Last summer I was at a dinner in London. The crowd was mostly composed of Americans and Brits. Britain had just voted for Brexit, and since it was also an election year in the States, politics and other cultural issues were natural topics of conversation.
Eventually, gun violence in America came up. The British book editor sitting next to me said, "I don't understand guns in America. It makes no sense to me." The other non-Americans all agreed.
My fellow Americans and I at the table were at a loss for words. The only answer that was given by an American was, "Neither do we."
The Las Vegas shooting was the deadliest mass shooting in American history. The Brady Campaign states that there was an average of 11,500 deaths per yearbetween 2011 and 2015. According to the Gun Violence Archive, there have already been more than 11,000 deaths in the United States caused by gun violence in 2017.
Compare that to the average one death of an American per year at the hands of Islamic extremists. Beyond Otto Warmbier, how many Americans have been killed in the last decade due to North Korea? I had a hard time finding any.
And yet here at home, when thousands die each year, when almost 60 people can be killed and 500 injured by another American with firearms, nothing will be done.
Kevin Necessary is the editorial cartoonist for WCPO. His opinions are not those of WCPO.
