Period 10: Gun Rights and Gun Control

After the devastating shooting that happened in Las Vegas, the topic of “Gun Control” has came up. In the background article, Background of the Issue, the author stated that “The United States has 88.8 guns per 100 people or 270,000,000 guns.” That statement made me think about how many people have guns and buy them for the sole purpose of committing crimes. When a person goes through with buying a gun, they get background checks for any situations that seem out of the ordinary.
With the ongoing debate between gun rights and gun control, people start to wonder where the government should intervene. After reading some of my fellow classmates responses, Ayslyn Duffy’s comment saying “The United States government may put as many regulations on weapons as they please. However, this will not stop someone who is determined to own an illegal firearm” made me stand for my argument even more. The government has rules for a specific reason but there are always ways around them. This may happen with people illegally coming into the United States, or in the purchase of an illegal weapon. The government can enforce laws that will prevent the selling of some weapons, but where is the line drawn?
With articles stating that they believe the gun used is a semi-automatic, can cause the debate that those types of guns should not be sold. The idea of the semi-automatic guns being sold should be going through more intense background checks seems like a good idea in theory but what else do you test? Should they check if they have criminal pasts? Own any other guns? Mental health? In my opinion it is not the gun that does the killing, it is the person is the one that does the killing. It is a person that thinks about taking this action, the gun does not make the choice for them.

@baker I understand the point you're making and it's a valid one at that. Something I keep noticing on several people's posts is that Gun Control will never completely solve the issue that is gun violence. That's true, however as a country, there needs to be some sort of break in the system in order to prevent future shootings. Like I said before, it will never completely diminish the possibility of gun violence, but it can lessen it. There needs to be something done about the issue even in the slightest form. Otherwise I agree with what you are trying to say.

@mcdermott Thoroughly evaluating someone's mental health is one of the regulations I was thinking about as I typed my original post. Like so many have said, there is no way to be able to track and record every gun ever bought, sold, traded, handed down in the family, etc. but there is still something we can do to decrease the chance of future tragedies such as Las Vegas. Performing mental health evaluations would definitely help with gun control. There are always going to be ways around the system but this could serve as the bare minimum and/or first step to protecting american citizens.

@mcdermott
I completely agree with your stance with making bump stocks illegal, since after all they do make semi automatics turn into automatics, which is defeating the purpose of making automatics illegal. I did take thought into what you said about making guns "harder to get". As I do see where you are coming from with trying to make less people be able to have one, it does make the Second Amendment become unjust, since only limited people are allowed to have them. People will also try and find ways around it regardless of making it harder to get or not, but again, I do understand and see the point that you are getting across. 

pflugh I disagree with your example of a little kid with a cookie. If the kid is determined enough he'll get to the cookie, and if the cookie is out of reach he'll go for the next best thing. Obviously if someone wants to kill someone else badly enough they're going to find a way to carry out that act whether it be from a gun or car or bomb a simple law isn't going to stop them, all its going to do is make it harder for the rest of the law abiding citizens to get guns so they can protect themselves.

There is certainly compelling government interest to attempt to somehow limit the number of gun related crimes, however, increasing the amount of restrictions on guns is not a definite solution. Actually, by adding more gun control, the number of civilian deaths could very well increase, due to their lack of means to protect themselves. How is this possible? Well, laws only apply to those who chose to follow them. Creating more gun laws will not prevent criminals from getting ahold of them. What these laws will do, is make it much harder for those who want to purchase guns legally, potentially discouraging those people from going through the complicated process, causing less citizens to be capable of protecting themselves in public places, or even their own homes, and unfortunately, the police don’t always make it in time.
Let’s look at the numbers. Yes, gun ownership rate in the United States is greater than that of any other country, and yes, Americans are twenty five percent more likely to be killed by firearm than in any other developed country, but there’s more to it than that. The majority of these deaths by guns, are performed by illegal firearms, or those who do not belong to the person wielding them. According to a research study done by an epidemiologist named Anthony Fabio in association with the Pittsburgh Bureau of police, 79% of gun crimes were carried out with a firearm that was owned by someone besides the perpetrator. Fabio stated, “All guns start out as legal guns, but a huge number of them move into illegal hands, as a public health person, I’d like to be able to figure out that path.” The government should focus more on enforcing the laws they already have in place regarding acquiring illegal guns, rather than adding more so that criminals can continue to ignore them. In light of recent shootings, unfortunately, the most that can be done to prevent them in the future is to crack down on finding ways to deter these straw purchases in the future, and to increase security everywhere. It is sad to say, but our world is growing more and more violent and airports shouldn’t be one of the only places that security is enforced seriously, and focus should be placed on changing that. Increasing the number of security briefings when entering public places (specifically ones that will be heavily trafficked) although they seem inconvenient and some may dislike the idea because of the time it would take up, inevitably, it would be worthwhile. Not only would there be thousands of new jobs created on U.S soil, but there would be less chance of a tragic massacre such as the Las Vegas, or San Bernardino shootings happening again, and even though some may feel like it is a waste of time or money, human life is priceless. Essentially, the energy of our government should be focused on finding ways to bust illegal gun trade, and increasing national security to protect law abiding citizens from those whom will acquire firearms without regard to any gun control regulations, instead of attempting to add more laws.


Do you think that increasing security is a reasonable response to these shootings versus adding more gun regulations?