: What needs to happen is for us to think about controlling crime and violence, not a particular tool of violence and crime such as guns. What is it that makes people hurt other people? It’s not the gun, it’s just the means to the end. So, let’s think about the end not the means so that we are not creating problems by applying policies that “projects” blame on (guns) a tool of MAN to carry out their heinous thoughts. Further, any Executive and legislative action that relies on a Gun—Impact Study is a waste and does not provide a basis for gun reform. Impacts and effects do not tell us how to minimize the rationale that creates a situation where legal guns are used which we know are already impactful. If guns are not used, then something else such as Suicide bombers, machetes and other weapons provide the same impact. On 9/11, they used knives to hi-jack the planes and then used the planes to collide in the Twin Towers which was just as impactful. So, let’s not be reactive and project our problems of crime on guns only to limit it so that more creative means are available to criminals to access guns to kill which then limits the ability of authorities to investigate crimes or killings using “trace and search” (McKenzie, Renaldo, Gun Control Reform Does Not Control Crime and Violence; It Only Makes People More Creative! http://renaldocmckenzie.blogspot.com/2021/04/gun-control-reform-does-not-control.html).

In addition, we need to look at the psychology of the impact or effects of video games, popular music and social media on children. Most of the gun-related crimes today are being committed by young men below the age of 26. If you study the data, it suggests that murder rates before 2013 were at least steady and or way below past years even with the financial crisis of 2008 – 2013. Coupled with that is the rise in social media, access to information, and more violent games that glorify and promote guns and gun-related crimes. The new kids who are now being primarily socialized by social media and video games instead of the church/mosques and responsible adult family homes with guidelines and principles. They are now committing majority of the crimes even without the use of legal guns, the data suggests (based on my analysis of the data). 

Further, most of the murders are occurring in poor black and brown communities that have been ravaged by COVID and have become the epicenters of the opioid crisis. Businesses were shut down and many relied heavily on welfare, covid-stimulus and unemployment benefits which also became a main source of contention in these communities as they fight over these benefits. Yet they weren’t enough to keep many of these families going given the economic fallout on these communities. In fact, if you look at the poverty and income figures since 2014, they have been worsening which correlates with the sharp increase in gun-related crimes, because prior to 2014, there has been consecutive years of increases in household median incomes and declines in the number of people in poverty in the US while at the same time the data suggests that gun-related murders were at their lowest rates. 

In SEPT. 14, 2021 — The U.S. Census Bureau announced “that median household income in 2020 decreased 2.9% between 2019 and 2020, and the official poverty rate increased 1.0 percentage point. Meanwhile the percentage of people with health insurance coverage for all or part of 2020 was 91.4%. An estimated 8.6% of people, or 28.0 million, did not have health insurance at any point during 2020, according to the 2021 Current Population Survey Annual Social and Economic Supplement (CPS ASEC). Median household income was $67,521 in 2020, a decrease of 2.9% from the 2019 median of $69,560. This is the first statistically significant decline in median household income since 2011. Between 2019 and 2020, the real median earnings of all workers decreased by 1.2%, while the real median earnings of full-time, year-round workers increased 6.9%. The total number of people with earnings decreased by about 3.0 million, while the number of full-time, year-round workers decreased by approximately 13.7 million. The official poverty rate in 2020 was 11.4%, up 1.0 percentage point from 2019. This is the first increase in poverty after five consecutive annual declines. In 2020, there were 37.2 million people in poverty, approximately 3.3 million more than in 2019,” (Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the U.S.: 2020).

In closing, if we are to truly deal with crime, we may not need to first reform gun laws but fix issues of poverty and income distribution and how our kids are being socialized. The data we referenced above seems to suggest that while poverty and income figures are worsening, so too is the social decay resulting in rising crimes and violence. What needs to happen is for us to think about controlling crime and violence, not a particular tool of violence and crime such as guns. What is it that makes people hurt other people? It’s not the gun, it’s just the means to the end. So, let’s think about the end not the means so that we are not creating problems by applying policies that “projects” blame on (guns) a tool of MAN to carry out their heinous thoughts. ‪Just so you know Guns don’t kill people. People kill people, using various means they create. If they can’t find a gun they will become creative & use something else. So don’t think gun reform will lower murder rates. We’re looking at the wrong things. (Video games, music, poverty‬.)

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I will end by sharing the lyrics of the number 10 song in the 2021 Music Billboards and No. 1 Rap song on the 2021 billboards entitled, “Back in Blood,” which means “having or wanting to keep something or someone that you will not lose them or it, so you’ll fight till the end for example: murder aka back in “blood,” or simply put “to murder something/someone,” and or “getting revenge through means of physical harm, usually referring to homicide,” (Urban Dictionary, “Back in Blood“, accessed April 10, 2022 at 3:19pm via https://urbandictionary.com): See lyrics below.

This article will also be available in The Neoliberal Post via https://renaldocmckenzie.com or https://theneoliberal.com and The Neoliberal Round Podcast later this evening:

“Smurk (hmm, hmm, big blrrd, hmm, hmm-mmm, huh, uh-uh) Long way, learned somethin’ back from this shit (mmm, mmm) (Turn me up, YC, turn me up, YC, turn me up, YC) Yeah, I get in this sh*t in blood, homie (mmm, mmm-mmm) B*tch, I got my own fire, don’t need security in the club (no) All the woofin’ on the net (net), nigga, I thought you was a thug. I ain’t got nowhere to go, I shot up everywhere they was (blrrd). Yeah, you ain’t know who took that shit from you (blrrd, blrrd). Come get it back in blood, blrrd, blrrd, bitch, come get it back in blood (big blrrd). We ain’t mask up, no dodge your ex (no), niggas know who it was (f**k’ em). Extortin’ shit just like the 80s, once I’m back, get it in blood (ayy, on God). Yeah, you know who took that shit from you (ayy), come get it back in blood (big blrrd, blrrd). If yo’ nigga killer ain’t dead, you shouldn’t wear no R.I.p., shirt (no). We had three hundred shots up in the car before we picked up Durk (three hunnid). Three niggas, who ain’t got shit goin’, go, grab a glizzy, get alert (‘lert). Shiesty G, post, R.I.p. (blrrd), wherever he is, he in the dirt (slime, blrrd, blrrd). You gotta know I go too far (let’s go). It’s two O’s up on this hunnied, one of them might stand for O’Block (blrrd). ‘Bout twenty some shots, left up in the K, fifteen still in the Glock (the glizzy). Keep my door unlock, and stop (stop, stall). I like gettin’ on feet, park the car, blrrd (park the car, blrrd). We gettin’ up close, do him dirty, I ain’t showin’ love (no). Eleven thousand, all ones, left my right pocket in the club (on God). These blue faces up on me, dirty, I went, got it out the mud (let’s go). If I took some, get it in blood (blrrd), I don’t give a f*ck what we was (blrrd, blrrd, blrrd). Bitch, I got my own fire, don’t need security in the club (blrrd, blrrd, big blrrd, no). All that woofin’ on the net (net), nigga, I thought you was a thug (what happened?). I ain’t got nowhere to go, I shot up everywhere they was (blrrd). Yeah, you know who took that shit from you (blrrd, blrrd). Come get it back in blood, blrrd, blrrd, b*tch, come get it back in blood (big blrrd). We ain’t mask up, no dodge your ex (no), niggas know who it was (Smurk, fuck ’em). Extortin’ shit just like the 80s (gang), once I’m back, get it in blood (on God). Yeah, you know who took that shit from you, come get it back in blood (let’s get it). Kilt yo’ mans, you keep on talkin’, better get that shit in blood. Give my shawty ‘nem a dub (yeah), and they gon’ walk inside this club (let’s get it). Hit his little ass with that switch (grrah), I bet that switch switch up his nerve. F**k the opps inside my city, lil’ bro put them in the mud (blrrdah). You can’t come back to your hood, huh? (No). He was dissin’ on my cousin, now his ass all in that ‘Wood, huh? (Boom, boom, boom). Book his ass, I wish he would come (p*ssy). V-roy pop up at that car with that new Glock (grrah, grrah), I wish he would run (grrah, grrah). His ass playin’, b*tch, I’m really icy (really icy). Pooh Shiesty, that’s my dawg, but, Pooh, you know I’m really shiesty (my nigga). You told all them OT niggas that you really slide? (P*ssy). Tell the truth about your gang, bitch, they really dyin’ (gang). B*tch, I got my own fire, don’t need security in the club (no). All that woofin’ on the net (net), nigga, I thought you was a thug. I ain’t got nowhere to go, I shot up everywhere they was (blrrd). Yeah, you know who took that sh*t from you (blrrd, blrrd). Come get it back in blood, blrrd, blrrd, b*tch, come get it back in blood (big blrrd). We ain’t mask up, no dodge your ex (no), niggas know who it was (fuck ’em). Extortin’ sh*t just like the 80s, once I’m back, get it in blood (on God). Yeah, you ain’t know who took that shit from you, come get it back in blood (b*tch). Blrrd. Come get it back in blood (blrrd, big blrrd),” (Source: LyricFind. Songwriters: Christopher Pearson / Durk Banks / Lontrell D. Williams. Back In Blood lyrics © Mime Music Worldwide, Smallbutbig Music Group, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC).

References

1. The US Census Bureau: Income, Poverty and Health Insurance Coverage in the U.S.: 2020).
2. Mckenzie, Renaldo. Gun Control Reform Does not Control Crime And Violence; It Only Makes People More Creative! http://renaldocmckenzie.blogspot.com/2021/04/gun-control-reform-does-not-control.html, Published, 4. 09. 2021).
3. Lee, Year In, President Biden’s Bold Gun Reform Agenda Remains Largely Aspirational, Jan. 5, 2022, What Happened to Biden’s Progressive Gun Reform Agenda?)
4. Gramlich, John, “Gun deaths in the U.S.: 10 key questions answered | Pew Research Center,” in the Pew Research Center, Feb. 3, 2022)
5. McKenzie, Renaldo, C. Neoliberalism, Globalization, Income Inequality, Poverty and Resistance. Charlotte: Palmetto. 2021.
6. Shiesty, Pooh. “Back in Blood.” LyricFind. Songwriters: Christopher Pearson / Durk Banks / Lontrell D. Williams. Back In Blood lyrics © Mime Music Worldwide, Smallbutbig Music Group, Sony/ATV Music Publishing LLC.
7. Urban Dictionary, “Back in blood”, accessed April 10, 2022, at 3:19pm via https://urbandictionary.com

This article was written by Rev. Renaldo C. McKenzie and first appeared in The Neoliberal Post.  Renaldo is pursuing his Doctor of Liberal Studies at Georgetown University and graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a Master of Philosophy in 2013 and a Master of Liberal Arts in 2011. Renaldo is the President of The Neoliberal Corporation, a “think tank” news commentary, social media, and publishing company that is “Serving the world today to solve tomorrow’s challenges.” Renaldo is also an Adjunct Professor and is working on another book entitled: “Privilege, Power, Position, Status, and Secrets to Unlocking Divine Intervention.” For more about Renaldo, visit his author’s page on KirkusReview, see link below, or visit renaldocmckenzie.com.

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