Despite highly publicized cases of shootings committed by white men in recent years, research shows that the proportion relative to U.S. demographics is overblown.
A 2018 policy brief by the Rockefeller Institute of Government and the State University of New York researched incidents that resulted in deaths and injuries, excluding gang and terrorist violence, and found that although whites make up the majority of mass shooters, the number is not overwhelming, the Washington Times reported.
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“Despite common misperceptions that all mass shooters are white, the findings indicate that while a majority are, this proportion is just over half of the perpetrators (53.9 percent),” the study found. “More than one in four shooters is black and nearly one in ten is of Hispanic descent.”
That same study also found that 96% of the shooters were men.
Another report in 2017 in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence found that white offenders committed 49.2% of public mass killings.
According to the most recent census, white non-Hispanic people make up about 61% of the U.S. population.
Northeastern professor James Alan Fox said that overall statistics about there being more mass shootings than days in the year are disingenuous because typically mass shootings are defined as where more than four people die in the incident.
“We do hear this number that we’ve had more mass shootings than dates. That’s not mass killings, [which are] four or more people shot,” Fox said. “Half of the time, no one’s killed.”
“Seventy-five percent of the time, at most one victim. I don’t want to say they’re not important; they certainly are. But they’re not mass killings. People get confused,” he added.
[Also read: NRA reacts to deadly mass shootings in El Paso and Dayton]
