THE MAY 26 San Jose murders, where a gunman opened fire at a public transit rail yard, killing nine people, further illustrate that this country’s epidemic of gun violence makes us an outlier around the globe. A stunning 232 mass shootings have taken place in the US in just the past five months. This has […]
guns
Posted inOpinion
Actually, Mass. is willfully blind to mass murder, suicide
IN RESPONSE to an opinion piece published on May 8, 2021, by Jim Jordan, I would point out that Massachusetts does not have a “blind spot” when it comes to so-called assault weapons. It is actually willfully blind to the common denominator behind mass murder and suicide. Ever since Columbine, and especially since Newtown, it […]
Posted inOpinion
Mass. has blind spot when it comes to assault weapons
WHAT IS OUR moral responsibility as a Commonwealth for preventing the predictable loss of life from products manufactured in Massachusetts? Four state legislators — Democratic Reps. Marjorie Decker of Cambridge, Frank Moran of Lawrence, and Bud Williams of Springfield and Democratic Sen. Cynthia Creem of Newton — are pressing that question with proposed legislation.  They want Massachusetts to ban […]
Posted inGun ownership
Our state gun laws need some updates
IN MASSACHUSETTS, we often congratulate ourselves for having strong gun laws. And we should. Evidence shows that there are fewer gun violence fatalities here than in states with laxer laws. In 2019 and 2020, Massachusetts was rated as the state with the lowest rate of gun deaths by The Education Fund to Stop Gun Violence. […]
Posted inOpinion
Gun store not welcome in Newton
PERHAPS THE MOST jarring part of returning to a sense of normalcy from COVID-19 has been the resurgence of daily headlines reporting the massacres of gun violence that continue to steal the lives of approximately 100 people per day and 40,000 per year, a tragically American statistic. I’ve dedicated my young adult life so far […]
Posted inGuns
While Black Lives Matter rises, gang gunfire keeps claiming more lives
IT’S BECOME THEÂ untenable backdrop to a national movement demanding a reckoning with systematic racism and centuries of sanctioned brutality against black Americans: While thousands have taken to the streets to protest police brutality and a host of racial wrongs, gunfire has exploded in American cities, claiming black lives at an astonishing pace. In Chicago, 87 […]
Posted inGuns
Boston doctors seek different approach to gun violence
DOCTORS AT MASSACHUSETTS GENERAL HOSPITAL launched the new Center for Gun Violence Prevention on Monday, with a slew of Massachusetts elected officials on hand to support the effort. Clinicians will use the center, funded with $1.2 million from MGH and $200,000 from Harvard Medical School, to address the gun violence problem through a public health […]
Posted inThe Download
Boston doctors seek different approach to gun violence
Doctors at Massachusetts General Hospital launched the new Center for Gun Violence Prevention on Monday, with a slew of Massachusetts elected officials on hand to support the effort. Clinicians will use the center, funded with $1.2 million from MGH and $200,000 from Harvard Medical School, to address the gun violence problem through a public health […]
Posted inGuns
Does attention to shooting miss the mark?
YESTERDAY’S DAYTIME FATAL SHOOTING of a taxi driver near the Prudential Center in Boston was the top story among local media outlets throughout the day and it’s the lead front-page story in both Boston daily newspapers this morning. The argument for the flood-the-zone coverage, of course, is that the more out of the ordinary an […]
Posted inCriminal Justice, Guns
Holding Steven close
RONALD ODOM TALKS about his son’s death like it was yesterday because, for the soft-spoken retired letter carrier, it still feels that way. But this fall will mark 12 years since Steven Odom was cut down by a bullet just blocks from his Dorchester home, with the shooter apparently mistaking someone he was walking with […]