Anti-Crime Jacobs Summary

With the popular culture providing positive images of guns, the United States has a gun prevalence that is very rare in the modern world. While many people appreciate the “gun culture”, guns are heavily involved in violence in the United States. According to U.S. Department of Justice, since 1960, more than 750,000 Americans have died under firearms, including homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries. The figure 1 provides a comprehensive survey of U.S. violent crimes for the period from 1993 to 2011.This figure illustrates that from 1993 to 2011, about 60% to 70% of homicides were associated with a firearm. Over the same period, between 6% and 9% of all nonfatal violence, with about 20% to 30% of robberies and 22% to 32% of aggravated assaults involving a firearm.

Eighty-nine people depart from this earth due to gun violence in the US every day. From school children, to victims of domestic violence, to people going about their daily lives, this status quo is unacceptable. On Tuesday January 5th, 2016 President Obama announced that he would send proposals on reducing gun violence in America to Congress. His spokesman, Jay Carney, mentioned that this is “a complex problem that will require a complex solution.” The ability to own a gun is considered by some a birthright of Americans. However, with crime rates involving handguns rising each day it has become quite clear. Handgun laws must become stricter in order to reduce homicide and crime. The question is, “which solution in most effective in decreasing gun violence?” Gun control is a major conflict that is constantly reoccurring and the US is seemingly divided over it.

“Interview the survivors of mass shootings and you hear these phrases a lot: Gunfire, they explain, rarely sounds like what it is… Many who have lived through the terror recall thinking it was a joke. A drill. Anything except the awful truth: that they might have only a few seconds to live” (“Stop the Violence” -Brody 220). Some people say guns make us feel safer, but in reality, they cause more harm than good. Arthur Kellermann and his colleagues concluded that, “Sadly, buying a gun does not make you safer. To the contrary, the evidence suggests that bringing a gun into your home increases the chances you will be killed” (“Feeling safe” -Vyse 27). Gun violence poses a very big threat to the U.S. “The U.S. has many more guns--and gun deaths--than any other developed country. In 2014, there were more than 33,000 such deaths in this country” (“Fight Over” 12). Guns are extremely dangerous and many deaths occur due to them, including murder, suicide, and accidental deaths, so stricter gun laws and technology should be used to decrease the number of gun deaths in the U.S.

Researchers at the University of Alabama have conducted studies trying to find links between guns and mass shootings (Michaels). There are hundreds of millions of guns in circulation in America today. In fact, “the total number of guns in circulation is at least 240 million” (Ballaro and Finley). Adam Lankford, an associate professor of criminal justice at the University of Alabama, suggests that “America’s high rate of public mass shootings is connected with the number of guns circulating in the country” (Michaels). Implementing stricter gun laws would cause fewer people to want to purchase guns, resulting in fewer guns in circulation in the coming years. In the United States, “around 30,000 people die from gun fire each year. Around half of these are murders, a little less than half are suicides, and the rest are lethal accidents” (Ballaro and Finley). (2) Currently there are several million guns in circulation, and gun deaths in America are higher than any other developed country. (5) If the trend continues, the number of gun deaths will continue to increase. As stated in the article “10 Pro-Gun Myths, Shot Down.” author Dave Gilson states that “People with access to more guns tend to kill more people- with guns. States with higher gun ownership rates have higher gun murder rates- as much as 114% higher than states with lower gun ownership rates” (Gilson). (7) More

From January 1, 2015 to December 23 of that same year a total of 12,942 people had been killed in America due to gun violence. These numbers include murders, accidental shootings, and murder suicides. According to a nonprofit website that records gun deaths in America called “Gun Violence Archive”, there were more than 50,000 gun violence incidents in 2015 alone. This includes homicides, gang incidents, and accidental and self-defense shootings, but it does not, however, include the near 20,000 American deaths due to gun suicides that occur each year.

No issue has dominated America like gun violence. Since the start of 2017 there has been 384 mass shootings in America (Mass Shooting Tracker). These include the horrifying event in Las Vegas, where Stephen Paddock opened fire on a concert from his room at the Mandalay Bay. He ended up killing fifty nine people and injuring around four hundred and fifty people (Mass Shooting Tracker). It also includes the shooting in Sutherland Springs, Texas where a gunman entered a church and killed twenty seven people and injured another twenty. Reactions to these types of events are fairly similar. An outcry for background checks and even calls for a ban on all firearms usually follow after these events, and for good reason. The loss of life due to gun violence is becoming all too normal in the United States, but to ban all guns would be ineffective and unethical. This article will show that gun control has not worked in certain places of America and other parts of the world. The article will also describe why it is not a viable solution to ban all guns because it would infringe on the Second Amendment. In addition, the article will also present the opinion of those who think that a ban on all guns is a viable solution. This article will now show examples of gun control not working in the United States and other places of the world.

Multiple political figures and citizens of America believe that the solution to America’s gun issue is to make gun laws more lenient. People believe that if America increases the amount of guns accessible to the average citizen then America’s streets will be safer, and there will be less gun violence. This fact is backed by Most political figures and citizens who want more guns in America, as they want them for one large reason, self defense. To support this, author William J Bennett wrote an article supporting the claim that gun laws should

While it is easy to focus on the national issues, gun control expands to much more such as, suicide and even accidents. As James B. Jacobs mentions in his book, Can Gun Control Work?, “Indeed, I believe it makes sense to understand ‘the gun problem’ as three separate problems: fatal accidents, suicides, and homicides.” (Jacobs 4) While the main threat is often seen as mass shootings due to the many times Americans see it across the television screens as national news, “the gun problem” hits a lot closer to home than many might like to think. That is why it is needed for a local gun reform group to educate locals on the laws about guns and how gun control can help their society in

In the recent years, the conversations of gun violence are increasing dramatically because of some homicide cases. Truly, the gun violence has been the one of biggest elements which threat both personal safety and national security in the United States. Website named Smartgunlaws.org stated that “Since 2015, the total number of incidents is 42,847; Number of deaths are 11,021; It is a really shocked statistics.” (Smartgunlaws.org,2012) It is a really shocked statistic that there are so many people died because of gun violence, but unfortunately there still some people don’t know what is gun violence. A professional editor Mascia defined that “Gun violence describes the results of all incidents of death or injury or threat with firearms without pejorative judgment within the definition. Violence is defined without intent or consequence as a consideration. To that end a shooting of a victim by a perpetrator is considered gun violence as is a defensive use or an officer involved shooting. The act itself, no matter the reason is violent in nature.” (Mascia, Fuhrman,2015).

In the United States National Vital Statistics report written by AM Minino in 2002, it was indicated that annually there are about 30, 000 people who die because of firearm injuries. And within the United States 28, 663 deaths have been caused by gunshots and these are mostly suicidal acts. Some of the facts in the report say that next to suicides are homicides with the use of guns and the third highest numbers of deaths due to gun violence are unintentional shootings, since this is America; most of these people have been living in the metropolis (Minino, 2002).

Over several years gun violence has became an epidemic. Gun control supporters in the public health field claim that gun violence has become a “epidemic.” The American gun murder rate is 25 times the amount of the other high income nations gun murder rate. In 2015, over 36,000 people died due to gun violence and gunfire. Also America’s national firearm death rate climbed to 12.0 pre 100,000 people in 2016, according

With all of the recent publicized gun violence, America is being seen as an unsafe place with a firearm problem. For many years, the government has been talking about the implementation of stricter gun laws to help improve the crime rates and make America a safer place (C-SPAN, 2013). Gun laws in the United States are meant to control and regulate the possession, sale, and use of firearms and ammunition. Currently, the media is taking advantage of the present gun violence situation and it is creating a controversy between the American people. The perception is that firearms are the source of violence and not the people behind the weapon. To help improve the current crime rate and the safety of the public, the community should be educated on gun control and firearm safety. The implementing of stricter gun laws for gun control has not been as beneficial to

According to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the United States experiences epidemic levels of gun violence, claiming over 30,000 lives annually. For every person who dies from a gunshot wound, two others are wounded. In America, there are approximately 270 million firearms possessed by civilians, and only 897,000 carried by police. Every year, approximately 100,000 Americans are victims of gun violence. In addition to those who are killed or injured, there are countless others whose lives are forever changed by the deaths of and injuries to their loved ones. (Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence).

It seems like every day I turn on the news there are more and more horrifying stories of violence around the United States. Our children are not safe playing outside in the front yard as they once were. The new terrifying social phenomenon going around today is violent rampage, shooting sprees or mass murder. Gun Violence has widespread effects, not only national grief but also stricter gun control laws that effect law-abiding citizens. The causes for gun violence may surprise you, such as guns are common and easy to obtain, desensitization of society, or mental problems.

In general, the higher the gun ownership in a state, the higher is the percentage of the occurrence of the homicides caused by firearms. Due to little gun control law enforcement, murder and crimes are on the rise. This is because the handguns are too easily accessible to the children, the teens, and the adult and this increases the risk of gun violence towards innocent people. The gun owners can use their gun to commit suicide when they wish to. The robbers use the gun to get involved in robbery cases. (Egendorf 2005).Torr (2002) argues that