As a Brit who moved here in 2001, a huge problem is American exceptionalism.
You guys are told from birth that you’re the greatest country in the world and are all going to be anything you want to be. You actually deserve it. You should have that Ferrari. The supermodel girlfriend. The amazing life. Then reality kicks in around 17-18.
Healthcare? Nope. Mental health care? Get outta here. Paid time off? No guarantee. Minimum wage? In the toilet. Wage increases? A joke. Chances are you’ll die poor and alone but you’re watching Keeping Up With The Kardashians
The rich get richer, the poor suffer. And most people are poor. Then you throw social media into the mix, showing you the lives people are living that you want to be living.
It induces rage. You were promised this from day one. You don’t get it. It’s not fair! But luckily, you live in a country that gives you unfettered access to high powered weaponry available in any strip mall, and cheap ammunition.
People snap. Mostly young white males but that’s not exclusive. Gun laws are so weak almost anyone can get an AR-15 and a bucket full of rounds. Rather than commit suicide, let’s take out as many people as possible before biting the bullet.
Could you do that with a car or truck or knife? Yeah. But it’s sure as shit way more easy with an AR-15, and you get to see the fear in people’s eyes as you end their lives.
That’s the problem.
Couldn’t have said it better myself. It reminds me of a scene in the show Sopranos where Tony is talking to Svetlana (Russian woman with a prosthetic leg) and asked her why nothing appears to get her down and she says, “That’s the trouble with you Americans. You expect nothing bad to ever happen, while the rest of the world expects only bad to happen. And they’re not disappointed.”
Exceptionalism is so baked into our psyche that we completely miss it as a possible and likely explanation for the problem.
And therefore, untangling that exceptionalism to dig at the problem would be in a very real way like dismantling what it means to be an American. I just don’t see that happening because it would unveil a darker ugliness about ourselves that we’d rather not deal with. It is much easier, more convenient, and frankly lazy to place the blame on others and guns and mental health and incels and so forth.