Violence…and tragedy…
so sad for all the families and friends…
The second event is a larger tragedy in term of immediate loss of life but the aviation authorities will investigate the root cause and take steps to try to prevent a recurrence if possible.
The former is a greater tragedy overall because, despite fewer lives being lost, no lessons will be learned, no behaviour will be changed and another gunman will kill innocent people in another school or concert hall or football stadium again and again while the Americans put their love of guns above all else.
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A fair assessment of the situation IMO 
I agree with your comment, Stella. It is a very fair and refreshingly thoughtful assessment of the scale of tragedy, because it takes account of dimensions of tragedy beyond the mere calculus of lives lost.
IMO the assessment is perhaps unduly pessimistic (and I stress perhaps) insofar as there does seem to be significant and growing pressure from school-age people to actively confront the gun lobby and weak politicians like Trump, so as to see that behaviour is changed, even if not soon. I think the tide of opinion on gun-ownership and unrestricted use is changing, albeit slowly.
Whilst there is the obvious call for a change in gun ownership laws I think the problem in the US goes much deeper than that. Yesterday’s incident was the 22nd school shooting so far in 2018 and most if not all were carried out by students. What makes a 17 year old with their whole life in front of them gun down fellow classmates and why is this becoming more frequent?
It’s not exactly uncommon for 17 year old boys to be boiling pits of poorly controlled emotions.
Let them near guns in an uncontrolled way and it’s hardly surprising that things like this happen.
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@anon88169868, in 2000 & 2001 there were only 6 school/university shootings in the US, so why are we now seeing one a week? It cannot just be easy access to guns, there has to be more to it than that.
I genuinely don’t know. It isn’t overall gun ownership because that has been fairly static since 2000/1, whether there has been a change meaning high school kids have easier access or (more likely) there is some other factor at play I cannot say. Video games? Mental health support? Changes in the way these things are counted?
IMO there is a link between the almost routine school shootings in the US by students and the huge increase in the number of shootings and stabbings in the UK. For some reason the value of life has been lost by so many young people who now see it as normal to kill or miam and almost accept that their own lives will be short.
Yet another death of an innocent bystander.
No doubt there are many others who’ deaths have bot been reported in the UK, apparently Sandra is the 7th school child to be murdered in Milwaukee this year.
How long can the US go on before doing something about its problem with guns?
Trump will do nothing (in my opinion), after all he recommends school teachers should be armed… 
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Sadly I think that you are completely correct.