Reminds me of something my mum told me like 14 years ago.
She said: "There is more coverage of pedos and kidnappers these days, but when I was young, it was a lot more prevalent. Parents who are keeping their kids indoors in fear of the 'rising crime rate' are the same ones who grew up with their nana telling them to avoid the nonce down the street."
It's a different country, but I think this is probably true with gun crime as well. The free-access we have to information now as opposed to the past means any incident will be brought to the attention of the public. However, it's possible that incidents of gun crime were more prevalent in the past, it's just we had no means of learning about them.
The media makes money off tragedy and controversy. What's juicier than a story of a teen shooting up a school, or a mentally ill person shooting up a parade? All it does it make the anxious folk of the world feel they are living in the darkest period of history. They demand ridiculous changes, not realising that crime has and always will exist.
We cannot complete erase the circumstances that breed criminality. Depriving people of guns just makes them helpless, be it against their would-be attackers, or their own government.