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Lashing out at the U.S., China and several other governments used the June 17 massacre at historic Charleston, S.C. Emanuel AME Church as proof of lingering racism and a flawed U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment, guaranteeing the right to bear arms. Foreign governments used the June 17 rampage by 21-year-old white racist Dylann Force Roof to prove that America is not safe, with too many guns and racists roaming the streets. Australia and Northwest Asia were especially critical of U.S. gun laws allowing ordinary citizens to possess dangerous firearms. Since Wednesday’s mass murder, world powers took liberty to criticize U.S. laws and race relations. Nowhere in the world are different cultures more tolerated and guaranteed racial, ethnic and religious freedom than in America. Piling on the criticism after another ballistic episode raises other issues about gun violence.

America’s freedoms, embodied in the country’s most sacred documents including the Declaration of Independence, Constitution and Bill of Rights, have no precedent in human history. Pointing to contemporary gun-violence massacres April 30, 1999 at Columbine High School, April 16, 2007 at Virginia Tech, Jan. 8. 2011 outside a Tucson mall, July 20, 2012 in an Aurora, Co. movie theater, Dec. 14, 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School or June 17 Church rampage, all have common perpetrators: All deranged young men “We don’t understand America’s need for guns,” said Philip Alpers, director of the University of Sidney’s GunPolicy.org project. “It’s is very puzzling for non-Americans, putting the onus on America’s liberal gun laws.” China and other Pacific Rim or Oceanic countries don’t get the idea that “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”

When Australia tightened its gun laws 1996 after a massacre that killed 35 citizens, the country of 23 million hasn’t had another incident. Whether that’s due to luck is anyone’s guess. “The USA is completely out of step with the rest of the world. We’ve tightened our gun laws and have seen a reduction,” said Claire Taylor, director of media and public relations at Gun Free South Africa. Controlling the access to firearms no doubt reduces gun violence in any society but also compromises individual rights, especially in the U.S. where there’s the Second Amendment. Availability of firearms carries the burden of individual responsibility, not always obeyed with certain maladjusted citizens. Ripping U.S. gun laws or, for that matter, race relations in a country of immigrants, with all races, ethnic groups and religions, diverts attention away from the real issue in the Charleston Church rampage.

Stretching for answers in Charleston, Indonesian scholar Ahmad Syafii Maarif, blamed the incident on lingering racism. “People all over the world believed racism had gone from the U.S when Barack Obama was elected to lead the superpower twice,” said Maaif, mirroring the most naïve view of U.S. society. Maaif wants to make the point that “terrorism” isn’t confined to Islamic societies, rejecting past U.S. criticism of radical Islam. Maiif doesn’t consider that while Roof certainly spewed racist hate, his mental illness has also been brought into focus, like other youthful mass killers. Blaming the Charleston mass murder on “racism” ignores everything known about youthful mass murders, often involving mental illness and drug abuse. Foreign governments want to simplify the U.S. battle against violent crime, attributing it to one-dimensional causes like racism.

Under the headline “America’s Shame,” the British Independent Newspaper noted the “obscene proliferation of guns only magnifies tragedies,” blaming recent gun violence on too much accessibility of handguns. President Barack Obama wants more gun control legislations to, if nothing else, keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill. It’s still inexplicable that Roof’s father Ben gave his deranged son a .45 caliber semiautomatic for his 21st birthday. If today’s gun laws held parents and gun dealers accountable for murders by youthful mentally ill offenders, it would offer another safety check. “Unless U.S. President Barack Obama’s government really reflects on his country’s deep-rooted issues like racial discrimination and social inequality and takes concrete actions on gun control, such tragedy will hardly be prevented from happening again,” editorialized China’s Xinhua news agency.

Charleston’s mass murder gives the U.S. a big black eye in the foreign press. Foreign governments seek any opportunity to criticize the U.S. for its imperfect society or form of government, knowing, however, it’s less-imperfect than others. China’s does a good job of keeping guns away from ordinary citizens but also routinely arrests, charges and punishes dissidents without regard to basic civil, human rights or due process. Whatever problems the U.S. has with race relations, it tries, through its laws and social activism, to get things right. Using a tragic mass murder as proof of the U.S. Wild West mentality only hides sincere efforts to work on stubborn social problems. However the media brands Roof as a racist for Charleston’s massacre, more time will prove he also suffered from untreated mental illness. Blaming it only on one thing doesn’t tell the whole story.