Gun Violence and Misogyny

I recently received this article from The New York Times on the shooting in Pennsylvania where three women were killed and nine were wounded. I found this article really interesting, and it reminded me of the Lane Bryant shooting not that long ago, which also had to do with gun violence against women. These incidents remind us of how women are affected by gun violence and that misogyny continues to run rampant in the US today. The closing paragraph of the Times article was most powerful, as it encapsulated the problems that gun violence and misogyny present to women:

“We would become much more sane, much healthier, as a society if we could bring ourselves to acknowledge that misogyny is a serious and pervasive problem, and that the twisted way so many men feel about women, combined with the absurdly easy availability of guns, is a toxic mix of the most tragic proportions.”

Another tragic discovery I made while doing a little side research was that the shooter had used the same online gun store as the VA Tech and NIU shooters. This hits close home, and I truly feel highlights that having easy access to guns is a HUGE problem that must be tackled. The old adage that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” may have a certain amount of truth; but lets face it, a gun can be a big difference on how much violence is inflicted.