Friday, July 8: Assassination in Japan
Former Japanese Prime Minister is gunned down in the street
Yesterday, while giving a speech in the Japanese city of Nara, former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe was murdered by a gun-wielding assailant. The gunman, a former member of the Japanese navy, used a makeshift gun to carry out the act, and Abe was pronounced dead soon after. The shock of the assassination is slowly setting in for a nation that averages about 10 gun deaths annually (For context, the US averages about 11 deaths from guns every day). Try to imagine the disbelief felt by people in Japan over losing such a public figure, it may prove difficult considering this country has had four presidents assassinated with guns and countless attempts on the lives of politicians every day.
At some point we should zoom out and realize that the constant state of fear of gun violence that many people inhabit in this country is unsustainable. We’re less than 4 days out from the latest mass shooting and it’s already old news. Gun violence is more American than baseball or apple pie, it has become a core trait of the American identity. Not every American enjoys baseball or prefers apple pie, but ask if their life has been touched by gun violence and witness the extent of its normalization.
Side Items
Israel casually announced that during the Six Day War, at least 20 Egyptians were burned alive and buried in a mass grave under what is now a parking garage…sick
Father of the year candidate & world’s wealthiest troll Elon Musk is having second thoughts about buying Twitter, citing the number of fake accounts
James Caan, the actor famous for portraying Sunny Corleone in The Godfather, passed away at the ripe old age of 82. God bless that man, he was great in Elf