Perhaps unintentionally, Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) said something smart on the Senate floor last week. Appearing flabbergasted by news of the recent spate of shootings in which seemingly understandable circumstances resulted in the use of lethal force — including one in which a 16-year-old boy who knocked on the wrong door was shot in Missouri and another in which two teenage cheerleaders who mistakenly approached the wrong car were shot in Texas — Murphy asked an oft-overlooked question in mass shooting discourse:

For proponents of a political ideology that professes abiding concern for solving “root problems,” Democrats’ fixation on guns and guns alone to solve the mass shooting epidemic has been curious. “It’s the guns,” they tweet reflexively to the news of shootings as if our politicians could magically wave away the 400 million guns circulating the U.S. if only they possessed the political will. And while certain reforms in the sale of firearms would indeed slow down would-be mass murderers, such as universal background checks and red flag laws, they wouldn’t address the most fundamental issue of the mass shooting epidemic: that our culture consistently pumps out maniacs willing to die in a demented orgy of indiscriminate murder.

These maniacal souls aren’t very different from Islamic extremist suicide bombers. They are perhaps even scarier because they don’t appear to be guided by any single set of ideas. Two years ago, for instance, a shooter opened fire on a predominantly black supermarket in Buffalo, New York, out of racial animus. And just weeks ago, a transgender activist opened fire on a Christian elementary school in Tennessee (her manifesto is apparently so appalling that its release has been delayed so that authorities can “ prepare it for public consumption .”) All that seems to unite these terrorists is resentment and fury. All they seem to want is for the world to burn.

I’m unaware of a gun reform law that would put a dent in any of this. And I’m entirely unconvinced that they wouldn’t find another way to carry out their evil designs. So when Democrats and their supporters predictably issue their boilerplate condemnations of the Second Amendment following a mass shooting, I feel a mixture of disdain and pity. Disdain for the obvious opportunism of the political operators who scan the headlines for stories to emphasize their preferred narratives, and pity for those who sincerely believe that gun reform is all that is necessary to end this national nightmare.

Instead, leaders in government and media who are sincerely interested in ending the mass shooting epidemic would be better off taking Sen. Murphy’s advice: We have to go a bit deeper. In addition to enacting necessary and overwhelmingly popular gun reform measures , a comprehensive solution would include tackling the pervasive cultural rot that has rendered Americans more miserable than ever before.

While the problem may seem too huge to tackle, there are some obvious and evidence-based starting points. For instance, it has become increasingly clear that social media is a main driver of unhappiness, depression, and anxiety . This is particularly true among young people, and particularly among young girls . Social media is at least as unhealthy for teenagers as tobacco (though probably much more so), and so the minimum age requirement for its use should be raised to 18, and social media companies should be legally responsible for enforcement. Further, public service campaigns should be waged in order to alert adults to the unhealthy aspects of prolonged social media use, similar to campaigns that raise awareness about tobacco use.

In addition, the pornography epidemic, which in many liberal circles is less a cause for alarm than celebration, is one of the chief contributors to the U.S.’s mental health crisis . Legislative measures must be taken to reduce access to pornography, especially among children, who are now subject to highly sexualized material in their school libraries . Reducing the spread of pornography in order to promote happiness is a science-based no-brainer. But this would require our secular-progressive culture to be honest with itself.

To be sure, such an effort cannot be reduced to legislation. In order to promote happiness and reduce the demented and seemingly contagious desire to kill everyone in sight, certain cultural norms demand retooling, and in some cases, restoring to their previous settings. Case in point: church attendance, which is one of the best predictors of personal happiness , has been in steady decline for decades. Also, while our culture continuously promotes self-worship and self-indulgence, community engagement and service to others is actually what causes lasting happiness and satisfaction in life. In this instance, as in so many others, our cultural priorities are exactly backward.

Secular leftism has won the culture war in a route. There is no question that the Left now universally shapes our cultural vision (welcome to the utopia, everyone). Addressing or, God-willing, ending the mass shooting epidemic — which is, at root, a mental health epidemic — will require a reevaluation of their cultural priorities in addition to enacting gun reforms.

Peter Laffin is a contributor at the Washington Examiner and the founder of Crush the College Essay. His work has also appeared in RealClearPolitics, the Catholic Thing, the National Catholic Register, and the American Spectator.