Gun Homicide Rates Up 31 Percent Since Stand Your Ground

Murders are down in Florida by about 5.5% over the 2004-2015 time period.

They are known for being able to suspend all rational thought when anything counter to gunner dogma is presented.

..."gun-control fail" and more of a "imply Obama/Democrats are to blame".

Suggesting there's a link, positive or negative, between a president, his party and violent crimes committed during his/her tenure is bizarre. The fail of the "fail article" is that:
- It's a lie to say gun-control under Obama fails since there has been no new federal laws passed.
- It's a lie to say that Obama issued executive orders relating to gun-control since the items were in reality executive actions.

Statistics don't show causation. Figure lie and liars figure.

Hearing about the "epidemic of gun violence" and "dramatic rise in mass shootings". This has come from The Brady campaign, VPC, Bloomberg and Watts' organizations and repeatedly told by gun control proponents.

So was it a lie then or is it a lie now?

Who said it was a lie?

I'm not saying the right-wing website is wrong to note the increase in mass shootings, I am suggesting, as you note, that they are using the exact same argument as the Brady campaign and VPC.

Do you not see how strange that is? Some RWers have come full circle and are now using Brady campaign talking points?

Furthermore, it takes serious chutzpah to blame this on Obama when he has been pushing for (admittedly weak) gun control measures and has been stymied by the Republican Congress the whole way.

Comment for which I apologize. To be fair, I don't think anyone expected the president's executive orders to have much of an effect. If memory serves that was even discussed here.

I must note that according to this report there are only 36 mass shooting over Obama's entire eight years. Quite different from the more than 300 per year pushed by the aforementioned organizations.

The differences in the numbers of mass shootings reported are probably just differences in the definition of "mass shooting". Googling the term "mass shootings" found lists hundreds of entries long for 2016, but it includes shooting incidents where 4 people were killed OR injured (and might include killing of the gunman too). https://www.massshootingtracker.org/data

On the other hand, Mother Jones has a summary of mass killings which includes only those where 4 or more people were actually killed.

MJ is closer to the FBI definition. Mass Shooting Tracker is ran by a propaganda student who posts on Reddit as "gnome chomsky".
http://www.thetruthaboutguns.com/2015/10/foghorn/shootingtracker-com-owner-admits-site-is-pure-propaganda/

The blogger in the OP is using the same logical fallacy gun control activists base a lot of their arguments on. The implication is that Obama's presence or policy caused these mass murders.

https://www.massshootingtracker.org/data

I just went back to that website (which I only found today on Google), and randomly clicked on the links next to ten of the listed shootings. All turned out to be valid local news articles about the shootings the list claimed they represented.

Are the local CBS and NBC affiliates lying about those shootings too?

which most of these shootings are. The these guys

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_shooting

The Pulse night club, several recent shootings in France and Germany, and the San Bernadino attack were terrorist attacks, not mass shootings.

1.) Gang related shootings are still shootings that involve guns. If one is talking about gun violence, then it makes sense to also talk about gun violence perpetrated by gangs. (And in the context of my OP, the right wing is talking about blaming Obama for, among other things, inner city violence, which is mostly gang violence anyway. Thus, including gang violence in the conversation is appropriate even under the rules laid out by the rw-ers).

Furthermore, whenever we talk about the 10000 or so gun homicides per year, we are including gang violence, so it would seem appropriate to include such gang shootings in our numbers of mass shootings.


2.) Why differentiate terrorism? Pulse and San Bernardino involved legally-obtained weapons like many other non-terroristic attacks, and thus those attacks certainly should be included in any list of mass shootings. Anyway, since terrorism is so rare here, it really doesn't matter whether we include Pulse or San Bernardino, since they are a drop in the bucket in relation to gang shootings and other non-terroristic shootings.


You point out that the FBI doesn't count gang activity in mass murder stats. Do you have an argument as to why that should be extended to the general field of gun violence or "mass shootings"?

I realize that in the context of gun-control laws, gang violence is a somewhat separate issue since they don't generally subject themselves to background checks. However, if we are interested in measuring the level of gun violence in our society, why not include them?

1) it takes the focus off of the real issues, and scapegoats people who have nothing to do with the problem. Also, they don't get the guns legally anymore than they get their drugs.

2)See above, and your statistic is for all homicides combined. Also, the terrorists in San Bernadino did not get their guns legally under California law. Would it matter if they got machine guns from the black market like the attacks in Europe? Would it matters if they used homemade flamethrowers? Even before NICS, criminals rarely went to gun stores and even more rare did they go to gun shows. Besides, more people are beaten to death by the "unarmed" than all rifles combined, let alone "assault weapons".

All of them are different issues with different causes, and thus all have different and complex solutions. Restricting civil liberties or Constitutional rights for the vast majority of people who do not engage in any of these, and never will, is not only ineffective but illiberal.

1.) Are you suggesting gun violence by gang members is not a "real" issue? I am not scapegoating anyone, I do not blame others for gang members fighting among themselves. I am interested in ways to mitigate the effects of that violence, and attempting to keep the gangs from getting handguns is one way to try to do that. It doesn't matter that gang members get their guns illegally (for the most part). They tend to steal the guns from legal owners, so a ban on such guns that included legal owners would still impact the pool of guns available to gang members.

2.) Which statistic? Why do you mention "assault weapons"? I imagine we agree that it is a "made-up" category of weapons. Either way, I am talking about handguns, which seem to be the weapon of choice for gangs.

3.) "Would it matter if they got machine guns from the black market like the attacks in Europe? Would it matters if they used homemade flamethrowers?"

But this just illustrates my point about gun bans. You mention several high-profile incidents, but these just show how rare gun violence is over there. I agree that terrorists could import guns and carry out attacks, but still those attacks are a drop in the bucket of gun violence here in the US (just as rifle homicides are a drop in the bucket compared to handguns). Yes, if gang members cannot get handguns perhaps they would make homemade flamethrowers. However, if they walk around with said flamethrowers on the street, it is a good bet they would be noticed.

As to illiberalism: I generally agree that more rights are better than fewer rights. And indeed, banning some or all guns would be taking away a right.

Rights can be respected or violated.

We all have a right to life. Murdering me does not take away my right to life, it violates that right. The true and pure motivation for any government to exist at all is to best protect the rights of the governed. Our government's just powers derive from the consent of the people. It is no more within the government's authority to deny my right to self-defense (or any right without due process) than it is for me to deny any other right to another individual.

but the right to self-defense has nothing to do specifically with hand guns or any other specific weapon system (at least in my opinion).

I am supposing that you feel handguns are your right because of the right of self-defense. Ask yourself this: Why does the right of self-defense include handguns but not air-to-air missiles? Or do you suppose that the right of self defense actually does include missiles and any other weapon systems we can dream up?

I agree that we all have the right to defend ourselves, that is the right of the jungle if nothing else. I just don't see how the right to self defense can be said to include any specific weapon system like handguns, rifles, knives, etc.

Is there any tool that compares in cost and function with the same degree of efficiency as a handgun?

I freely admit that guns are great for threatening or hurting people. In our country, both perps and victims are routinely threatened and/or hurt by guns.

My point about self-defense is that we already do not allow certain weapon systems to be used for self-defense, and thus it seems the right is not absolute. Thus, while guns are great for self-defense, they should not be treated as an inherent feature or requirement of the "right of self defense".

IMHO, the first and most basic purpose of the right is assure that civilians are afforded the ability to defend themselves. This is announced in the Constitutions of several states back to the 18th century. Our federal Constitution mentions the militia only because the federal government had nexus to regulating interstate activity not the day to day conduct of individuals. At the time of the founding the people were skeptical of a big country with a big government far removed from them as individuals. They trusted the state they lived in and knew.

As far as me and my home, I have to say my landscaping could certainly benefit from a few claymores and some foo gas but I try to be a good neighbor.

Heller v DC established that banning handguns is unconstitutional.

No, I'm suggesting that gangs will always have their guns and guns are not the real issue when it comes to gangs. You will never take guns away from the gangs. They will always have them.

FBI UCR. They use them only because they are more available. Submachine guns are the weapons of choice in UK and Europe for the same reason.

Outside of the urban cores in the US, "gun violence" is even more rare in the US. It is easier to get an illegal machine gun in the EU than it is to get any gun legally in some US states. Their rates were even lower before they passed any gun laws at all. Europe also doesn't have the drug and gang problems we do either.

turned up this from a redditor:

https://www.reddit.com/r/politics/comments/3o9adl/auditing_the_mass_shooting_tracker/

He details how he read "every single source" on Mass Shooting Tracker (from 2013 to 2015) and found problems with 10% of their listings. That means that, if this percentage holds, we can assume that only 423 of the 470 listings for 2016 are accurate. I don't know about you, but that still seems like a lot.

Now of course their definition is "4 people injured or killed" in a shooting, but still that is a lot of mass gun violence.

Furthermore, no one is arguing that guns are not lethal weapons, and thus the distinction between "mass shootings (including injuries)" and "mass killings" really doesn't have any meaning. I mean, a mass shooting where 4 people are injured could pretty easily have turned into a mass killing.

BB guns. He is an admitted propagandist with a political goal.

Actually, it isn't a large number. At least compared to mass stabbings in Chinese schools, which are more common shootings here.
90 percent of the US is as safe as Western Europe, if not safer. The problems are concentrated in urban pockets.
When you look at the fifty most violent cities in the world, which only three US cities are on the list, they have these in common. First, Detroit is the only one where they don't have strict gun control laws.
They have these in common
poor and crumbling infrastructure
poverty
extremes wealth inequality
drug gangs
high unemployment
political corruption.
That is equally true in Chicago and Baltimore as it is in Caracas and Rio.

If more guns equals more crime were true, then Iceland, Finland, Norway, Czech Republic, Switzerland, Austria, and Canada should have similar murder rates as we do and Brazil and South Africa should have lower murder rates. If more guns equals more crime, Svalbard Norway should have the highest in the world, since owning and carrying a gun is required by law, and is actually enforced.

"He is an admitted propagandist with a political goal."

If that is a damning indictment, then aren't we all here at DU guilty as well?

All I know is, I go to the website Mass Shooting Tracker, click the links, and get local news stories that talk about people with gunshot wounds. I guess I could go click more of them and hope to find one about BB guns, but so far zilch.

I agree about cities, they have way worse problems than, for instance, my small town. However, those problems are certainly made worse by guns. If those gangs only had knives, it is likely that many victims/rival gang members could at least attempt to flee.

The fact that violence is part of human nature doesn't mean guns don't enhance the capacity for violence. Thus it makes no real sense to compare our gun stats with knife stats elsewhere.

No. I believe in basing policies on facts and evidence, not ideology.

Maybe he scrubbed after being discovered and called out.

Yes, but how are you going to take those guns from gangs? I guess we could save 40K lives by banning heroin, oh wait. Abortion is completely banned in South Korea, but it isn't hard to find an abortion clinic. If strict gun control laws and prohibition in places like South Africa, Mexico, Brazil, or Venezuela doesn't work there, why do you think it would work here? Speaking of knives. There was a time when street gangs had "rumbles", which were mutual combat in a predetermined place and time, usually in parks away from citizens. If anyone had a gun, it was a "zip gun". This was also before the Gun Control Act when all you needed was a Sears catalog and a money order for the right amount. Back then, they fought over territory and being "king bad ass". Going face to face with knives and tire chains makes you "king bad ass", remote control does not. What changed? The drug business, and the profits it produces. They have the money for guns to protect their profits and market share from other gangs.

It isn't human nature, it is culture. As for knife vs gun, dead is dead unless it is about culture war and not the real issue.
Really, most of the gun control movement is about culture, not violence.

"No. I believe in basing policies on facts and evidence, not ideology."

Then you must be ok with the links on the Mass Shooting Tracker website, since they are to actual news sources, right?

"Maybe he scrubbed after being discovered and called out. "

If that is the case, then we can be even more confident that he is correct in listing 470 mass shootings for 2016, right?

"Yes, but how are you going to take those guns from gangs? "

We are getting further away from my main point about gun violence, but perhaps there are things that can be done to combat these guns. If I am not mistaken, many handguns used by gangs are stolen. Thus, if we were to just ban handguns (and law-abiding owners would certainly turn theirs in), there would be a lot less opportunity to steal them. This would of course be unconstitutional under the current reading of the 2A, but if a ban were likely to pass then I would think an amendment to the amendment would also likely pass (i.e. neither is very likely to pass at this stage). If they were banned to normal gun owners, the gang supply should dry up over time. This would require more border security to ensure no one is smuggling.

Other than banning handguns, there are probably some economic steps we could take to combat gang violence (by getting them jobs instead), but they are not gun related.

"It isn't human nature, it is culture. As for knife vs gun, dead is dead unless it is about culture war and not the real issue. "

You yourself mentioned chinese knifings, and every culture has violence inside. Knives and guns can both kill, but it is way harder to kill many people with a knife than with a gun. This is literally the reason guns were invented.

As gejohnston mentioned from Augustine of Hippo: "Though defensive violence will always be 'a sad necessity' in the eyes of men of principle, it would be still more unfortunate if wrongdoers should dominate just men."

The very essence of freedom is ability to enjoy the fruits of one's labors and bless one's family and those about whom you care with help by investing on them of your time, talents and any wealth you may have. Interfering with that is wrong. That is part of the essence of freedom and why self-defense is justified.

Permit me to bless you with the words of Samuel Adams:

A handgun is 2 edged sword. It may be used as the best tool in self-defense and also the best tool for domination and murder. In that way it is analogous to a vote.

but none of it justifies allowing or disallowing handguns (just as none of it justifies allowing or disallowing nuclear bombs or bioweapons for individual use). Saying it is "wrong" to limit self-defense says nothing about the specific issue of handguns (or gang violence, or gun violence in general).

Furthermore, banning handguns does not necessarily mean banning rifles. I was asked about solutions to gang gun violence and proposed banning handguns. Since rifles are not easily concealed, perhaps gang members would not be carrying them as much, and would be more easily identified when they are. Rifles and shotguns can be chopped down a bit in size, but I doubt they could be as small or concealable as a 9mm pistol.

...which is as efficacious as a handgun for personal self-defense.

In reality banning all handguns would:
A- Do nothing to remove them from the criminals that have them now
B- Take them from many who legally own them for a variety of reasons
C- Turn those who fail to comply (for valid reasons IMNSHO) into criminals (this exercise has creating new criminals as a goal right?)
D- Wouldn't ban 3D printers...
E- Wouldn't stop those determined to acquire one from stealing one from a cop
F- If the cops are banned as well, will they just be unarmed or will just take on a more complete resemblance to the Waffen SS?

I agree that pistols are excellent for self defense, we aren't arguing there!

A: True, but the supply of stolen weapons would dry up over time, as there would be fewer to steal.
B: The only thing we really care about is the right to defend oneself, is there any other purpose that would be covered under a right?
C: True, failing to follow a law is illegal.
D: This is a good point, and should also include those who can make their own weapons in their personal machine shop as well. This would have to be dealt with the same as smuggling.
E: I would assume this would be harder than stealing one from a civilian gun owner. This is perfectly in line with a handgun ban since the point is to make acquiring such weapons harder.
F: I haven't seen anyone who supports a handgun ban also calling for a ban on cops having handguns. We already ban civilians from owning air-to-air missiles (I assume, but cannot point to an actual law), so why would it be any different for cops to have guns that civilians cannot have?

I think your Waffen SS reference might be a bit "Godwin", don't ya think?

As seen in the drug war, prohibition cannot completely tamp down an illegal activity. However, we pretty much ban automatic weapons in this country, and that ban seems to be working. Perhaps the difference is that people don't get addicted to guns like they do to heroin...

A: I have a problem with the "bake time" on your "recipe".

Remove handguns from the batter and wait 80 years.

B: All rights are to be respected? Can you narrow the focus of the question, please?


C: True, failing to follow a law is illegal. Should I infer that your answer to fighting crime is to create more criminals?


D: I conclude that, since the war on drugs is going so well, you propose starting a war on handguns.


E: Harder? Well in some ways but not others. Cops are harder to find than civilians because there are fewer of them. OTOH cops are easy to identify (uniform, car...) and they mostly all open carry. As a side note, look up the percentage of cops that favor handgun bans.


F: I infer you mean owning an armed AAM. Disarmed missiles are legal. The explosive portion is regulated by some complicated laws but can be had after enough time, money and background checks by local LE and the ATF. I drive a Chevy not a Grumman. A personal defense tool like a handgun is the topic. Crew served area and theater scale weapons are outside the topic.



"Godwin": absolutely but I like the picture. I think the police have attributes that make them different from civilians and some of them don't deal with those differences too well. I'm referring to the cops who kill civilians with insufficient justification. The infusion of military weapons, the ones the general public is mostly restricted from, isn't working all that well, but that's is a different problem.

Guns and heroin: Cutting off the supply of heroin (or alcohol or marijuana) is, in some ways, a different task than banning handguns. A bit of heroin is single use while a handgun may be used over a course of decades and its mere presence as a threat often serves the purpose of the holder, good or evil.

From inmates serving time for crimes such as robbery and burglary the number one concern wasn't police or alarms, it was encountering an armed victim. To paraphrase Will Smith, 'That's what I call a close encounter.'

A medium length answer about full-auto: I support removing the 1986 limit on full-auto guns. I don't see that full-autos will have the impact that handguns do on crime. When full-autos could be bought at a local hardware store, they were never popular. The gangsters who used them generally stole them from law enforcement or the military.

and the #2 priority is magazine bans that hit rifles hardest, I think "we want to take your pistols but we promise to leave your rifles alone" is not going to be believed.

There's also the issue that as many Americans own pistols as own rifles and shotguns, and will keep them.

I think focusing on *misuse* rather than lawful and responsible ownership would be a point of common ground, but I don't see the gun control lobby turning in that direction until the prohibitionists stop running the movement.

mass shooting tracker is an admitted propagandist pushing an ideology.

History and the plurality of criminologists say banning guns will do absolutely nothing. Like I said before, if banning handguns in places like Mexico, Brazil, Venezuela, Australia didn't work, what makes you think it will work here? Gangs in Australia have no problem getting handguns, and it is even easier for them to get basement made machine guns. Heroin has been banned for over a century. You also ignore another issue. Handguns are used to defend innocents than they are used in criminal use. The actual number varies, but most criminologists put it in the neighborhood of 500K per year. True, a few thousand of them require the trigger being pulled and even fewer result in the death of the bad guy, but you get the point. There is more evidence that removing lead from gasoline decreased crime than banning guns.

China's mass murder problem has more to do with their very shitty mental health system. Since they tend to attack elementary schools and preschools, so the death toll is pretty high.
Banning handguns, or any other infringement on the vast majority of law-abiding citizens, will do nothing but piss people off. Even the residents of places South Chicago that live under the gangs' thumbs are seeing it for what it is, political theater by corrupt and apathetic politicians who are in mutually beneficial relationships with these gangs.
Banning something from law abiding target shooters, collectors, or whomever, for the slim chance it might get stolen and used by some far away gang, will get you the literal and electoral middle finger.

"there are probably some economic steps....but they are not gun related" That sounds like you are more about banning guns than actually caring about fixing the problem. Since the "war on..." phrase is used, let's go with war on drug gangs. That requires a strategic war plan that takes on the triad of any military enemy. Chicago took down the management of the large gangs, leaving soldiers to kill for promotion and start their own little gangs. We saw how that went.
The triad is: finance, recruitment, communications.
End the drug war. Treat addiction as a health issue, not a criminal issue. Repeal the federal ban on things like pot. I personally don't like pot, but I'm not a moral busybody either. That takes away much of the money.
massive infrastructure projects. We have to get lead out of the water just like we did the air. Schools that are falling apart and graduates functional illiterates can't be tolerated in any society. Also, more skilled trades training along with humanities and university STEM. This will increase employment Walkable mixed residential and business neighborhoods that will even allow urban agriculture, especially greenhouses that can grow fresh vegies year around. That would push the prices down and improve nutrition. Giving better alternatives, and positive role models other than the few that make obscene amounts of money playing children's games while trashing their health. That denies the gangs new recruits.

Of course, before we can do this we have to take on the hardest problem of all. Political corruption from the Detroit school board that squaders money on bullshit to Chicago city council that protects the gangs who keep them in office. They all have to go.

Have you clicked the links and found faulty info? I found the links I clicked had local news reports of shootings involving 4 or more people shot, just as advertised. Merely saying the website is "propaganda" is not making the links to news stories disappear.

I agree with your solutions to the gang problem, they are reasonable. Maybe a handgun ban is unreasonable. My comment about other steps not being related to guns was specifically because we here are talking about gun bans and thus I did not see the need to talk about school reform, welfare, drug war, etc.

by changing the definition. Also, does he include legitimate self-defense? How many are under investigation that will found to be latter? We don't know that. The point of it is an appeal to emotion and fear mongering.

Most people think they are reasonable until it means shooting some sacred cows.
I didn't mention welfare. On this, the Republicans have it backwards. They claim to want "incentives to work", I say simply remove the current disincentives and have a job to go to. For example, enrolling in a local community college means losing your SNAP, taking a minimum wage job meant losing your healthcare before the ACA. The solution for that is to create the jobs, encourage entrepreneurship, gradually remove help when no longer needed, and replace ACA with single payer.
But, that is a different issue.

1.) I have asked this before on this thread: why is it not appropriate to talk about "shootings' rather than "killings"? You claim that he "chang[ed] the definition", but you never stated why this matters? Since we are talking about gun violence as a whole, rather than just about murders, it seems appropriate to me to talk about "mass shootings" as opposed to "mass murders".

2.) Self-defense cases in the Mass Shooting Tracker database: So some of these cases where four or more people were shot could be "self-defense?" It's possible that someone was defending themselves by shooting four or more people, but is it really likely enough to change the numbers by more than single digits?

"Most people think they are reasonable until it means shooting some sacred cows. " I agree, but that works two ways on this issue...

The politics of "mass shootings" probably led to this hat & cane attempt at blaming Obama for something. But what do you expect from the intellectual fire power of prohibitionists?

"Mass shootings" is a rather new definition. It holds that a mass shooting is one in which 4+ people are shot in one setting (not including the shooter). MSM has feverishly jumped on this new & improved category, neglecting the old FBI definition of Mass Murder, which holds that 4+ victims are KILLED in one setting (not including the shooter). That old definition is why Mother Jones concluded rather ruefully a few years back that the U.S. averaged slightly over two (2) mass murders/year since 1982. Yep, Two.

But with the All-New Mass Shooting definition, the "mass" becomes really Massive. And one can concoct a Yuge rise in MS incidents because -- viola! -- the only data one can compare to longitudinally is the old 2/year FBI standard of Mass Murder.

Mass Shooting (bigger number) ------------------------- Mass Murder (2/yr).

Apples -------------------------------------------------------------------------------Oranges.

____________

Washington Post article of Feb 26, 2016 "We have three different definitions of 'mass shootings,' and we probably need more" [It is Wapo, after all.]. Comment section:

"We need clarity. We don't need to believe that "mass shooting" means a certain number, then see a news story claiming that we have 3 "mass shootings" a day -- only to later find that the reporter has created a new definition that enables those stunningly high figures." JD Connelly.

____________
It should come as no surprise how the politics of stylized body counts involving the charged word "Mass" can be used against a president who speaks for some gun control; after all, the data can be force-fitted whenever, as WaPo says, "we need more."

it was not from the "prohibitionists". That is what makes it so strange.

As to "mass murder" vs "mass shootings", you really need to make an argument as to why we can talk about one (FBI's mass murder) but not the other. Why is it only appropriate to discuss the FBI's stats on mass murder, and not discuss the other violence that is not necessarily murder. Is it not a bad thing when four people are shot (but not always killed)?

so it is not so strange. The author was probably taking advantage of some blatant irony, made possible by the posting I made. But irony passes by like a noisy locomotive on this site.

As to that posting, we can always talk about both measures. But what has been done is to create a "new" measure (MassShootings© or apples), and then make the dubious case that they have increased massively when the only longitudinal measure we have is for the last 4 or so years of the life of the new measure, OR we must measure MS against the older Mass Murder defnition -- oranges. Boy, that 'll get you a ready-made increase!

In other words, what is the data for justifying the contention that MassShootings© have increased massively?

The controllers & MSM love the new measure, and have pasted together a rationale for some big increase; the RW says to the controller "fair game: By your own standards, the biggest increase was on Obama's watch," hence my errant heat-seeking missile metaphor.

Am I making myself clear?

"As to that posting, we can always talk about both measures. But what has been done is to create a "new" measure (MassShootings© or apples), and then make the dubious case that they have increased massively when the only longitudinal measure we have is for the last 4 or so years of the life of the new measure, OR we must measure MS against the older Mass Murder defnition -- oranges. Boy, that 'll get you a ready-made increase!"

I have not seen anyone reporting the "mass shooting" numbers (470 this year by Mass Shooting Tracker count) as the same as the old "mass murder" FBI numbers. Do you have any links to people doing this and saying there has been a massive increase due to the deceit?

It seems to me that Mass Shooting Tracker does not try to pass its numbers off as the same as the FBI numbers. Indeed, the Mass Shooting Tracker site mentions the difference in its "about" section, and thus does not attempt to deceive anyone.

In the absence of any deceit like that above, there is no logical reason to favor the FBI "mass murder" definition over the "mass shooting" definition. In fact, if we are talking in general about gun violence, it makes more sense to talk about "shootings" rather than just "murders" (although, to be fair, it would be EVEN MORE appropriate to talk about the shooting of any number of people injured, rather than the arbitrary four).

But to say it is increasing massively as some commentators contend without a basis for seeng that phenomenon is propagandizing.

ON EDIT:

I Googled "Mass Shootings Increasing" (I have trouble linking on this cheapo tablet), and found a spate of articles saying they are, and some which say otherwise. Controversy centers on dicey definitions, poor histories of shooting data, and little to support the contention of an increased rate over the long trend. Of particular interest is "Are Mass Shootings Really on the Rise -- Or do We Just Think They Are," by Jeanna Birch, writing in Yahoo, Nov. 10, 2015.

On edit: What's a little time warp between friends? Edited for one century. Still at it.

1915????