News compilation by New Cold War.org, Oct 3, 2017 (headline text is from The New Yorker)
The white privilege of the “lone wolf” shooter
By Shaun King, The Intercept, Oct 2, 2017 (with extensive, additonal reporting further below)
Last night, the United States experienced the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. At least 58 people are dead and over 500 more wounded. No, that’s not a typo: More than 500 were injured in one, single incident.
As tens of thousands enjoyed a music festival on the streets of Las Vegas, 64-year-old Stephen Paddock, of Mesquite, Nevada, was perched 32 floors above them in his Mandalay Bay hotel room. Paddock had 19 rifles and hundreds of rounds of ammo — supplies that are plentiful in a nation that has more guns than people. A few minutes after 10 p.m., Paddock opened fire on the unsuspecting crowd. They were sitting ducks.
No expensive wall along the Mexican border would’ve prevented this. No Muslim ban stopping immigrants and refugees from a few randomly selected countries from reaching our shores would’ve slowed this down.
Paddock, like the majority of mass shooters in this country, was a white American. And that simple fact changes absolutely everything about the way this horrible moment gets discussed in the media and the national discourse: Whiteness, somehow, protects men from being labeled terrorists…
Read the full article at the original weblink above.
Las Vegas shooting: festival crowd had nowhere to hide as hail of gunfire burst from hotel’s 32nd floor, by Rogert Mendick, The Telegraph, Oct 2, 2017
Was machine gun used in 10-minute killing spree?, by David Pugliese, Postmedia News, Oct 2, 2017
Las Vegas gunman Stephen Paddock was a millionaire retired accountant, high-stakes gambler and son of ‘psychopathic’ bank robber, Agence France Presse, Oct 2, 2017
Las Vegas, gun violence and the failing American state, by John Cassidy, The New Yorker, Oct 2, 2017
Trump being thrust into gun debate after Vegas shooting, by Annie Karni, Politico, Oct 2, 2017
Facebook and Google pledged to stop fake news. So why did they promote Las Vegas-shooting hoaxes?, LA Times, Oct 2, 2017
Russians, their guns and the state, by Matthew Bodner, The Moscow Times, April 28, 2016
How strict are Russian gun laws?, Quora, Aug 14, 2016
Murder rates per 100,000 population (2015), selected countries: Venezuela 57.2; Brazil 26.7; Mexico 16.3; Russia 11.3; United States 4.9; United Kingdom .92 (2014); China .74 . Source: United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (Wikipedia)
