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More Than 100,000 Americans Are Victims of Gun Violence Each Year. What Happens to Those Who Survive?

  

Category:  News & Politics

Via:  krishna  •  5 years ago  •  43 comments

More Than 100,000 Americans Are Victims of Gun Violence Each Year. What Happens to Those Who Survive?
While we focus on the victims of mass shootings, survivors struggle with psychological trauma of their own. Especially when new horrors play on loop.

S E E D E D   C O N T E N T



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Connecticut State Police lead children from the Sandy Hook Elementary School immediately after the shooting Photo: AP Photo/Newtown Bee, Shannon Hick

When a bullet tears a jagged path through a body, it may end one life...and dramatically alter others: the friend who was standing right there, the neighbor who called for help, the girlfriend who rushed to the scene. Along with those who survive physical injuries, these are the living victims of gun violence in America, an epidemic that kills 35,000 each year and cripples countless more, both physically and mentally.

This growing group includes survivors of mass tragedies, like the one in Parkland, Florida, as well as anonymous victims of random shootings and domestic violence. Because while public massacres grab headlines (and indeed, more than 214,000 kids have experienced a school shooting since 1999), it’s the incidents we never hear about that disproportionately affect women. Nearly 1 million women alive today have been shot at by an intimate partner, according to one study.

Together, these victims represent a little acknowledged or studied diaspora of trauma. “An event like this shatters your belief that you’re safe in the world,” says Gerard Lawson, PhD, a licensed counselor and professor at Virginia Tech, who helped coordinate the counseling response to that school’s 2007 shooting.

Survivors can suffer nightmares, flashbacks, and sleeplessness. For some, this morphs into post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a condition that can linger for years, even decades.

RELATED STORY America's Children Go to School Waiting for Death


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Krishna
Professor Expert
1  seeder  Krishna    5 years ago

Some of the teachers are extremely traumatized. One, a friend of mine, hasn’t been able to come back to her classroom yet. I’m trying to help, but my husband has told me that I have to stop trying to solve everyone’s problems. I worry that once things slow down, I’ll break down in moments of quiet. I’ve already been through phases where I was numb and in shock, then totally upset and crying, then angry. There are so many emotions. You don’t know which one you’re going to get at any given time.

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
1.1  Buzz of the Orient  replied to  Krishna @1    5 years ago

Is that quoting the words of a victimized person?  If so, you should have used quotation marks or the name of the author.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
2  seeder  Krishna    5 years ago

12 years ago, at a nightclub, she was hit by a ricocheting bullet:

I never saw the gunman or heard shots fired. One minute, I was laughing with my cousin on the rooftop of the club; the next, I felt a vibration in my leg and fell to the ground.

The man standing next tome was shot three times. I was lying on my side on the ground, looking at him. He bled out before paramedics arrived. In that moment, I accepted that I was going to die. And I did, a little.

I lived in that night constantly for seven years. I would be in the shower or the car, and in my head, it’d be me on the floor, the man dying next to me. Any loud noise or argument would just flip a switch and send me into a complete panic. I felt like there was something wrong with me because I couldn’t just get over it.

Every new shooting felt like it validated my fears. After the Sandy Hook school shooting in 2012, I became really depressed. How can you move on when this is just constant? It felt like the country didn’t care, that it was chaos.

 
 
 
Enoch
Masters Quiet
2.1  Enoch  replied to  Krishna @2    5 years ago

Dear Friend Krishna: As a combat veteran, and one who does Chaplaincy at among other places the VA Hospital System I can attest to the fact that death isn't the worst thing that can happen to someone at a shooting scene. 

It is faster, but not the worst.

Peace and Abundant Blessings to Everyone.

Enoch.

 
 
 
It Is ME
Masters Guide
3  It Is ME    5 years ago

So what "SHOULD? be done ?

I'm more ascared of a friggin car driven by someone else, than I am of a gun.

Vote Beto…..he'll TAKE your gun. But the car.....well ….. "We actually NEED Killer Cars" !

#getridofcarsandsavetheplanet !

 
 
 
Paula Bartholomew
Professor Participates
3.2  Paula Bartholomew  replied to  It Is ME @3    5 years ago
So what "SHOULD? be done ?

That my friend is the $64,000 question.  It has been asked a thousand times and yet there seems to be no answer.

 
 
 
It Is ME
Masters Guide
3.2.1  It Is ME  replied to  Paula Bartholomew @3.2    5 years ago

I always find it funny when I hear about needing "Comprehensive Background Checks" as one of the end all's for solving the problem. Seems no one thinks about the info availability on those they are "checking" on. If the info isn't there, the "Check" comes back clear, so this "Comprehensive" word being thrown around,  is actually useless.

 
 
 
Snuffy
Professor Participates
3.2.2  Snuffy  replied to  It Is ME @3.2.1    5 years ago

Comprehensive is the new buzz word to say background checks on private party sales. There are some states that mandate a background check on private party gun sales but I would rather the federal government not go down that path. The federal government should not be involved in intrastate commerce which is exactly that that is. You know as well as I that as soon as they get a toe-hold in "managing" intrastate commerce they will expand on their grasp and eventually move to tax it in an effort to make another cash grab.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
3.2.3  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Paula Bartholomew @3.2    5 years ago
That my friend is the $64,000 question.  It has been asked a thousand times and yet there seems to be no answer.

Of course another way to look at it is that there many, many answers.

Many different "answers"-- but we can't get people to agree on which ones to implement!

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
3.2.5  seeder  Krishna  replied to    5 years ago

I could be wrong, but I predict that no meingful action will be taken in the near future.

Gun violence will continue to increase.

Eventually it will get to the point that so many people will have someone close to them murdered this way that the government will eventually be forced to act.

But IMO that won't be anytime soon.

(Which means, I'm begining to realize, that we are wasting our time even discussing it :-(

 
 
 
It Is ME
Masters Guide
3.2.6  It Is ME  replied to  Krishna @3.2.3    5 years ago
Of course another way to look at it is that there many, many answers.

There really is ONLY "ONE" answer, but only Beto was Stupid Enough to say it !

Even that wouldn't work. Ever see "Cocaine" on the shelf ? It's "ILLEGAL" and "BANNED", yet ….. there it is anyway !

 
 
 
Dean Moriarty
Professor Quiet
3.2.7  Dean Moriarty  replied to  Krishna @3.2.5    5 years ago

No it certainly won't be happening anytime soon because the murder rate is now about half of what it was in 1980. 

800

 
 
 
TTGA
Professor Silent
3.2.8  TTGA  replied to  Paula Bartholomew @3.2    5 years ago
It has been asked a thousand times and yet there seems to be no answer.

Of course there's an answer Paula.  It's just that none of the anti gun types want to exercise it because it would actually do something and cut into their political propaganda.

"The remedy for evil men is not the abrogation of the rights of law abiding citizens. The remedy for evil men is the gallows." -- Thomas Jefferson

I think that a few public hangings might get the message across to the scumbags who want to do mass shootings.

 
 
 
Freefaller
Professor Quiet
3.2.9  Freefaller  replied to  TTGA @3.2.8    5 years ago
I think that a few public hangings might get the message across to the scumbags who want to do mass shootings.

I've nothing against hanging them but doubt it would have any impact, these types are obviously simply not right in the head. 

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
4  Tacos!    5 years ago
gun violence in America, an epidemic that kills 35,000 each year

Oh! What dishonest garbage! 2/3 of that number is suicides. Characterizing that as part of an "epidemic" of "gun violence" is absurd. If that's where you start, everything that follows has zero credibility.

The garbage continues though:

more than 214,000 kids have experienced a school shooting since 1999

This very much implies that 214,000 kids have been shot, which of course is not true.

100,000 Americans Are Victims Of Gun Violence Each Year

No they aren't. Geez!

I'm not saying that gun violence isn't something we should be concerned with, but let's at least be honest with what we're talking about. If you start with exaggeration like this, it makes it hard to swallow whatever else it is you have to say.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
4.1  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Tacos! @4    5 years ago
more than 214,000 kids have experienced a school shooting since 1999
This very much implies that 214,000 kids have been shot, which of course is not true.

Nope. It does not imply that-- you are (erroneously) inferring that.

Because they have been there and experienced it. (I have never actually experienced a school shooting-- I've read about it, seen coverage on TV, etc). But being there and actually experiencing the situation-- perhaps seeing someone next to you die of gunshot wounds is an experience.

Different than reading about it or seeing it on the news.

And that's important.

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
4.1.1  Tacos!  replied to  Krishna @4.1    5 years ago
Because they have been there and experienced it.

Even with that definition, how do you suppose they have "experienced" the shooting? By actually seeing the shooter himself? I doubt it. By actually having shots fired at them personally? I doubt it. By seeing another human being shot or killed in front of them? Again, I doubt it. I suspect the numbers are more like the total enrollment at a school, whether a student was anywhere near the action or not, and whether they knew the victims or not. It may even be students in the same school district or town.

These numbers are inflated for dramatic effect, not sober analysis.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
4.1.2  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Tacos! @4.1.1    5 years ago

That has got to be one of the stupidiest comments I've seen here is a long time....

[Deleted]

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
4.1.3  Tacos!  replied to  Krishna @4.1.2    5 years ago
That has got to be one of the stupidiest comments I've seen here is a long time

 stupidiest ?

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
4.1.4  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Tacos! @4.1.3    5 years ago
That has got to be one of the stupidiest comments I've seen here is a long time
 stupidiest ?

Congratulations-- you just made an even stupiderer comment than your previous stoopid comment!

 
 
 
TTGA
Professor Silent
4.1.5  TTGA  replied to  Tacos! @4.1.3    5 years ago
 stupidiest ?

Tacos, usually I don't waste my time commenting on grammar or spelling errors, but, in this case, I will make the observation that being unable to pass Second Grade spelling is not a bar to posting on social media.  Hell, considering the shape our government is in now, it's not even a bar to getting elected to Congress.

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
4.1.6  Tacos!  replied to  Krishna @4.1.4    5 years ago

My respect for you evolves with each new comment. We are all richer for your contributions.

 
 
 
bugsy
Professor Participates
4.1.7  bugsy  replied to  Krishna @4.1    5 years ago

It is a little disingenuous. Most school districts consider a "school" shooting if it happens within a certain amount of feet around the school. Someone could have gotten shot in a home 2,000 feet from a school, and depending on the school's parameters, it could get reported as a "school" shooting.

 
 
 
bugsy
Professor Participates
4.1.8  bugsy  replied to  bugsy @4.1.7    5 years ago

A little clarity by left wing NPR.

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
5  Buzz of the Orient    5 years ago

I'm confused by the fact that the title of the seed says 100,000 are killed by gun violence each year and in the body of the seed it says there are 35,000 each year.

 
 
 
Dean Moriarty
Professor Quiet
5.1  Dean Moriarty  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @5    5 years ago

The title says victims not killed. 

2 | Gunshot – 80-95% chance of survival

If you take a shot to the head or the heart, you’re basically done (less than a nine percent chance of survival). But according to Dr. Vincent J.M. DiMaio, a former medical examiner who wrote a book on gunshot wounds, there’s a reason horror movie bad guys… and 50 Cent… can be shot repeatedly and live.

He found that 80 percent of the targets on the body are not fatal places to be shot. And if you’re shot and you get to a hospital with your heart still beating, there’s a 95 percent chance of survival. ( Source )

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
5.2  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @5    5 years ago
I'm confused by the fact that the title of the seed says 100,000 are killed by gun violence each year

Nope.  it does not!

Read it again-- perhaps a bit more slowly.

 
 
 
TTGA
Professor Silent
5.3  TTGA  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @5    5 years ago
I'm confused by the fact that the title of the seed says 100,000 are killed by gun violence each year and in the body of the seed it says there are 35,000 each year.

Actually Buzz, it says 100,000 are VICTIMS every year.  In this country, all you have to do to become a victim is feel upset, you don't have to actually be there when the violence takes place.  Feelings seem to have replaced thought in this society, and people want to use feelings as the basis for our laws.

What the article does not state is that, of the 35,000 killed, 2/3 are suicides.  I know that, from the distance you are viewing it, this seems like a very violent place.  Actually, the murder rates are quite low and have been going down for the last 20 years, but considering that while making the laws would not allow the invocation of FEELINGS and other emotional nonsense and would not fit the political propaganda.

 
 
 
Tacos!
Professor Guide
5.4  Tacos!  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @5    5 years ago

Careful, if you quibble with the way the numbers are presented, the seeder might find it "stoopid." 

 
 
 
Buzz of the Orient
Professor Expert
6  Buzz of the Orient    5 years ago

Ah, I see.  I took into consideration the second part of the title "What happens to those who survive?" to mean that "those" who survive were NOT included in the 100,000.  In other words I thought that the second part of the title was not speaking of the same persons as included in the first part of the title. I guess I was just emulating Shakespeare's Hamlet in that I thought too much upon the event.

I should have taken into consideration John Donne's Meditation XVII in which he writes that when a person dies, we all die a little. "Seek not for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee."  Donne was referring to the fact that in his time, the late 16th century to early 17th century, as there were no newspapers, radio or TV, when the church bell would ring it meant someone in the community had died, so the people of the community would go to the church to find out who died.  Donne wrote that it was unnecessary to do that because when one person dies, we all die a little.

The movie starring Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman, being an adaptation of Hemingway's masterpiece, For Whom The Bell Tolls, follows that theme, in that Cooper's character considered the plight of the Spanish Republicans to be his own, and he died proving it.

So the title is CORRECT in saying that MORE than 100,000 were victims, because when the 35,000 people were killed, we ALL died a little.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
6.1  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Buzz of the Orient @6    5 years ago
So the title is CORRECT in saying that MORE than 100,000 were victims, because when the 35,000 people were killed, we ALL died a little.

IMO the title is poorly worded.

There have been many articles about the horrors of these mass shootings-- and the terrible murders of those killed. So when we hear of the "victims" of these shootings, I suppose its natural to assume that the word "victims" refers to those killed.

But that's not what this article is about. (And that's why I thought it important to seed). There have been so many articles about one type of victim-- people who were actually murdered. But it seems the author wasn't clear enough in saying that the article isn't about that, but rather the other victims of the shootings-- those victims that were present, but survived.

Here's a quote:

While we focus on the victims of mass shootings, survivors struggle with psychological trauma of their own. Especially when new horrors play on loop.

So the article is actually about the "other type of victims"-- those that witnessed the terror of the shooting, but who survived.

 
 
 
Krishna
Professor Expert
6.1.1  seeder  Krishna  replied to  Krishna @6.1    5 years ago
psychological trauma of their own. Especially when new horrors play on loop.

I also wonder if the author's use of the word "loop" was understood by many readers? (Perhaps it should have been explained more clearly?)

 
 
 
freepress
Freshman Silent
7  freepress    5 years ago

Because no action has been taken and the number of victims has risen, the ripple effect on family members and friends has also risen to far greater numbers that will cause change to happen. If the gun lobbyists had only looked at this factor alone, something would have been done and the political will would have followed. Instead nothing has been done and now the families and survivors have grown so large that it will force the issue. 

 
 
 
Dean Moriarty
Professor Quiet
7.1  Dean Moriarty  replied to  freepress @7    5 years ago

If the total number of victims has risen it is because the population has nearly doubled in the last forty years. The actual percentage rate of getting shot has decreased significantly so it is less likely a person would be a victim or know a victim as compared to forty years ago. We are now about half as likely to be a victim or know a victim as compared to 1980. 

 
 

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