I just don't understand why in the 50s and 60s these shootings were extremely rare.

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because the society was so high-trust

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in the 50s and 60s?

I think cultural atomization and decay has played a part in it, but it's important to remember that virtually all of these guys would have been involuntarily locked in a mental institution sixty years ago.

We'd see less of these mass shootings if social media and 24-hour news media weren't around rather than guns. Abstraction from reality, egocentrism and the desire to be famous are characteristics of modern America that social media and round the clock news fuels.

US population went from about 100MM then to about 330MM now.

Throw in the active efforts to erode societal connections among Americans and, well...

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What happened?

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Lyndon Baines Johnson.

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Back when divorce was rare, and feminism hadn't destroyed marriage.

America was 90% Caucasian/Christian.

The Left tells me all of the above conditions were "the bad old days" yet we didn't create mass-murdering spree-killers by the dozens every year.

Kids could play in their neighborhoods without constant supervision because the society was so high-trust and people were so decent.

What happened?

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I agree with all the degradation of society arguments.

But there is a constant drumbeat of "it's the left" "it's minorities" "it's the atheists."

Plenty of shitty parents are white, Republican and go to church. Plenty of worthlessly irresponsible people are in those categories. Hell, I've got them in my extended family.

I'm not at all opposed to talking about how the absence of faith, the nuclear family, etc. have impacted society. But I don't think you can limit this conversation to those issues.

Social engineering has failed this country.

not directed at you Salmon, just making a post..

You can do many things rather than shoot up kids.

I mean, the rate of total crime is reaching mid-1960 levels, with that rate cut nearly in half from its 1980 high. The violent crime rate has been dropping significantly as well, down from a high of 758.1 per 100000 in 1991 to 397.1 per 100,000 in 2016.

The mass shooting issue, in my view, is very much tied in with social media, and how that media affects people who have not developed completely. That is a much more complicated issue than tying mass shooters to social degradation at large. I'd also argue that the rate of technological progress has created culture lag to the degree that can't be discounted when discussing mass-shooting events.

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You already know. We kicked God out of society, now we reap what we sow.

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This