Bassam Gergi comments on gun violence in American inner cities

Bassam Gergi, a student in comparative government at St. Antonys College, has co-authored an article for CNN online (27 December) on gun violence in the United States.

While much media attention has focused on the massacre in Newtown, Connecticut, Bassam and co-author Ali Breland argue that we must not ignore the forgotten victims of gun violence: young black people living in large metropolitan areas, who face staggering violence on a day-to-day basis. The authors note that the media is fixated, and with justification, on the string of high-profile massacres that have rocked the nation in Aurora, Colorado; Tucson, Arizona; Virginia Tech; and now in Newtown. Yet in many of Americas neighborhoods most affected by the calamity of gun violence, there is a warranted exasperation -- residents are tired, tired of the ubiquity of guns, tired of fearing for their childrens safety, tired of being forgotten.

The article can be read in full here.