After reassuring multiple people by text that my partner and I had been tucked safely in bed at 11:30 on Saturday night, I finally cracked and posted a general reassurance on Facebook. No, we had not been near the shooting on South Street in Philadelphia, where we live, that resulted in 3 deaths and 11 major injuries. But people's concerns weren't misplaced. We had been at a party in that neighborhood just the night before. Saturday's was the ninth mass shooting in the city this year alone, according to the Gun Violence Archive. There have been shootings at train stations and house parties. One group of victims was going to the prom. These things really are a matter of luck in a society that's swimming in as much gun violence as ours.
What made the South Street shooting particularly nerve-rattling was how unhinged the situation seems to have been. Current reports suggest it started as a fight between two young men, but at least three other civilians and a police officer whipped out guns and sent bullets flying everywhere. There's a very Wild West quality to the whole thing, except, you know, it happened in a 21st-century crowded city, with advanced gun tech, making the body count much higher than someone like Billy the Kid would have experienced.
