The Pros And Cons Of Gun Control

Well, it seems like society has taken sides on this issue. On June 23, 2016, a radio hostess, Jasmin Tuffaha, from AirTalk interviewed Adam Winkler, a UCLA gun policy and politics scholar, on gun violence and the groups formed around it. The question that was asked was why the NRA and other groups like them are so large on one side and the other side is so broken. He said, “gun rights people are more cohesive because they are united by a hobby and lifestyle. As for the gun control people, they are united by a policy position and sometimes because of the unfortunate situation of being a victim of gun violence”(Winkler). In other words, what the gun control advocates need to do to get their voices heard, is to be just as politically active and financed as the gun lobbyists. The pro-gun advocates will always have the advantage over society unless the gun control advocates band together and counter

Next, it is important to ask who are the people that really kill? Is it the gun or the person? People who defend the right to bear arms often state that it is not the gun that kills it is the individual that kills. Some feel the answer lies in that we need to introduce stricter laws on who is able to apply for license to carry guns. Gun laws vary from state to state with California being the most restrictive state to Arizona with the most lenient laws. These laws include background checks, waiting periods, and registration requirements to who can purchase and sells guns. Even with these laws in place we have still witnessed an increase in the number of mass shootings over the past few years. Implementing stricter gun control laws will ultimately not eliminate individuals from acquiring access to guns if they truly desire. State governments may require licenses to purchase guns but there remains an underground and online market to purchase guns, which does not monitor whether a person truly has a license or not. Rather than focusing on implementing stricter laws for control and ways to make the purchase

Gun Control is robbing us of a human right. People are entitled to carrying and using guns wherever and whenever they want. Without guns, defenseless women have no way to protect themselves. Only leftists and hippies want gun control in our flawless country, and they’re ruining it for the rest of us gun-toting patriots. In A.W.R. Hawkins’ article “Gun Control: The Ultimate Human Rights Violation,” Hawkins makes a solid stand against gun control, and states that it “actually steals part of our humanity.”

The Second Amendment of the United States Constitution reads: "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." Courts have universally agreed, however, that the right provided by the Second Amendment is not absolute and that many kinds of gun legislation designed to protect public safety remain valid ("Gun Safety & Public Health," 2013). The ongoing debate between the gun rights versus gun control has caught more attention as number of cases involving gun violence increased significantly. In one study, it stated that major mental illnesses are associated with increased risk of violent act. In recent years, there were several news headlines on

“Gun are designed to kill. They have no other function” (Bowman and Newton). Today, there is a major debate whether or not guns should be legalized or stay legal. The Second Amendment allows people to right to bear arms, but many people disagree with that and to express their opinions, both sides protest. Guns have a long history in the United States. They were made for military purposes and are now used for anything a individual wants to use it for, like for example hunting. Stricter gun control laws should be enacted because they will cause fewer deaths, save money, and for increased public safety.

The article “Gun Control isn’t the answer” stated “There is no way to extinguish the supply of guns. It would be constitutionally suspect and politically impossible to confiscate hundreds of millions of weapons” (James Q. Wilson) The facts are absolutely correct, there are millions of legal and illegal weapons within our borders and no way to cut off the supply of weapons. Criminals always find ways around the laws and rules. “There is the problem of lack of political will within the Executive Branch, one key example is the ban on imported assault weapons” ("Fully Enforce the Ban on Imported Assault Weapons”). The government is even lacking support on the ban of illegal assault weapons. It would make a huge difference in the United States if the ban was enforced with more power. It would bring down several mass shootings and homicide deaths across the nation. “Gun Control: An overview” states “As defined by gun right advocates, only fully automatic weapons should be considered assault weapons” (Lee, M., and Alexander Stingl). If the gun does not spray rounds constantly like some of the weapons out there, it should not be considered illegal and unsafe. People need to know the gun laws and be more educated about them. They need to realize the dangers of a gun but also need to realize the positives about them. They need to be kept out of the wrong people’s hands. As stated above, guns are

The Constitution states the second amendment as, “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.”1 This amendment gives the people the right to own and carry guns for their protection and for the security of their homes. There are many controversies surrounding the issue of people owning guns and gun related violence because of the second amendment. One of the biggest controversies is the regulations on gun control regulating what type of guns people may possess and what kind of registration is required. The tenth amendment says, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”2 The second amendment (along with all the other amendments) is under federal jurisdiction; therefore the states do not have power in this case.3 The second amendment gives the right to all American citizens to bear arms, therefore, the States do not have the power to regulate what type of firearm they may possess and how they carry or keep it.

There is a lot of controversy today about whether gun control should be taken further in the US. Whenever there is a mass shooting, democrats and liberals jump on it and use it for their own agendas, which in my opinion, is not right. They seize the opportunity to try to force gun control laws upon we the people. Thankfully, there are enough conservatives and others who value the constitution to stop these blatant attempts. Gun control laws are a waste of time and resources because they do not deter crime, they do not prevent criminals from obtaining guns, and they infringe upon the right of self protection.

Modern mass media has led to very rapid showing of current events, such as car accidents, buisness scandals, and shootings. When one sees news of a shooting, regardless of size, society quickly searches for logical explanations and places to point the blame. This is where many take aim at firearms, even though it is apart of every Americans 2nd amendment rights to possess a firearm, as it reads “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 second amendment was put into place by our founding fathers in order to ensure that citizens had a means of defending themselves against, whether that is against robbers, pirates, or the government itself. These basic rights to own a firearm date back hundreds of years, in fact, this heritage has created a culture in of itself . Results of this heritage has been many Americans, wanting a vast array of firearms, whether that be bolt action rifles, semi-automatic rifles, or even fully-automatic rifles. All of these borrow aspects from a military rifle, such as high capacity mags, firing modes, and even just being a decommissioned rifle itself. When certain members of society see this and say why do we even need access to military grade firearms as citizens. “Gun control laws would prevent citizens from protecting themselves from foreign invaders. The Libertarian Party stated, "A

Gun Control has been a long debated, and hot topic among the American population for many decades. The 2nd Amendment to the United States Constitution states that, “The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed”. Both sides of this debate have very logical arguments for increasing gun control or lessening gun control. These arguments tend to spike shortly after active shooter events, eventually having some type of legislature passed to prevent these atrocious acts from happening. But ultimately active shooter events continue to plague the United States, and much of the world.

“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 right of all Americans to bear arms is a right the Founding Fathers held to equal importance as the Constitution itself. Gun control laws directly violate this right and therefore should not even be under consideration. Even if that issue is overlooked, gun control advocates state that in order to reduce firearm related violence, gun control laws must be implemented to remove the violence caused by firearms. Although this may seem reasonable, the consequences of such laws are ironically counterproductive; they exacerbate the problem instead of fixing it. Besides the fact that the American

In recent years, gun control has been one of the most debated topics in the United States. No matter who you ask, everyone always has an opinion on firearm ownership. After every publicized mass shooting, two groups of people form: group #1 wants to ban guns from private ownership in some shape or form, and group #2 fights against them fiercely to protect the constitutional right to bear arms. More specifically, the 2nd amendment to the U.S Constitution 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.” (US Const. amend. II).

“The only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun.” says NRA vice president Wayne Lapierre on gun control. Most know that gun control is the set of laws or policies that regulate the manufacture, sale, transfer, possession, modification, or use of firearms by civilians. These policies, in fact, don’t solve most problems as intended, but can even cause more. Guns are not the problem; putting laws on guns doesn’t resolve the fact that killers will kill regardless. The right to bear arms is a constitutional right. Taking control of guns would be extremely unconstitutional. Guns are a functional part of society. The United States should never be able to take our guns.

Although I did not agree with the article How Gun Control Advocates Could break the NRA’s Blockade by Ronald Brownstein, it states some points that were hard to refute about gun control and that helped shape my argument. My stance on gun control is that we should not ban guns as a whole, but have more of a centralized approach on how people can obtain a gun. Being an American citizen allows you with certain alienable rights that are outlined by the Bill of Rights. We as a nation were given these rights at the creation of our great nation based on the fact that all men were created equal. Some of the rights that are given include things such as, freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom of the press, and the right to bear arms. The Bill of Rights was made because they wanted to place specific limits on government power. The author of the article is suggesting that we as a nation should ban all types of guns. This topic of banning guns or not banning guns is important because in recent events there has been a lot of mass shootings that have ended lives too early. These mass shootings are becoming more and more common the number of people that have been killed by guns within the last year has been four hundred and sixty-one. Also, there have been over three hundred mass shootings in the last 477 days.

The banning of guns at the hands of the American government would leave law-abiding citizens defenseless against armed thieves. In America, many criminals use guns to commit an inconsiderable amount of crimes, such as murder and robbery. To prepare for a worst-case scenario, people who have a gun license arm themselves with multiple firearms to protect their families. By arming themselves, gun owners feel some sense of security, should they be involved in a gun-related incident. In the article “The NRA Is Right, But We Still Need to Ban Handguns,” the author states that “One tenet of the National Rifle Association’s faith has always been that handgun controls do little to stop criminals from obtaining handguns” (Sugarmann). If the