The Negative Effects Of Gun Violence In America

We don’t need to be that vigilant in order to know that gun-related violence and massacres have infiltrated our society. There have been many cases of public mass shootings that have occurred, with some of them happening in schools. 2015 will now be known as the year of mass shootings in the United States, and this is also the reason why the discussion for new gun control laws has heighten in the media.

Gun violence is a very controversial topic because everyone has their own perspectives on this particular topic. There are so many crimes caused by fire arms that it’s just plain out ridiculous. Many people have lost their lives due to gun violence and other crimes due to the use of a gun. Although guns are used for protection in certain cases, but most of the time they are not. There aren’t too many cases where someone used a gun for self-defense but there are many news stories and etcetera about a crime committed with the use of a firearm. A long time ago weapon violence had its issues however in no way like what is going on it current society. While there are occasions that have happened that appear to be stunning, tragic and pointless, comparable activities have happened decades prior; with the exception of they didn 't appear to happen as regularly as they do today. Weapon savagery has developed into a worldwide emergency. A few individuals feel we ought to boycott weapons inside and out, while others feel this would be unthinkable. Disposing of firearms may cure the issue however it may not be sufficient to make the issue go away.

According to the 2010 study there were 31,672 fatalities due to firearms. The following year the number went up to 32,163. Homicides that are a result from guns are relatively high in the States and they take more than eleven thousand lives a year. 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 alarming frequency. While the Newtown shooting is one of the horrific ones, it certainly isn’t the only one that happened in the last two years alone. There were several other mass shootings that took the lives of many all across America. While there are other significant problems in America that need our attention, in my opinion, increasing rate of Gun violence is the most significant problem in American that needs to be addressed.

Background checks can’t predict when or where the next mass shooting is going to occur. “Mass shooters can’t be stopped because we never know who they are until they make themselves known” (Jundo). (6) It is argued that stricter background checks would be an ineffective solution because nobody has the ability to predict the next mass shooting. (2) Gun advocates believe that giving more people guns would make people feel safer, and more civilians would be able to stop crimes. (5) Although it is true that background checks won’t predict who the next mass shooter will be, that is just part of the reason why background checks are important. People who oppose background checks need to look at the bigger picture. Giving more people guns would promote a more violent society. (5) According to Mother Jones, the number of mass shootings stopped by armed civilians in the past 33 years is zero (Gilson). (5) While increasing the number of armed civilians has not shown to decrease gun violence, background checks have been proven to lower overall gun related violence. Background checks ensure that the majority of people buying firearms aren’t

Since 1982, at least sixty-two mass shootings have occurred, thirty-two of them since 2006. (Aronsen). Jared Loughner was sentenced to life in prison after shooting nineteen people in January of 2011. Last July, fifty-eight people were shot and twelve killed while watching the new Batman movie in a theater in Colorado. In December, twenty-six people were murdered, including twenty first-graders, in a Connecticut elementary school (Follman). The issue of gun violence only becomes relevant after a horrific event such as these, then fades from public concern after about two weeks. The number of injuries and murders using guns in the United States is a large number, which can hopefully be

My second point is why guns are such a problem in the United States. The problem with guns is fairly straightforward: they make it easy to kill or injure a person. In Dr. Jeffrey A. Roth’s Firearms and Violence Brief he points out that approximately 60% of all murder victims in the U.S. were killed by firearms. In 1985(the latest year for which data is available) the cost of shootings was estimated to be more than $14 billion nationwide for medical care, long-term disability, and premature death. Arthur L. Kellerman found that residents of homes where a gun is present are 5 times more likely to experience a suicide than residents of homes without guns.

In the United States, over the past few decades, gun violence has increased massively, leading to over 10,000 gun-related incidents in 2015. The main cause of the massive amount of violence in the United States in recent decades is mainly because people who are in danger have no means to protect themselves. This is why guns should be more accessible for citizens, so that they can protect themselves in dangerous situations. Allowing citizens to conceal weapons would heavily decrease the amount of incidents that occur because innocent people were unable to protect themselves. Also, putting less control on guns would prevent crimes from even happening in the first place. If a criminal had intentions of committing a crime, they would be much less willing if they knew that they might possibly get shot trying to commit that crime. Thus, criminal activity and violent crimes will cease to continue at such high rates and more people will have the ability to protect themselves in dangerous situations.

Gun Violence is a major problem in the United States, it leads to a lot of deaths every day. The area of focus is the United States of America. More controls need to be put on guns to make America a safer nation. More than 30,000 people are killed each year in this country due to guns. There are some questions that haven’t been answered like, Amendments that need to be made to reduce the availability of guns. At the point when American threats with Britain began on April 19, 1775, the Continental Congress had no standing armed force, no stores of weapons and munitions, no naval force, and no navy ships. The Continental Congress revitalized volunteers to join the battle against the British. Farmers and tradesmen conveying their own black powder guns framed a volunteer army along the street from Boston to Concord, Massachusetts, discharged the first shot of the Revolution, and battled again on Bunker Hill in Charlestown on June 17. As a result, the Constitution of the United States was embraced in 1787 on the condition that a Bill of Rights would be included. The initial Ten Amendments to the Constitution, including the Second Amendment, were sanctioned by Congress on December 15, 1791. The Second Amendment states: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed. The historical backdrop of

The Orlando nightclub shooting in Florida on June 12, 2016 was the single largest massacre in U.S history, taking the lives of 50 individuals, including the shooter himself, and injuring 53 others. This is one extreme example of the gun violence that has been occurring in this country, but mass shootings like this and the one at Newton in 2012 are only a small part of our gun violence issue. The everyday gun violence that takes place in cities all across the United States claims the lives of thousands every single year. According to The Guardian, 33,500 civilians die each year because of gun brutality- “that’s about 1 life every 15 minutes” (Beckett). Between the years of 1999 and 2013, there were 464,003 gun deaths in the U.S, about 58% of them were suicides 37% were homicides. (ProCon.org) Gun violence and the consequences of that violence, have become a real and dangerous problem in the U.S , why else would the CDC list the United States as having the highest rate of gun violence out of all developed countries today? (Gale Opposing Viewpoints) This issue is not just attributable to a single factor, there are several that play an important part in why gun violence is such an issue in the U.S, namely laws and poverty; and in these causes we can also find solutions.

First, guns are way too easy to buy in America. Private gun sellers, such as gun shows, are not required to conduct background checks even though they make up over 20% of all firearm sales as stated in a 2017 National Survey done by the Annals of Internal Medicine. The background checks themselves are not reliable either. In 2005, Seung Hui Cho was declared mentally ill by a judge. Two years later, Cho shot and killed 32 people in the Virginia Tech massacre. Cho was able to legally obtain a gun and pass a background check due to an absence of records in the NICS, or National Crime Information Center, system. As of

Sandy Hook Elementary, Charleston, Umpqua Community College, and Virginia Tech. These names spark fear into those who have witnessed the outrage of Gun Violence in America. Nearly Eighty people die of gun-related deaths each day. It is true that stricter gun laws would not have abolished these incidents, but there is a high chance that stricter measures could have prevented a majority of these incidents, and minimized the number of casualties involved. The culture of violence in America has gotten out of control, therefore the Second Amendment should be repealed.

As the daughter of a victim of gun violence I know what it is like to hear about this rising issue and instantly feel pained. Gun violence not only harms those that have been injured or killed, but it takes a lot from close relatives and friends. Within in the past few years it has become normal to hear about this act of violence occurring in America. According to GunViolenceArchive.org, there have been a total of 14,259 incidents in 2016 thus far. This is shocking because the year just began a few months ago and this number is extremely high. The big question is why is this number so high? The gun violence rate in America has inclined over the years and if nothing is being set in place to stop or control it, it will only get worse as the years continue. The Washington Post’s article, “Gun Violence in America is out of Control” is simply stating that the gun violence in America is out of hand and as citizens we need to be aware of this issue and keep that in mind when we are voting for our next president. (Washington Post) In Vox.com’s article, “Gun violence in America, in 17 maps and charts” express that America is one of the most violent countries in the world and gun violence is happening more frequently because of the easy access of guns. (Vox) Both sources recognize that gun violence in America has reached an all-time high, but I agree with Vox’s argument because

Every day in America, we hear it on the news. Another person shot. Another murder. Another mass shooting. Gun violence has become the Black Plague of the 21st century. Just in 2017, the total number of gun violence incidents reached 61,593. Our current laws and restrictions do very little to curb these numbers, and restrict very little in the means of purchasing a gun. Our laws need clearer borders suited to modern times and modern weapons. Our 2A rights were written in 1787. We are now in 2018. These laws are antiquated, not written for a society with assault weapons. Adjusting laws poses a challenge because so many oppose changing our 2nd Amendment. A compromise needs to be reached if

The US has nearly six times the number of gun homicides as Canada, more than seven times as Sweden, and nearly 16 times as Germany” (Lopez 1). The juxtaposition of the number of gun homicides in America with other Western nations, Lopez shows how uncommon this is amongst countries similar to our own. Following the church shooting in Charleston, South Carolina, President Obama remarks that the American people would “have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence does not happen in other developed countries” (LoGiurato 1). So if this is a trend shared by all developed nations, then what makes America different?

Guns are major part of living in the United States of America. The U.S alone has 35% to 50% of the world's civilian owned Firearms. More than likely you have at least one in your house. As more and more guns are being produced and sold in the U.S more anti-gun activists are pushing for increased gun control but the facts show that more gun control actually means more gun related violence. There is no doubt that there is a problem with gun related violence in the U.S. but there is a perception that it has suddenly worsened but in all reality things are better that they have been in decades. Once again on the news you will hear that 30,000 people killed last year with guns. What the media does not say is that of those 30,000, 20,000 of those people killed themselves with a gun. Some of these facts are shocking to hear. Even though gun control is the first thing we turn to when gun related violence occurs the negative factors are far greater than the positives.