THE CONNECTION BETWEEN WHITE MEN, AGGRIEVEMENT, AND MASS SHOOTINGS
The thread that connects these two stories is aggrievement, and it offers a unique insight into the cause of mass shootings—at least 57 percent of which are committed by white men, according to data from Mother Jones. The perpetuation of these crimes is deeply entangled with both the actual and perceived downward mobility of white men, as well as their mistaken attribution of that decline to African Americans, feminists, immigrants, and other "boogeymen" of social justice movements.
Michael Kimmel, a professor of sociology and gender studies at Stony Brook University, examined "aggrieved entitlement" in his 2013 book Angry White Men. He defines aggrieved entitlement as a deal between white men and the nation, which they feel the nation has reneged on.
"These white men made a bargain with American society, which is, if I do all of these things that you've asked me to do—be solid, responsible, tax-paying, hard-working citizens—then I should expect to get these rewards," Kimmel tells me. Those rewards include societal markers such as home ownership and wages high enough to support a family on a single income.
But those supposed promises have not been fulfilled. According to data from the Census Bureau, homeownership rates for non-Hispanic whites has been fallingsince at least 2004, while the number of white dual-income families has grown by almost 34 percent since 1980—a reflection of economic necessity as much as feminist independence.
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