Gun violence is the leading cause of death in the United States. In recent news, we see school shootings and shootings in general occurring more often than usual. It is not hard at all to acquire a gun in the United States. Currently, many states have weak gun laws, which can lead to guns falling into the wrong hands. Guns are the cause of most of the crime in the United States, we need to enhance gun laws/gun control so that it is harder to possess a gun in public space.
To purchase a gun in most states all one has to do is fill out about two pages of forms at the gun store, wait for a quick background check, and then simply purchase the gun. In a news article called “Buying a semi-automatic rifle in Philadelphia in 7 minutes”, a columnist
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named Helen Ubinas, went to a gun shop to see how easy it was to buy a gun and turn in a gun. In the study, Ubinas goes to a gun shop in Philadelphia in hopes of buying a semi-automatic gun. Ubinas successfully bought the gun and surprisingly, it only took Ubinas about 15 minutes to buy it, and it took her even longer to turn the gun in. Ubinas states that there was “no need for a concealed carry permit, and no mandatory training” personally, I believe that it is uncanny that someone can walk out of a gun store with a dangerous gun in about 15 minutes with no training needed, and no permit. (Ubinas, 2016). Weak gun laws are the main reason guns end up in the wrong hands. Some states have extra laws set for certain weapons. Customers wouldn’t be able purchase guns and acquire it the same day, they would have to wait a certain amount of time with these laws set but only eight states have this law in place currently. Kate Taylor and Mary Hanbury talk about how easy it is to legally buy a semi-automatic gun in the U.S in their news article,”How easy it is to legally buy a semiautomatic gun.” In the article, Taylor and Hanbury state that “In most states, the store will run two background checks, a state check, and a federal check. The background checks provide nearly instantaneous results. Customers can fail the federal background check for a number of reasons, including if they are a convicted felon, fugitive from justice, or have been convicted of domestic violence” (Taylor & Hanbury, 2018). Although these are only some of the reasons customers fail the test, the list is fairly short and I believe it should include more in-depth search and should take more than a few minutes to return the results. While other stores conduct two checks, private sellers are allowed to sell guns without background checks. According to Taylor and Hanbury’s study, many of these background-check-free gun sales also occur at gun shows. Taylor and Hanbury also inform the readers that, “in 33 states, private sellers are allowed to sell guns without performing any kind of background check — state or federal” (Taylor & Hanbury, 2018). Personally, I don’t think this is appropriate, every state and type of seller should be required to perform a background check. Not performing background checks and weak background checks are how guns end up in the wrong hands. Weak state laws are increasing the amount of people who can carry hidden firearms, and allows guns into many public spaces without anyone knowing. Giffords Law Center published an article called “Guns in Public Places: The Increasing Threat of Hidden Guns in America,“ which goes into depth on the weak gun laws and what kind of gun laws certain states have. According to the Giffords Law Center study in 2011, there is only 1 state (Illinois) where concealed carrying is prohibited, in 10 states concealed carry is allowed with a permit and the issuing agency may grant or deny the permit. In 35 states concealed carry is allowed but the issuing agency must grant a permit to anyone who meets minimum requirements, and 4 states where no permit is required (Giffords Law Center, 2013). We need to strengthen these state laws to prohibit concealed carry in public space. These places would include, schools, public parks, restaurants, hospitals, bars, and other public spaces. In most of these places guns are not necessary, such as schools. Guns being allowed in schools only endangers innocent children pursuing education. Guns should especially be prohibited in bars, mixing drugs/alcohol with gun use can be very dangerous. When drunk, most people don't make good decisions and are not in the right state of mind to weild a gun. Drinking alcohol is generally associated with impaired judgement and for some, heightened levels of aggression. Those who carry guns have an increased chance of pulling it out when a disagreement escalates. Malcom Gay wrote an article, ”More States Allowing Guns in Bars,” specifically addressing the issue of guns in bars in Tennessee. Gay states in his article that “Tennessee is one of four states, along with Arizona, Georgia and Virginia, that recently enacted laws explicitly allowing loaded guns in bars. (Eighteen other states allow weapons in restaurants that serve alcohol)” (Gay, 2010). As stated before, drinking alcohol is associated with heightened aggression and impaired judgment, this means that there is a high possibility that an argument can escalate leading to a gun being pulled. This can lead to someone getting seriously injured, therefore, this law should be prohibiting guns instead of allowing it in bars. David Hemenway, along with other authors, conducted a study in his research article, “National attitudes concerning gun carrying in the United States,” to see how Americans feel about guns being in certain public spaces. Hemenway’s research article states ”they (the sample group) did not think regular citizens should be allowed to bring their guns into restaurants (88%), schools (94%), sports stadiums (94%), bars (93%), and hospitals (91%) (2,521 Americans were included in the study)” (Hemenway et. al., 2001). As we can see, ninety-three percent of Americans agree that guns should not be allowed in bars. Banning guns in bars is crucial, it will soon result in less deaths by gun due to intoxication. The most given reason for owning a firearm in America is self defense.
I agree that guns can be a good use for self defense, it can save many people in dire situations such as robberies. Though I concede that guns are good for self defense, we can see that more people are using guns for needs other than self defense. The Center for Disease Control and Prevention publish “National Vital Statistics Report” every two years. Author Sherry L. Murphy, along with others, report on the deaths, death rates, life expectancy, infant mortality, and trends from 2015 in the journal entry. The most common type of firearm death is suicide, the second most common is homicide. The various graphs in the “2015 National Vital Statistics Report,” give us information on the amount of deaths by firearm along with the causes. In 2015 there were 36,352 deaths by firearm, of that 22,018 were suicides (60%), and 12,979 were homicides (35%) (Murphy, et al., 2015). Suicide is a very important issue in today’s society, many people (mostly teens) are committing suicide not with their own guns, but with others. This is why guardians must make sure that weapons in a household are locked away or be sure that everyone in the household knows the dangers of a gun and why it is in the house. Gun violence can also show impacts on medical costs, costs of security precautions, and it reduces quality of life for many because most people are living life with the constant fear of gun
violence. Solving the problem of gun violence may be hard but with some simple steps we can work towards less gun violence in the United States. One way we can work towards a safer country is the ban of high-capacity magazines and automatic weapons. These weapons are used to shoot many bullets in a short amount of time and it spreads the bullets sporadically allowing them to injure more people, these weapons can easily turn murder into mass murder. These assault rifles have no place anywhere outside of war. These weapons are not needed for self defense, therefore they should simply be banned. Improving background checks is also a main topic when discussing better gun control and a safer community. Improving background checks, which includes a slightly longer wait to purchase a gun, will deter gun violence and keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people. Currently the FBI, who reviews criminal record through a database check, has 3 days to research a person’s records to see if they are legally allowed to own a gun. If the background check isn’t done in the 3 days given, the gun shop may sell the gun anyway. A new background check policy would allow the FBI enough time to review every aspect and all records thoroughly. Background checks are a vital part of gun control, and currently the system is more focused on speed rather than thoroughness. In the graph below from the Gun Violence Archive shows the amount of gun violence incidents in 2018 (so far). The Gun Violence Archive is a not for profit corporation formed in which provides information about gun-related violence in the United States. The red dots represent incidents including firearms, the total is currently at 19,792. The Gun Violence Archive reports that number of deaths by firearm this year is at 4,913, the number of injuries is at 8,812 (Gun Violence Archive, 2018). As you can see the most incidents occur in popular states and more of the eastern states. This graph shows that we need to improve gun control in the United States because we are only five months into the year. The numbers keep growing every day, who knows what the graph will look like at the end of the year. (Gun Violence Archive, 2018) With all the current popular gun violence incidents we must improve our gun control laws, we can’t let people who are untrustworthy with guns kill innocent people and kids. Nikolas Cruz, Stephen Paddock, and Adam Lanza are a few of the recent gunman's that left more than a dozen people dead. These stories are only the incidents that are popular at the time, meanwhile there are many other incidents that go unknown each day. There are many ways to solve the controversial topic of gun control, improve background checks, stricter gun laws, restricting guns in certain public spaces, and more. The statistics speak for themself, how many incidents and deaths do we need in order to make a change. In conclusion, guns are the cause of many of the crime in the United States, therefore, we need to enhance gun control making it harder to possess a gun.
Right now, the U.S. has a National Instant Background Check System; however, it contains many flaws. This system is meant to act as a filter to stop the wrong people from having guns. In 2007, the Bipartisan legislation was passed to strengthen this system. It relies on data supplied by the states, but the data is often incomplete and inadequate (Merino 104). Unlicensed gun sellers have also created a dangerous loophole. The law makes an exception for gun sellers who aren’t federally licensed gun dealers. These sellers sell guns informally through venues such as gun shows, and are not required to run background checks. This is a dangerous loophole where people who should not have guns can get them (“Gun”). Senator Frank R. Lautenberg once stated, commenting on the gun sh...
Individuals acquire guns in a variety of ways, from inheritance, purchasing, or theft. Regardless of the means of attainment, the possession of firearms is widespread in the United States. Those who possess guns do so for many reasons, such as for sport, protection, or illegal activities (Bilchik, 1999). Gun buyback programs receive weapons from all types of individuals, regardless of how they originally acquired their firearms or why. The first gun buyback program was employed in Baltimore in 1977 to curb violence perpetrated by the use of firearms (Carter, 2002).
The Federal Government today is putting forth much effort in order to control the purchase and registration of handguns. In 1993, Congress approved the Brady Bill that requires a mandatory five-day waiting period when buying a gun. The recent school shootings have pushed Congress to pass a bill requiring approximately 80% of handguns to be produced with child safety locks. The ultimate goal of the government is to ban the sale of firearms to the public. By starting out small, and having big goals, later generations will enjoy peaceful lives.
Imagine... you are driving down the street to see your loving family. You stop at a gas station and a guy comes in. He has a bandana and bad intentions. All of a sudden, he loads a pistol and aims it towards you. What are your options? Try to visualize, a guy going to see his wife and kids, but when out of nowhere a person pulls you aside and then points a pistol at you. Over the course of years, ninety-three United States citizens are killed with guns. Due to these reasons, it seems it is necessary to get rid of guns because of the 21,175 suicides, 505 deaths due to accidental/ negligent discharge of a firearm. Guns should be banned for civilian use, due to too many deaths from unregistered users, misuse, and increased crime rate.
The debate over firearms has been polarized for too long. Gun law is a never-ending issue because there hardly is any true debate. Americans (and even gun owners) do support the governments efforts to make sure guns are less dangerous in violent hands, but that is the main problem-the guns getting in the wrong human hands. Millions of law-abiding Americans do own and do enjoy their guns. But criminals and sometimes-disconcerted kids often use firearms to kill. The use of firearms has increased tremendously. An average day in Los Angeles is four people dying in a gun related crime and the United States faces approximately 87 deaths a day. There are more than 200 million guns in circulation in the United States and if you don’t own a firearm, chances are that your neighbor or friend does (Fineman 27). Sure, the Founding Fathers incorporated the Second Amendment as “the right to keep and bear arms,” but it did not give the distinction of using guns to kill more children and people than anywhere in the world.
Gun violence has been and continues to be one of the major problems in American. The U.S. has the highest rate of gun ownership in the world and consequently the highest rate of gun violence and fatalities compared to other developed countries. In a study by the University of Sydney it is estimated that there are 270,000,000 to 310,000,000 guns in the United States. According to the same study in 2010 there were 31,672 fatalities caused by firearms and on the following year the number went up to 32,163. Homicides resulting from guns are high in the United States and they are claiming more than eleven thousand lives every year (Guns in the United States: Firearms, Armed Violence and Gun Law). According to Vision for Humanity, an initiative for the Economics and Peace, the United States is ranked 99 out of 162 countries in the 2013 global peace index, homicide rates and violent crimes are among the various criteria used to determine the ranking (Vision of Humanity). Mass shootings at work places, schools, shopping malls and places of worship are happening in an a...
Today in the United States many people argue over the fact of guns being legal or illegal. There are people using guns for personal safety and there are others who use them for crimes, as well as for other situations. Firearm deaths in the United States have slowly been decreasing from year to year with all these bills getting passed to promote a safer country than ever before. Guns are the main weapon for youth suicide, school shootings, and for committing murder. In 2010 there were 2,711 infants, child, and teenage firearm deaths. As in school shootings and in committing murder, studies show shooters often had multiple, non-automatic guns, shootings were planned, most youth tell before shooting, shooters have a history of being bullied or threatened, shooters have mental issues, and shooters have done suicidal gestures before (Gun Control with School Shootings). Although there are people who use guns for murdering, there are also those who oppose guns being used without the proper requirements. 85% of all respondents to the survey supporting requiring states to report people to national background-checks systems who are prohibited from owning gu...
“A handgun ban is not realistically enforceable. Confiscating guns would require house-to-house searches and alienate the very individuals whose compliance is essential to the success of any regulation. If gun ownership were prohibited, organized crime would step in to provide the firearms that will continue to be procured with criminal intent” (Done Kates). Over the past decade, the media has reported an increase in the severity of violent crimes as individuals have killed and hurt many others, including kids. Since 2006, there have been over 200 mass murders in the United States.
The problem with guns is fairly obvious: they decrease the difficulty of killing or injuring a person. In Jeffrey A. Roth's Firearms and Violence (NIJ Research in Brief, February 1994), he points out the obvious dangers. About 60 percent of all murder victims in the United States in 1989 (about 12,000 people) were killed with firearms. Firearm attacks injured another 70,000 victims, some of whom were left permanently disabled. In 1985, the cost of shootings was an estimated $14 billion nationwide for medical care, long-term disability, and premature death. In robberies and assaults, victims are far more likely to die when the perpetrator is armed with a gun than when he or she has another weapon or is unarmed.
Without sufficient gun control laws, the death rate in the United States is incredibly high. Gun violence in the United States results in thousands of deaths and many times more injuries annually. Many countries have death rates of gun violence at or lower than 200. This, as will be shown later, is quite It is reported that out of twenty-seven developed countries, the U.S. has the highest rate of gun deaths and the number is more than forty times larger than the deaths of Great Britain by guns (O’Brien 1). According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, in 2013, firearms were used in 84,258 nonfatal injuries and homicide deaths reached 11,208, suicide rates of 21,175, and accidental deaths by guns reaching a death count of 505 (23). From these similar high death counts from several different organizations, it is clear that the U.S must impose stricter gun control laws. If countries as developed as the U.S. are achieving low death rates from gun violence what is stopping the U.S. from making the same changes? Why not the U.S. too? By the same token, in an interview between Tiffany O’Callaghan and Garen Wintemute, Wintemute states that “It (guns) takes upward of
“According to FBI statistics, 46, 313 Americans were murdered during the time period of 2007 to 2011. This translates to an average of 9,263 murders per year.” There was about one murder every hour. These murders involved guns. If gun control laws are enhanced then everyone would be safer. There would be less crime and no one would have to be as concerned. That would be a huge benefit to us all. According to JustFacts, “12% of Americans will be the victims of a complete violent crime in the course of their lives. 83% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed crime. 52% of Americans will be the victim of an attempted or completed crime more than once.” Obviously many Americans have been involved in a violent gun act. Many probably live in fear. Maybe someone suffers from trauma after an incident like this happened. People who commit these crimes do not even stay in prison for that long. Thus, this makes the United States a scarier
Guns save more lives than they take. According to statistics on gun owners.org two and a half million times a year, guns are used for self defense. Self defense can be anywhere from sexual assault, to open fire against the criminal. One example given on foxnews.com of open fire against a criminal, would be during the school shooting in Pearl, Mississippi. Luke Woodham walked into a high school and open fired. Luke tried to walk across the street to the intermediate building, only to be stopped by the assistant principal. While Luke was firing at the high school, the assistant principal got loose to get to his
First, and foremost many handguns have claimed the lives of too many people. This is a very serious issue we must tackle globally not just in the United States. The same problem is killing our past, present, and future. Gun violence has claimed the lives of so many Americans that we are the leading country in crimes committed by guns. These guns are claiming the lives of people ranging from babies to adults to even the elderly. Handguns are just causing too many deaths.
Guns have a long history in the United States. Guns are used for self-defense, but they are also used for hunting. Since guns are a part of the American culture, it is almost impossible to get rid of all the guns in the country. However, by training people how to use the guns properly, giving people the right mental care, and limiting the number of people who can have guns, could stop school shootings in America. Anything in the world could be dangerous if people do not know how to use them.
The argument that guns are rarely used for self-defense implies that they have been used before for this purpose. Even if they are not always used for protection, guns have saved people from severe injury or death before. If guns were banned, those people who relied on them for protection would probably be in a lot worse shape than they are