[vintagetoppsguy]

In case anyone overlooked it, Steve made a great point in post #63. I'm only copying part of it, but you can go back and read it in its entirety if you like.

"Now, you might wonder why the bad stuff always seems to be done with the same piece of hardware. The answer is to me a simple one. It has nothing to do with whether it was the best choice. It's about image. To use the car analogy - there are stereotypes about different cars and their drivers. Like some cars are more often bought by people who are more prone to speeding or acting superior for some reason. Show a movie scene where the guy in a sleeveless shirt says "Hey, don't lean on the Camaro!" And everyone just smiles and laughs because we've all seen that guy. Not all Camaro owners are, but enough that it's a common image. Same as the BMW driver who thinks he's better than everyone because his car is nice or the Prius driver who looks down on the people wrecking the planet with normal cars. In the same way, something like an AR-15 is more attractive to the nuts than many other bits of hardware. Only a small number of owners are nuts, many are very serious responsible people. But the nuts get the attention."

I've never considered the "image" aspect of it, but it makes a lot of sense. A lot of these people are "society's rejects" - they never fit in, they were picked on in school, bullied, etc. Mass shootings are their way "get back" at society.

I honestly think that if you gave one of these nuts the choice between a slingshot and an AR-15 and told them that each would kill the same number of people, they would choose the AR-15 because, just as Steve said, the image that it projects. They fill empowered with an assault rifle over other weapons of choice. They want to go out in a blaze of glory. After all, there are certainly other ways to kill a large number of people besides an assault rifle. The assault rifle give them the power or respect (or so they think) that they never had before.