Gun-Control in Charlton Heston’s Is Freedom Lost on the Next Generation and Paul Craig Robert’s Unarmed and Unsafe

Gun-Control in Charlton Heston’s Is Freedom Lost on the Next Generation and Paul Craig Robert’s Unarmed and Unsafe

There are three ways to approach gun-control: first, it is the citizens’ constitutional right to own firearms; second, firearms kill - get rid of them; and third, to have no opinion and not deal with the issue. Whichever view people have on gun-control, they must first understand the facts and statistics of these issues. Charlton Heston’s “Is Freedom Lost on the Next Generation?” and Paul Craig Robert’s “Unarmed and Unsafe” both study the opposing side of gun-control with facts and logic.

In Heston’s “Is Freedom Lost on the Next Generation,” he writes about how “we may be losing the next generation of Americans, as they lose an understanding and appreciation of what the Second Amendment is and does” (Heston 1). Heston uses the statistics from a June, 2000 national survey of 1,500 high school students to show that the young adults of America do not have faith in the Constitution or Bill of Rights. He reports that “64 percent of high school students favor stricter anti-gun laws, 90 percent favor the licensing of handgun buyers, 96 percent said all handguns should be registered at purchase, and 19 percent of high school students do not believe that the Second Amendment guarantees the right to own a firearm”(Heston 1). Heston asks how safe any of America’s freedoms are if twenty percent of high school students believe that the Bill of Rights does not mean what it says? High schools use to have rifle teams along with soccer and football teams, and now even toy guns have the possibility of being banned. He mentions that being able to own a gun does not mean a thing if so many requirements, fees and restrictions practically leave Americans disarmed. Heston claims that being allowed to own, or even use, a firearm is a maturing experience for young people. He also mentions that the trust that goes hand in hand with the gun does more than show the acknowledgement of self-discipline and responsibility, it reinforces those virtues better than almost anything else can. Heston argues that it is the American’s responsibility to maintain the rights of gun ownership and provide the next generation with the same freedoms(Heston 1-2) .

In “Unarmed and Unsafe,” Roberts confirms the saying “when guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns”(Roberts 2) He begins his article with the effects of recent gun-control in Britain.