Are mass shootings the result of American exceptionalism?

One study claims America's 'cultural propensity for violence' is to blame.

A new study shows America has the highest rate of mass shootings in the world due to the "dark side of exceptionalism."

MUNTINLUPA, PHILIPPINES (Catholic Online) - Adam Lankford, a criminologist at University of Alabama discovered The United States has experienced five times the number of mass shootings in the last 50 years than any other country. It is his belief that "cultural propensity for violence" is to blame.

In Lankford's study, he claims, "... perhaps no form of violence is seen as more uniquely American than public mass shootings."

Internationally, there have been 291 recorded cases of mass shootings, 31% of which happened in the United States. Lankford enumerated several factors that he believes caused this, including America's high rate of gun ownership, the idolization of fame among U.S. mass shooters and what Lankford calls "the dark side of American exceptionalism."    

"Increasingly in America - perhaps more than in any other country on the globe - fame is revered as an end unto itself. Some mass shooters succumb to terrible delusions of grandeur and seek fame and glory through killing," he added, stating that shooters know they will be seen on the front page of newspapers, talked about on television, and their images splashed across magazine covers.

"Because of its world-leading firearm ownership rate, America does stand apart and this appears connected to its high percentage of mass shootings," he wrote.

Recently, after two journalists were shot dead during a live broadcast in Virginia, Obama and the White House renewed their calls for Congress to pass bills that would decrease gun crime. "What we know is that the number of people who die from gun-related incidents around this country dwarfs any deaths that happen through terrorism," Obama said.

Josh Earnest, the spokesperson for the White House said that Congress could pass legislation that would have a "tangible impact on reducing gun violence in this country."

Democratic candidate for president Hillary Clinton also tweeted to her followers that she was "heartbroken and angry." She wrote, "We must act to stop gun violence, and we cannot wait any longer. Praying for the victims' families in Virginia."

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