The Pros And Cons Of Gun Control

In the current year, many things have changed in the political world with some of them being welcomed by all and others not as much. While this paper is not specifically about the people holding political offices, I feel as though it is important to view their influence in these issues. The policy that I am going to discuss in this paper is gun control as I feel it is a hotly debated issue in the country today, especially after the incidents we have had throughout the recent years.

Many tragedies have occurred recently that have spurred the debate on whether or not we need tighter gun controls. On one side of the debate are the gun control supporters, who claim that the easy access to guns is the primary cause for high rates of crime plaguing the United States. On the other side are people who argue that gun laws will not prevent criminals from obtaining guns, since they will continue to get them illegally. Guns are used for protection when in the hands of people who obey the law. It is crucial to not hinder law-abiding citizen’s ability to possess firearms with stricter gun laws, since gun laws do not lower crime, and guns can keep people safe.

“Legal restraints on the lawful purchase of guns will have little effect on the legal use of guns” (pg.125). Author James Q. Wilson, a professor of management and public policy at the University of California in Los Angeles writes the article “Just Take Away Their Guns” to provide the American public with evidence of why taking away their guns will have little effect on crime in the United States. “Just Take Away Their Guns” was published into the New York Times Magazine in March, 1994. Professor Wilson, author of many books such as “Thinking about Crime,” “Bureaucracy,” “The Moral Sense,” and “Moral Judgment” uses statistics to advocate for perspective on gun control. The article not only addresses the use of guns but also provides a lot of textual evidence to support the author’s claims related to legal restraints on lawful purchases of guns. Firearms present in the homes of American citizens, while potentially dangerous, provide these citizens with a sense of security.

If gun control is regulated, then we will have less crime. Access to firearms makes killing easy, efficient, and impersonal, which increases the lethality of crime. Josh Sugarmann, the Executive Director of the Violence Policy Center has once said, "We recoil in horror and search for explanations, but we never face up to the obvious preventive measure: a ban on the handy killing machines that make crimes so easy.”Allowing untrained people to carry guns puts others at risk and it can result in self-inflicting injuries both by suicide and unintentional incidents. Gun violence in America kills more than 30,000 and injures almost 70,000 each year. Guns can be misused and abused, which is why gun

What cause crime? Is is an individual’s access to firearms or is it their willingness to act illegally given the opportunity? In this argumentative essay I will be discussing one of the most debated topics in the United States today, gun control. There are two extremely opposite views on this topic: the belief that guns enable crime, and the belief that guns deter crime. These polar opposites leave room for a very good discussion of what facts and truths may lie behind this topic. Throughout this essay I will be analyzing both sides of this issue.The significance of a topic such as gun control is very prevalent in today’s society. Some see it sad that we must argue over one of our supposedly deemed unalienable rights such as bearing a firearm.

A majority of the American people feel that gun control laws will help reduce crime rates because the waiting period would allow time for a person’s temper to cool down. They also feel that gun control will prevent repeat offenders because when a person tries to purchase a handgun, he will have to fill out a lengthy questionnaire. The questionnaire will include questions about the buyer’s past, for example, if they have a criminal record or a record of any mental illness. If there is a criminal record in that person’s history, he will not be able to make the purchase. Restricting handgun ownership would also reduce crime, because guns are used most often in robberies and murders (Mayer 28). They are very easily concealed under a coat, or even in the waistband of pants.

For this reason, it is incredibly hard for the country to agree or disagree on controversial topics such as gun control. Gun control laws and restrictions are methods in reducing the accessibility of firearms to the ordinary citizen. The belief is that with less dangerous firearms in the streets, the less crime there will be. Numerous studies and evidence show that a reduction of gun ownership can ironically increase the crime rate. This trend might seem counter intuitive but when seen at a different perspective, it becomes logical. When law abiding citizens are not able to purchase a weapon but a criminal is through illegal means such as the black market, it leaves people helpless against the gunman. Many advocates for gun control seem to ignore the facts and trends that show that gun ownership and crime rate does not have any correlation. Instead, these advocates seem to rely on the emotional appeal of people, exploiting the tragedies that are caused by shootings, wars, and criminal activities. The purpose of this essay is to educate people on the negative side effects of gun control and on how guns can actually decrease

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

n this article, Cooke examines many of the most horrific mass shootings of recent years with the purpose of hypothesizing whether stricter gun control laws would have prevented any or all of those tragedies. His conclusion is that they would not have. He then extends this contention to state that gun control laws in general are useless, because they clearly do not prevent acts of mass violence.

There are many Americans who are opposed and many who are for the control of firearms. Robert Farago is an author and publisher of thetruthaboutguns.com, in his article, “Gun control is not the answer: Opposing view”, he states that gun control laws won’t stop criminals from committing mass shooting or other crimes. Farago gives an example of how president Obama created more gun control laws but he goes on to saying that with or without laws, criminals are still going to shoot or rob innocent people. He also gives reasons on how a law cannot prevent guns from falling into the wrong hands. The main idea of this article is to persuade and inform American citizens that with or without gun control laws, crimes will keep occurring. Farago has a strong belief that gun control acts will not

When debating the effect that a particular law, or ban of item, has on the rate of violent crime, it is beneficial to look back at the effect that laws and bans similar to these have had on the crime rate throughout history.  The 1994 Assault Weapons ban which Dianne Feinstein proposed and that of which Congress passed would be a prime example. “This ban specifically selected fire arms

First, non-strict gun control laws and gun ownership helps lower crime. However, more gun ownership can lead to more firearm robberies in public areas, like a bank or a store. Without stricter gun laws, there will be less deaths in the United States. While gun ownership doubled in the 20th century, the murder rate decreased. A study in November 26, 2013 stated in between 1980 and 2009, “states with restrictions on the carrying of concealed weapons had higher gun-related murders.” (ProCon 5) John R. Lott Jr, PhD, author of More Guns, Less Crime: Understanding Crime and Gun

Hence we conclude that gun control is not only immoral because it infringes on the fundamental human rights of U.S. Citizens to be armed as guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, but also because it has shown no real substantive effect in the reduction of violent crime. Further, we re-emphasize the relative unpredictability of mass shootings and the lack of rational choice on the part of mass shooters as evidence of the inability of sanctions imposed by firearms regulations to deter such violent perpetrators from the unlawful possession of firearms. Thus we further conclude mass shootings are impossible to deter, reduce, or eliminate through further firearms regulation. Finally, we conclude based on the fact that despite the massive proliferation

2.Another myth going around is that once your on a universal gun register the government will use this list to find out who has a gun so they can come to your house and take it. That one is so far from the truth that it makes me laugh. No one will come take your gun unless you use it to commit a crime. Even if a ban on Assault Weapons does go into effect, all weapons you now own will not be taken away. Only new weapons will be banned and no longer sold.

For many years, people have been pushing the American government to implement new laws that deal with gun control. Supporters of the argument claim that increased gun control will drastically reduce the crime rate in America. Nevertheless, a majority of gun control arguments are formed from strict control of data and emotional appeal. The mainstream media picks up these stories and broadcasts them to viewers without providing any context to them. While gun control activists assert that gun control is necessary, the American government should not ban guns because of the following reasons: potential vulnerability of innocent people being shot at by criminals and the inability for people to defend themselves against their own government.