Keys to deciphering violence in the United States

By: Beatrice E. Rangel - 16/07/2024

Even without absorbing the trauma caused by the attack against former President Donald Trump, the political and business leadership of the largest liberal democracy in the world has made urgent calls for unity and dialogue. These calls contrasted with the images on television screens that showed two sides in conflict hurling insults at each other while pointing out that the rival was directly responsible for the unfortunate event. For liberals (in the North American sense) the former president would have been a victim of their own vision of the world in which decisions are imposed by force and majorities are crushed by organized minorities. For the former president's followers, the constant classification of his standard-bearer as a violent, criminal and undesirable person had motivated the attack.

Engrossed as they will be until November 8 in this sterile debate between the deaf, they will dedicate little attention to examining the sources of violence and trying to channel its impetus.

Three sources of support for violence in the United States come to mind.

First is the story. The United States is an armed country where almost every citizen owns a firearm. And that access is guaranteed by the constitution because it was the conduit of freedom. In effect, while south of the Rio Grande the colonial elites armed armies with low-income citizens to protect territorial occupations from the stalking of other European powers eager to participate in the promise of El Dorado, in the United States the armies were formed by the citizens. These armies as a civil body constituted militias and the militias were constituted as a libertarian army to confront England. Thus, the right to have a firearm is equivalent to being free. This is why almost all attempts to modify the constitution fail in the political culture of the United States, whose citizens think that without the possession of a weapon freedom cannot be defended.

But the passage of time has greatly complicated the exercise of this freedom. Because when the North American state decided in the seventies to no longer provide hospitalization services for people with psychological imbalances, the people affected by them were under the care of relatives or on the streets. And these people may have easy access to firearms. Added to this is the number of young people who experience trauma in their childhood or adolescence, as a result of destroyed homes and/or adverse social pressures. There are also military veterans who have seen the economic-social support network provided by the Veterans Administration be reduced to a minimum. Almost all veterans suffer from post-traumatic stress that can be expressed in violent outbursts. It is also necessary to note that some studies indicate that sex modification treatments tend to create severe psychological imbalances. In terms of ethnicity, 70 percent of the protagonists of violent attacks on schools or other public places are white; 20 percent black, 8% Hispanic and 3% Asian. In terms of age, the participation of young people in the number of violent incidents has grown alarmingly in the last 20 years. Indeed, of the 1,042 violent incidents that occurred between June 1971 and June 2020, 582 involved people between 15 and 19 years old.

But psychological imbalances are only one source of violence. Because the strongest fountain is what I call vital confusion. The rapid evolution of technology has managed to decontextualize the existence of a large sector of the American population. These are the lower middle class whose education levels barely reach high school and live in depressed sectors of cities or in the rural areas that surround them. They are factory workers; restaurant employees; truck drivers or public service staff. In short, what in Europe they call the working class. That middle class that in 1971 represented 25% of the American population today represents almost 30% and could be described as the forgotten of the earth. Their parents and grandparents benefited from the growth of the post-war North American economy and from the integration programs in the industrial economy designed by Franklin D Roosevelt that allowed them to acquire urban-industrial skills and abilities. Thus they left poverty and entered the middle class sector, which until 1971 represented 61% of the North American population. But the digital revolution reduced this middle class to 50% of the population, throwing many heads of families into poverty from which they have not been able to escape because they lack digital skills and abilities. The jobs that had allowed them to save, have housing and send their children to university disappeared overnight, leaving this sector without income and without social protection. This sector is deeply resentful of the situation. They have voted Democratic and they have voted Republican without either helping them regain their balance. These people hate globalization because it means losing their jobs; They reject strange cultures because they disturb their sense of direction, they fear the world because they see how two buildings in New York were blown up by some Mezo-Oriental fanatics. They were members of this sector who went to the Federal Capitol to suspend on January 6, 2021 the process of counting the results of the electoral college voting in 2020. For them the world is confusing and hostile and they are looking for a kind of Messiah to take them to the promised land. They are mostly white and feel represented by the NRA (National Rifle Association), Christian associations and groups that promote conspiracy theories.

This gloomy picture can only be improved with public policies that restore excellence in public services and provide this 29% of the United States population with the instruments to successfully enter the digital economy. Curiously, neither in the Democratic nor the Republican platform does this issue have the relevance of abortion.

«The opinions published herein are the sole responsibility of its author».