My own view is that it is a combination of things, firstly there is the public acceptance of ever more violent games.
Before video games it was tv , before tv those darn dime novels. Just because it wasn't in paramount during the last generation does not mean it's the root. Every generation that experiances something new seems to place negative opinions on it.
I already know I will be that way in my later years, but that withstanding,
Fear of the next technological innovation often to leads to it being blamed for other ills of society.
May it contribute in some cases? Certainly, will it be shot down as much in 20 years? Doubt it. A syptom to some cases , not all.
Secondly the general acceptance of "Political Correctness" doesn't help either where gangs and other crazies have been able to expand and make huge profits from crime,
You have my hat in on that one, I can't agree more, this political correctness is intruding in policy of regards to what is benificial to society or not in terms of correctional legtristration all the way to firearm laws.
now effectively out numbering and out gunning the police, along with the fact that so many of the mentally ill have been released into the public to reduce government spending.
This is a strange one, from what I have seen in this country's law enforcement history in the last 30 years in particular, is that what you say was true to a degree as more voilent, but really infrequent outbursts of voilence such as the school massacres of the 90s, and this culminated in a way with the Hollywood Bank of America Incident.
But ever since 9/11, it seems that law enforcement sometimes can be deemed to over respond in some instances that did not result in voilence (Like False bank alarms and bomb threats that don't make national headlines.).
Some police departments in this country are contemplating anti material rifles... I do belief One non federal agency already has them.
As for federal agencies they can , and have federalized use of armored military vehicles from local National Gaurd units, and that was in instances before 9/11, I am not sure how policy has changed since.
Since 9/11 , the emergancy use of anti tank weapons were contemplated before the famous "Killdozer" instance, being that the driver committed suicide they were not necessitated.
Point is, the gap is closed. Assualt weapons and a variety of other measures are more readily availble to law enforcement nationwide in regards to these spikes in deadly crimes involving firearms.
I suppose it could be summed up by saying that the government, at the behest of the PC crowd has emasculated the agencies who once had the powers to protect us.
Some of the legistration that's been turned down in terms of public monitoring, especially in the electronic areas of citizen privacy. Are somewhat alarming.
A hard idea to grasp I suppose to those who contemplate such an instance outside of the U.S. , I already know It would be very difficult for myself to analyze crime rates in another country (save for Mexico for obvious reasons.).
I suppose that a big country makes for big crime, of course outside of a war zone I don't know what other industrialized country that suffers such deadly occurances such as the horrific recent trend in shooting sprees...
What catches my attention is that I have researched this trend, many of these shootings happen in small communities like one such instance in Texas where the attack started as a man attempted to kill his family at a local courthouse there,
If it can happen in such a place it can happen anywhere, that is the distrubing part.