Liberal View On Gun Control

One of the biggest arguments against gun control is that it does not prevent criminals from committing violent crimes, such as murder. Based on information gathered by Argesti and Smith, this A Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) study showed that when a handgun ban was put in effect in Washington D.C. “the murder rate averaged 73% higher than it was at the outset of the law” (Argesti and Smith). Another report from the FBI showed that when Florida and Texas implemented a right-to-carry law, their murder rates dropped by 30 and 36 percent (qtd. in Argesti and Smith). It is blatantly obvious that areas with high crime will continue to have the same level of crime, even after the implementation of stricter gun control laws.

Gun control has been undoubtedly one of the most heated public policies in the history of our nation. The Second Amendment states that as citizens we have the right to bear arms, which is why gun control is such a heated issue. Gun control has become a huge issue on the national, state, and local scales in the United States and I do not see it improving anytime soon.

Current Gun Control regulations do not deter violence and crime. It has been shown that places that have relaxed their gun control laws have a higher crime and death rate. Data proves that homicide rates “[...] among the metro areas whose principal city is in a state that requires some form of permit to purchase a gun, is 4.32 per 100,000 residents, compared with 5.74 among cities in no-permit states”(Bailey). This is evidence that there is a correlation between gun control and death rates. It is also proven with statistical evidence that places with the least amount of gun control have the most violence. Statistics show that “‘none of the states with the most gun violence require permits to purchase rifles, shotguns, or handguns. Gun owners are also not required to register

Using this definition, a 2016 study published in the journal Violence and Victims reported that 292 mass shooting incidents took place worldwide between 1966 and 2012; nearly one-third of these were in the United States.”(DiLascio, 2017). The statistics are the answer to whether or not limiting firearms in The United States will help in the overall goal of limiting firearm violence. Other Countries such as England and Japan have more regulations on firearms and it limits the firearm related murders in those Countries. “Have some of the tightest gun control measures in the world, also feature some of the world’s lowest gun homicide rates (per 100,000 people, 0.04 killings and 0.03, respectively).The United States, by contrast, has a rate of 3.42 gun murders per 100,000 people-100 times greater than England or Japan” (Ballaro, 2016). Over the years gun crime has decreased a lot. “ Although gun crime declined steadily throughout the 1990s and early 2000s-thanks in part, perhaps, to the assault weapons ban still in force at the time-it increased sharply in 2005 and has been on a steady rise since. In 2008, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a bipartisan group of 300 US mayors, found that homicides from handguns were highest in states with the most lenient gun laws” (Ballaro,

Looking at the nightly news, many would believe violent crimes are at an all-time high. There is no longer just one on one violent crimes or gang violent crimes. There are court shootings, school shootings, church shootings, theater shootings, mall shootings, workplace shootings, and others. Most one on one crime is committed with an illegal gun; whereas most mass shootings are done with handguns that are purchased legally. Although, violent crimes reported on the nightly news is hard to hear or see. It has become very common to encounter this information on a daily basis. The numbers seem to be overwhelming; statistics share violent crimes are at an all-time low. While the numbers of crimes are decreasing, gun ownership

Policymakers are constantly saying they need to lower crime rates in America. When looking at the numbers America doesn't have a significantly higher rate of crime compared to other developed countries. In fact, Canada has a 94% higher total crime rate per capita then America.”” There is not more crime in America, the crime is just much more lethal. When looking at violent crime due to guns America has a 288% higher violent crime rate then Canada.”” The main reason for the higher violent crime rate is the leisurely process of obtaining a firearm in America. In America, there is an average of 88.2 guns per 100 people, making it very easy to obtain a firearm. “”

As it is well known gun violence is a major problem in today’s society, places like Chicago and New York City have a serious epidemic on their hands. It is not uncommon to hear about an incident where a gun was involved in these big cities on a day to day basis, but it’s not just the big cities, these type of things are happening nationwide. There has been an argument for many decades whether the cause of such violence is due to the lack of gun control laws or the restrictions put on firearms. Both sides of the isle will argue, the more liberal individual will tell you there is not enough while the conservative individual will tell you the laws put in place are too strict.

The majority of anti-gun advocates voice their opinion that more guns would produce more crimes unfortunately for them there is little to no truth in that claim. In reality, when gun ownership increased the amount of murders diminished as well. When states passed concealed weapons laws there was significant drops in the number of multiple victim shootings occurring, the number of deaths, and the number of injuries at these shootings. In 1997 both Wales and England banned handguns and the instantaneous effect was a 50% increase according to crime research. They never saw a day lower than after the year they decided to ban handguns. It has been proven by many surveys that the banning of guns increases crime rate which in turn proves that gun control is not the answer.

The Gun Control issue has sparked major controversy in America today. People who support gun control feel that guns are the reason for the soaring crime rate in our country. I disagree with the supporters of gun control. I feel that because of the black market, violent criminals being released from prison early, and the need to ensure personal safety, stricter gun control will have very little impact on violent crime in America.

Even though evidence proves otherwise, many people claim the large quantity of guns in the United States are culpable for the country’s murder rates. While the United States population and number of guns have steadily gone up since 1994, the rates of all different crime types have drastically gone down (Planty). Over the last nineteen years, almost fifty million guns have been added to the US, yet firearm violence has been reduced by more than two thirds (Federal Bureau). This completely contradicts the statement that more guns equal more violence. To compare the two, solely based on these statistics, it looks as though the upsurge of guns and armed citizens has only led to less violence. Another example, that disproves this, is the Firearm Act of 1997. After a school shooting, the United Kingdom passed this act banning almost all of their guns. That year, the UK had initially recorded seven hundred and thirty-four homicides. While only steadily increasing, by the year 2002, they had a recorded one thousand and forty-one homicides (Osborne). This act did not prevent homicides at all, and as a matter of fact it only created more violence. The District of Columbia is another case in point on how the lack of guns does not mean there is any lack of violence. DC has a 3.6% gun ownership ratio of the people living there, ranking it the lowest in the Unites States. At the same time, DC has the highest gun deaths and firearm robberies in the Unites States. The District has a

One of those many statistics would be the number of casualties created by firearms in the United States. According to Zakaria, “the number of deaths by firearms in the United States was 32,000 last year [which was around 2011]. Around 11,000 were gun homicides.” The number of deaths is just tragic. To think that many of the citizens in the United States go around shooting other citizens is definitely stomach churning. The fact that this statistic is so painstakingly true is one of the reasons why it is so effective. Zakaria goes on to compare the United States to different countries such as Australia and England. In England and Wales, there are only 50 gun homicides a year. According to Zakaria, that is only “3 percent of our rate per 100,000 people”. Zakaria uses the data from the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime to continue to compare the United States to other countries. The homicidal rate in the U.S outgrows that of other neighboring countries by 12 percent. Australia had all their automatic guns and semi-automatic guns banned for residential use in 1996. According to Zakaria, the Australian gun ban was a “real ban, not like the one we enacted in 1994 with 600-plus exceptions” (Zakaria). By blatantly pointing out the number of exceptions that the United States has with their guns continues to support his argument about why restricted gun control is needed. So the question really is: How can America expect for any results in homicide to happen if there is still a big archway that citizens can use to generate more

According to Dr. John R. Lott Jr, world recognized economist, this is not the case at all. Lott holds a Ph.D in economics from the University of California of Los Angeles has rigorgously decidated to finding the correlation between violence and guns within the United States. According to this findings “Consealed Carry Permit Holders Across the United States” several misconceptions where cleared in a scienfic manner. First, the number of consealed handgun permits are increasing each year. Just within the past 2015 year, 1.7 million additional permits were issued. This has resulted in a 15.4% increase in permits within one calendar year. Where John R. Lott Jr. makes a distinction in his research center, that although permits are increasing, this does not neccesarily mean that violence is increasing as well. To the contrary belief violence is decreasing at a significant rate. Just between the years of 2007 and 2014 murder rates have fallen to an dismounting rate of 4.2 per 100,000 people. Looking at both variables closely this has represented a 25% drop in overall murder rate while the percentage of permits have increased at a rate of 175%. This provides a basis that lets concerned families, verterans and students that the possession of Firearms is not a direct correlation to violence within

Although the laws of gun control are more and more strict, the rate of gun violence and gun crime in the United State are not going down. Many people think gun control is not the answer for gun violence. For example, the tragedy at Virginia Tech may tell us something about how a young man could be driven to commit terrible actions, but it does not teach us very much about gun control. So

Controversy on the right to have and bear arms brings into question the cost in human lives for the protections of the 2nd amendment of the US Constitution . At issue is whether personal gun ownership promotes a safer home and community environment, or whether guns and gun availability correlate with increasing violent crime. Violent crime in the United States has been steadily declining for over the past two decades. However, most serious violent crime in the United States is perpetrated with guns and statistics have indicated a sharp increase in 2015. By proposing a gun crime prevention strategy to reduce such serious violent crime, violent crime will dramatically decrease.

As far as overall gun violence is concerned, according to the FBI's 1998 Uniform Crime Reports, the overall violent crime rate in the US decreased about 7%. Robbery alone declined by 11%, the lowest since 1969. In addition, murder dropped by 7%, the lowest since 1967. More significantly, despite the fact the number of firearms and handguns owned by individual Americans continued to increase from 1997-1998, the FBI also reported the rate of firearms used to commit murder and robberies decreased in 1998. (1998 Uniform Crime Reports). These facts conclusively prove that firearms owned by peaceable citizens do not lead to increased murder or violent crime rates. In fact, they demonstrate that armed citizens lead to reduced rates of violent crime. When the gun is in the hands of a well-rounded person, it is no more of a weapon than your every day curling iron.