Blame everything but

Several recent pieces place blame for increased gun violence on our present culture and declining family values. Since no data was offered to support this theory, the FBI UCRS covering the years 1960-2016 was consulted. If gun violence has increased dramatically, we should see a similar increase in the violent crime and murder rates.

From 2000 to 2016 the violent crime rate ranged from 372.6 to 506.5 per 100,000 population. Murder rates for the same period ranged from 4.4 to

5.8. How do these rates compare to those of the golden age of Reagan/Bush before the alleged big change in our culture and family values? From 1981-1993 the violent crime rate ranged from 538.1 to 758.2 with the high being almost double that of 2016 (386.3). Murder rates ranged from 7.9 to 9.8 for same period, again with the high almost double the rate of 2016 (5.4). If the changes in our culture and family values have had an effect on gun violence and associated violent crime and murder rates, it was to lower them.

For 2017 the Brennan Center for Justice reports: “Despite recent increases, rates of murder and violent crime remain at historic low points, almost 50 percent below their early 1990s peaks. A preliminary analysis of 2017 crime rates in the nation’s 30 largest cities projects that the overall crime rate and the violent crime rate will decline to the second-lowest levels since 1990.”

It seems conservatives will blame anything but guns for gun violence. Semper fi.

KENNETH R. WEBER

Bella Vista