Being Reactive is Not Working
It has become almost habitual to see a story about a mass murder or mass shooting in the news every week. So far, in 2025, there have been a total of 48 mass shootings (Mass Shooting Tracker, 2025). As of writing this on February 24, it has been two days since the last one. In our schools, we teach our children to hide and stay quiet. As adults, we have become so traumatized that we jump at the sound of a muffler popping or instinctually running away if we see others doing the same. Every time a new event occurs, the police apologize and say they did their best, and politicians offer their condolences and point their fingers. We create solutions after the problem has happened, but at that point, the damage is done. Instead of causing trauma and creating new victims, we need to encourage proactive solutions instead of putting a band-aid on the problem after somebody has been shot.
There are a few ideas that could be implemented that could prevent mass shootings from occurring. In our society, we are afraid of sharing information if we think it can hurt someone or ourselves. What we can begin to do is encourage people who witness concerning behaviors from people that they know to report it. Often, those who commit mass shootings display four to five concerning behaviors, such as leaking information about what they are going to do or expressing problematic behaviors (Silver, Simons, Craun, 2018). By destigmatizing the idea of going to law enforcement or similar entities to express concerning information, it could prevent more mass shootings from happening. Another idea is better training for law enforcement to identify concerning behaviors. Because of the way the media portrays mass shooters, people have created a profile or typology in their minds as to what a mass shooter looks like. This can cause law enforcement to become tunneled visioned, ignoring other information and behaviors. By improving training for law enforcement, they will be better prepared if there is a situation where there may be a credible threat.
As it stands, gun violence is the number one cause of death for children and teens in America (John Hopkins, 2024). The number of mass shootings has been steadily increasing every year, leading to more and more people dying or becoming victimized (Rockefeller Institute of Government). Current efforts are clearly not working, and by doing nothing, we are telling the families and survivors that their trauma and pain mean nothing. By becoming more proactive in our strategies, we can better anticipate and prevent mass shootings from occurring and thus prevent further generations from experiencing the trauma of living in a society where a mass shooting can happen at any time or place.
Johns Hopkins . (2024, September 12). Guns remain leading cause of death for children and teens. Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. https://publichealth.jhu.edu/2024/guns-remain-leading-cause-of-death-for-children-and-teens
Mass Shooting Tracker. (2025). Mass shooting tracker. https://massshootingtracker.site/
Rockefeller Institute of Government. (2023, September 18). Mass shooting factsheet. https://rockinst.org/gun-violence/mass-shooting-factsheet/
Silver, J., Simons, A., Craun, S. (2018, June). A Study of the Pre-Attack Behaviors of Active Shooters in the United States. FBI.
One comment
I totally agree that any number of mass murders is too many, so we need to be better at preventing them from happening in the first place rather than continuing to explain what we missed or how we could have been better. I also absolutely agree that the first step should be developing an alternate route for people to take when they have identified a concerning behavior in a loved one that needs to be reported. Just as there are good samaritan laws to protect active bystanders from getting in trouble when reporting a crime, there should be some layer of protection to avoid failure to share information based on fear. A few major misconceptions I’ve learned about in this course… this is not necessarily a mental health issue. Some of those who commit murder may have underlying mental health issues, but many do not. However, mental illness is not solely the issue. Also, changing gun laws does not change how many guns are already existing in our communities. In sum, it is not simply a mental health issue or a gun control issue. I believe getting youth involved in the community at an early age and fostering a sense of belonging is a great way to begin preventing these tragedies. John Silver’s AI threat assessment was also eye-opening in terms of a proactive approach to preventing mass murder.