Gun related deaths need to stop. In 2013 alone, almost thirty people died every day because you didn’t have the courage to put greater restriction on guns. This needs to stop. The majority of these deaths are completely unnecessary and can be prevented with only minimal law changes. Why is it so hard to protect the people of our country?
Sandy Hook elementary school shooting is a horrifying example of exactly how easily accessible guns can destroy innocent lives. Twenty young children were murdered on that day. Six teachers died trying to protect them and it was all down to one man. One man with a twisted mind and three guns he had taken from his own home was able to eliminate the future of twenty six people and break apart families forever.
…show more content…
A shocking 11% of teenagers suffer from depression in the US, with 14% having suicidal thoughts and 7% attempting it. By having easy to access guns, teenagers have a much higher chance of finding and using a gun on themselves. When asked, the majority of people who were about to commit suicide had second thoughts after being unable to find an easy access method that didn’t require much thought or lengthy pain, for example hanging themselves. Comparing the percentage of suicide by guns to Australia, a country that changed their regulations on guns in the last twenty years and now has a 35% decrease in gun suicide since this law change presents the clear evidence that restricting guns will reduce the number of suicides …show more content…
In 1996 there was a horrendous mass shooting at Port Arthur that killed 35 people and injured 20. However, the only difference between this shooting and America’s constant shootings is that Australia decided to take action, preventing the murder of innocent people. So they did what was necessary. They put greater restrictions on guns. For example, background checks and having a licence. It took only a couple of months for their laws to take action, so stop making the excuse it will take years to pass. It is not that hard so why do you find it so difficult? Is it because our Government, the American Government, is too afraid to fight the public, or do you just want power so badly that no matter how hard the people scream for change you know some will disagree and that you will not be re-elected. So you ignore them. You listen to the voices you want to hear. Telling you that the 2nd Amendment is the most important clause, because that is what you believe, rather than the voices in mourning for the loved ones they’ve lost. You listen to the stories on how guns save people’s lives, rather than how they lose them. But you need to reach out further, to those who need your help the most and you need to protect them. Because there will always be protests, whatever law you pass and the least you could do is
Many teenagers and even adults feel worthless and depressed and give up on life. Instead of taking action and getting help to solve their life problems, these people choose to commit suicide. There are about 30,000 suicide deaths per year. This number is outrageously high. One out of every 45 attempts of suicide actually succeeds. Whether suicide attempters succeed or fail, all depends on how easy it is for them to get the resources they want to use for this task, especially firearms. Deborah Azrael, a research associate at Harvard’s Research Center, found that when guns were predominant in a state, suicide rates were higher. The inverse of this statement was also correct, in states where guns were not prevalent, suicide rates were lower. Many lives would be saved, many suicides would be prevented, and many families would be able to avoid heartbreak and despair, if firearms were not accessible in the United
According to the past summaries ledgers provided by GunViolenceArchive.org the number of gun related incidents has increased over the past three years, along with the number of children deaths. Furthermore, as demonstrated by the charts, the number of deaths has been steadily increasing over the past three years by about 1,000 deaths, a crazy number that should be going in the opposite direction.
Tougher gun control laws will most certainly lead to less people owning guns. It is argued that if less people own guns, then those who choose to commit suicide using a gun will be saved. However, there is no direct correlation between those who choose to commit suicide and the amount of people who choose to own a gun (Thompson, 2001). Although gun
One morning in Newtown, Connecticut, many children and staff of Sandy Hook Elementary were ready to begin their daily routine of attending school, or work. Unfortunately, they were not aware that this would be the last time they do so. The shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary ended the lives of several staff and young children. This devastating tragedy added fuel to the controversial gun argument. Parents of the children lobbied to pass gun reform laws which would help provide safety for citizens and prevent awful events similar to this from occurring in the future.
Imagine more school shootings because someone had access to automatic weapons and big mags. With gun control there would be less shootings in general, due to the inaccessibility to automatic weapons.
You walk through the door, after a long day and you see your six year old son holding a gun that you thought you stored , and your toddler is on the floor with blood gushing out of his body. Your son now scarred, and precious daughter now dying, it’s too late too late to think ‘What could I have done to prevent this’. 48 children and teens are killed either accidentally, in a suicide, or in a homicide every day in America (one person every 30 minutes.) Unintentional gun deaths and suicide are among the top ten of the leading causes of teenage deaths in America (CDC, 2015). Any incident of gun violence involving an underage shooter, is an accident.
The Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting which occurred on December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut is an atrocity that rattled the entire nation. 20-year-old Adam Lanza fatally shot 20 children and six adult staff members with a gun that he obtained because his mother did not lock it up properly. Adam Lanza, without a doubt, is/was a sick and evil human being that preyed on young, helpless children. Their school was a gun free zone and those teachers and young students were defenseless. No other person in the school was armed besides Adam Lanza (CNN.com). Another awful and tragic mass shooting occurred on July 20, 2012, injuring 70 and killing 12 people. The murderer, James Eagan Holmes, had many options to
While research into the subject is crucial for the development of programs to help protect the mentally afflicted from themselves as well as others, technologies such as Trigger-Smart firearms can help protect potential victims of suicide. According to the New York Times, in this state of Wyoming, the unfortunate record for most suicides committed per capita is held at a rate of 30 out of 100 thousand as opposed to national average of 12.6 in 2012. The issue is heavily prevalent among teenagers, and the state of their mental health is a largely determining factor in their likelihood to commit suicide. As a matter of fact, according to Child Trends, more than 90 percent of children and adolescents who committed suicide had some type of mental disorder. Many would argue that those suffering from mental disorders should not have access to a firearm in the first place; however, this does not mean that the family of a depressed individual should sacrifice their right to bear arms and protect themselves from threats foreign and domestic. In acquiring a Trigger-Smart firearm, suicidal teenagers will not be enabled to inflict damage via gun violence on themselves nearly as easily, which would be a dramatic decrease in the use of home acquired firearms used in suicides. The numbers on such a subject are worrisome, in fact, according to the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun
Gun law advocates argue that gun control laws diminish the amount of weaponry in the streets, and, by extension, in the hands of criminals. Likewise, gun control will diminish suicide. There were 464,033 total gun deaths between 1999 and 2013: 270,237 suicides (58.2% of total deaths); 174,773 homicides (37.7%); and 9,983 unintentional deaths (2.2%) (CDC, 2014). If perhaps, one of these families had a surviving brother or sister, mother or father, due to the current policies, it is worth enacting change. It is inhuman to allow people to die by firearms when they could simply be banned. In light of the recent mass shootings, families are left with the lingering wonder as to whether these national tragedies could be prevented. Criminals can easily
Every year more than 20,000 children, as well as a youth under the age of 20 years, face deaths and in other case injured by firearms in the US. The fact that guns are lethal, as well as the fact that there is ease of access to the guns by the young people, is the main explanation why firearms are the second cause of deaths among young people between 10 and 19 years. Most of these deaths are homicides while suicides account for approximately one-third of the deaths by gun among the young people, and unintentional shootings account for approximately 7% of the deaths. Among the homicides that have perpetrated by the young people in their school include the 2012-gun attack at Sandy Elementary where 28 people at the school killed. In the year 1927 in the bath school, there were 45 murders whereby the majority of the victims were children. At Virginia Tech, a gunman killed 33 victims in the year 2007 (Swanson, et al. 361-376).
The United States is one of the few countries were the right to bear arms is protected by the constitution. Unfortunately, it is also one of the most violent with incidents involving guns this year reaching an estimated 36,212 and an approximate 9,050 deaths (“Gun Violence Archive”). There are an estimated 310 million firearms in households across American, these are only estimates because current gun laws do not require them to be registered or tracked. A more staggering estimate is that most of the guns owned by private citizens are semi-automatic guns, the same type of gun used in almost all mass shootings. While these privately owned guns are legally purchased, many times, they land in the hands of criminals, and owners never report them stolen. Mass shootings and gun crimes are not the only issues with gun violence the one never talked about is suicide, more guns available equals more suicides. The United States is one of the easiest countries to own a gun legally or illegally, stricter gun control laws are necessary.
This means more than half of the suicide in America was done using a firearm. Perhaps the use of firearms use in suicides are high is because it is also reported by GunPolicy that, “The estimated total number of guns held by civilians in the United States is 270,000,000.” Also it is important to take in an account that this number possibly can be much greater because illegal guns and unregistered guns might not be included. With this amount of guns in America, someone with the passion to kill someone or themselves, the most convenient way to commit suicide or kill someone would be to obtain one of the million guns across America. The number of suicides from firearms are so high because the availability to obtain the potentially greater 270,000,000 guns in America. Gun control laws can potential decrease passion crimes and suicides. In Australia, they have passed guns laws that have reduced homicides and suicides. The law that made it possible for the decrease in firearm suicides and homicide for civilians is that
The occurence of the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting of December 14, 2012, in Newtown, Connecticut. The gunman, was 20-year-old Adam Lana, who first shot and killed his mother at their Newtown home. He then drove to Sandy Hook Elementary School where he fatally shot 20 children and 6 adult staff members. As first responders arrived, Lana committed suicide by shooting himself in the head. The shooting began at approximately 9:30 a.m. Sandy Hook was the deadliest mass shooting at a high school or grade school in U.S. history and the second-deadliest mass shooting by a single person in U.S. history, after the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre. This shooting yet again assured the nation that gun violence is still as big of a problem as it was back in the late 90’s when 27 teenagers got killed in another mass killing in Columbine, Colorado. We as a nation must stand up and oppose mass murdering because these actions are not only unjust but inhuman as well. The increase in gun violence can be decreased by, identifying the regions in the country where the most gun violence occurs and restricting their access to limiting or monitoring the availability of guns and ammunition.
Modern America is dealing with a new pressing issue, gun related homicide and suicide. America is one of world’s leader in this department unfortunately. Action needs to be taken to reduce these outrageous statistics. The reason for these unusually high gun related homicides and suicides is the United States lack of federal regulations on gun laws and the myriad of easily accessible firearms. Each of the fifty different states has their own interpretation of the second amendment, meaning there are fifty different sets of laws on how to obtain a gun. Some states have more relaxed laws, meaning no permit or no background checks. Other states are stricter on gun laws making it much more difficult to own a firearm, by placing cool down periods or requiring background checks. America is one of the leaders the world in rate of gun related deaths and suicides, because of the immense amount of easily accessible firearms and no federal regulated gun laws.
The authors of this report state what would happen if Gun Control was implemented, especially the impact on the suicide rate in the U.S. Through the author's studies they have found there is a correlation between how many suicides and suicide attempts and the access the person has to a gun. For many people, especially males, the preferred way of killing oneself is by gun. Men are to make sure the killing is fast and less personal, so they prefer a weapon of choice to make the decision “easy”. From the research the research actually made a correlation between the suicide rates and access that the authors were successful in making several equations that fit their information such as to prove their point there is a correlation and if the government