The killing of 10 black people by a gun-toting white teenager in Buffalo, New York, indicates that not much has changed in the US even two years after a nationwide outrage over George Floyd’s murder had revitalized the Black Lives Matter movement. ‘Terrorism, terrorism, domestic terrorism,’ that’s how US President Joe Biden has described the Buffalo incident, while the authorities have termed it an act of ‘racially motivated violent extremism’. In a strongly worded statement, Biden has condemned white supremacists, the media, the Internet and politics for spreading racist conspiracy theories. The assailant was reportedly using social media to convince netizens about the ‘Great Replacement’ theory, which contends that white people are being deliberately replaced by minorities through immigration in the US and elsewhere.

Violence incited or perpetrated by white supremacists is regarded as one of the biggest terror threats the US is facing, but the country is not doing enough to stem the rot. Instead, the alarming trend of ‘copycat’ gunmen getting influenced by previous massacres and carrying out deadlier mass shootings appears to be on the rise. Online radicalization is fanning the flames of racial intolerance and injustice – two monstrous evils rooted in America’s troubled history. Even as various minorities in the US have been targeted after the 9/11 attacks, African-Americans continue to comprise the most vulnerable group.

The rate of gun deaths in America rose by 35 per cent in 2020 to the highest point since 1994. With the gun lobby holding sway, the US is way ahead of other countries in terms of the scale of firearm possession. Its ratio is at least 120 firearms per 100 residents, significantly higher than what it was a decade ago (88:100). Americans are using guns not only to kill others but also to end their own lives. A 2016 study published in the American Journal of Public Health found a strong link between gun ownership and firearm suicide rates. Gun laws, racism, mental health — these issues are inseparable and the US badly needs a multi-pronged strategy to ensure the safety of its citizens. The superpower should first set its own house in order.

(Tribune, India)