More and more guns in the USA – White do in citizen cooperation nThe pandemic and the Anti-racism fight back-protests lead to rise in arms. Especially wealthy White feel threatened.Jürgen Schmieder from Los Angeles0 comment about 80 percent more weapons per month: White to Protest against Corona-measures .Photo: Kevin Lamarque (Reuters)

1’726’053 – so many weapons, the Americans have in may alone, legally purchased. The are 80 percent more than in the same period last year. This number is the database of the National Instant Criminal Background Check System of the FBI is even more amazing when you consider that the Americans have also bought in the months of March and April, significantly more weapons than in the respective prior-year period, 71 percent and 80 percent. Almost half of all the world’s civilian-owned guns in the United States, specifically, the approximately 400 million copies means. Experts predict that June will be a record month.

in mid-March, to lock the beginning of the output due to the pandemic, predicted experts: Who has lost the Job and no longer know where he gets the barest necessities of life that could Rob people in richer areas – and equip yourself against this by arming themselves. Now, the sometimes violent protests heating up after the death of the African-American George Floyd Fears more, and two already fearsome storms combine to form a hurricane.

Black rage: a protester after the killing of a Black man by the police in Atlanta. Photo: Elijah Nouvelage (Reuters)

Perhaps you have to what’s happening in the Large, the Small explain. Hermosa Beach is a beach city South of Los Angeles. Many of the nearly 20’000 inhabitants are wealthy, the median household income of almost 125’000 dollars per year – almost twice as much as the national average. With 85 percent of White constitute the great majority.

Hermosa Beach is a small town, but what is happening here, is representative of many municipalities in the country: the Rich, predominantly white Americans fear that someone could let this bubble with a small needle to burst.

He wanted to protect his family, he was afraid

In Hermosa Beach it began with entries in a local Facebook Forum, where debate is usually about noisy neighbors or dog poop. Last weekend, one of them asked whether it would not make sense to arm themselves. He wanted to protect his family, he was afraid. The answer, without exception: Yes, you currently need urgently a gun!

the light-skinned questioner, who had never in his life with a pistol in Hand, went, on the advice of his friends over to the light-skinned neighbors and borrowed a Glock 23. So he sat the whole night on the roof terrace of his house, from where you can see the Pacific ocean, and waited for the villains.

wine sipping, cigar, keep Smoking and be on the lookout for intruders.

The fear seemed justified: Due to nocturnal riots and looting was imposed in the County of Los Angeles has a curfew. And it would have had were Twitter posts, which, according to weisse, the protesters on the how it was said, “and historically racist Hermosa Beach” apart. The shops were boarded up, the people got guns. Some residents invited the neighbors to the so-called Curfew-Meetings: wine sipping, cigar Smoking, and on the roof terrace, be on the lookout for possible intruders.

It nothing happened that night, and later it turned out that the followers of a group want to trigger had white racists, with its announcement of a panic. With Success. According to statistics, 261 African Americans living in Hermosa Beach. One of them is Jeremiah Tshimanga is, for almost a year in the city. “I’ve been stopped since then three times “accidentally” by the police,” he wrote on the neighborhood portal Nextdoor: “My experiences in this community have not been pleasant. I’ve seen at parties of racism, and I’m literally been interrogated, where I was working.” Tshimanga is a Manager at the aerospace company Northrop Grumman. He is wealthy, but he is also dark-skinned.

Teenager night’s watch

organize It means that the number of weapons is likely to increase purchases in June again strong. “If the people see on television the violence, the Looting, the destruction of private property, then you can be the understandably be nervous,” said Dana Loesch, author of the book “Hands Off My Gun”, the TV channel Fox News. She was not surprised by the increase in weapons purchases, they welcome him: “The people want to protect themselves and their assets – right now, where protests in the violence get out of hand.”

Recently, there has been a night guard at the Pier in Hermosa Beach, organized by teenagers. 300 people came, even though many parents left their children at home – it could happen but what. It happened: nothing, except that 300 people knelt 8 minutes and 46 seconds silently while a young woman to “Amazing Grace” sang.

comments please Log in to comment