Gun Laws Have Been A Major Issue - Free Essay Example

Gun laws have been a major issue in society today that creates many different ideas and controversies. The Second Amendment allows citizens the right to keep and bear Arms, so why are people raging about the opposing views of others? Globally, people are debating on whether or not guns should be so easily accessed. According to the Crime Prevention Research Center, over 50 percent of murders occur in 2 percent of the nations counties. With the amount of gun related crimes, it is not hard to tell why some individuals oppose persons to effortlessly purchase a firearm. Guns have been involved in many unfortunate events, various have happened in the past and are even still very common today. Earlier this year, on February 14th a man by the name of Nikolas Cruz went into Stoneman Douglas High School and shot 17 persons, forlorn, all individuals have passed away. Stricter gun laws can have a positive effect on society, if stricter gun laws are enforced, society will be much safer. Gun officials should have stricter gun laws because of the increased school shootings, to decrease death rates, and guns are to easily accessible to everyone. School shootings have been unfortunately growing in numbers over the years. Gun laws should in fact be harsher. Everyday information with gun violence is being seen around the globe. Shooting in public spaces, schools, killing and suicide are only some of various types of gun violence. Shooting and killing any individual is a huge topic in the world and several different comments are offered about this. One of the most significant of them is about weapon (gun) regulation forces. Stingl (2013) states The term gun control as it constitutes applied in the United States relates to any action brought by federal government or by state or localized governments to regulate, through legislation, the sale, purchase, safety, and the use of handguns and other types of firearms by individual citizens. With the number of crimes today, it would only make sense to put these regulations into place in order to ensure the safety of our communities. According to Mark Gius of Quinnipiac University, Assault weapons bans reduced the number of school shooting victims by 54.4 percent. If government officials would enforce stricter gun laws, the reduced percentage of school shooting victims will be even lower. Furthermore, making the age to own a gun higher will not prevent school shootings, neither will background checks, or even bump stock banning. Reason being is because the individual who aspires to commit the crime will rebel against gun laws anyway, similarly to Nicolas Cruz, who broke an (existing) law and commitment the crime with a firearm he was not even allowed to own because of his age. Supporters for more gun regulations typically only rise immediately after a mass shooting, and the falls when the incident fades from memory. For example, after the shooting in 2012 December, at Sandy Hook Elementary the support for stricter gun laws rose to 58%! In less then a year, that percentage fell to only 49%, despite the sudden peaks and drops, the support for stricter gun regulations has overall risen. Gun control laws will make schools and America safer. Places where guns are not allowed are usually the places where all the shootings happen, for instance, schools, churches, and concerts. These places are usually the most targeted, when their victims are most likely unarmed, and defenseless. Additionally, to both state which h ave their own laws to regulate firearms and federal gun laws, the right to keep and bear arms is grounded by the second amendment to the U.S Constitution. Mass shootings in the U.S has started public debate about gun control laws, however. Whenever these mass shootings occur, there is always a call for stronger gun laws. Urban schools are typically where guns are most easily accessible. For example, Chicago has many of the strictest gun laws in the country however still manages to have some of the highest murder rates. Whether guns are legal or not in Chicago, there are still numerous firearms. If there are so many guns in Chicago, why arent there many school shootings there? When a shooting has occurred, gun control is suddenly a main topic, not surprisingly. People will want to have regulations by increasing background checks, closing loopholes in gun laws and banning weapons. We have witnessed many gun related murders and as mentioned previously there has been a rise in mass shootings throughout the years, if you were to observe statistics on gun control laws and murder rates, there will be no correlation. Stricter government laws related with less gun related deaths, report finds The section talked about gun regulations laws in states with harsher laws tend to take lower rates of weapon related homicides, as well as suicides (ProCon par 1). Gun control in the U.S is growing into a broad distribution issue and is growing into the question everywhere. Stricter gun laws should be enforced in order to decrease death rates. According to www.statistics.com, the presence of guns in the home increased an individuals risk of death by homicides by 90 percent. Even if you give a good guy a gun, their chance of surviving isnt even risen, its actually decreased. Additionally, when an individual uses a gun to present self-defense, there is no obvious way to lessen or reduce their chance of being hurt. Similarly, individuals who were in possession of a gun were about 4.5 times more likely to be shot in an assault than those not in possession.5 (Do Gun Laws Work? 1). Although some may believe that giving a good person a gun will help to eliminate the chance of gun violence being accumulated, it is best to have harsher gun laws that way it is much harder for criminals to obtain a firearm. Doing background checks and having an age requirement to own a gun will not prevent gun violence at all. As an example, the age to own a firearm is 21 and Nicolas Cruz was 20 years old when he shot and killed the students in Parkland with an AR-15. An AR-15 is a a weapon Cruz should not even have been able to withhold because of his age. As mentioned in the U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, The United States goes through many epidemic levels of gun violence, over 30,000 lives are lost yearly[]for every person who dies from a gunshot wound, two others are wounded and every year about 100,000 Americans are victims of gun violence. Gun related deaths are only expanding and only stricter laws will help to lower the rates. Government officials can enforce stricter gun laws by not eliminating the prior regulations, but altering them. For instance, background checks: instead of the elimination of background checks they can be stricter; for example, officials can change the policy to NO felonies or NO arrests of any kind completely in order to purchase. They can also regulate the denial of any individual if they have not had a gun permit for a minimum of X amount of time. This way, it will be much harder for an individual (of any kind) to purchase a firearm. If government officials use this approach, the number of death rates do to gun violence will significantly decrease. Approximately one-third of gun deaths in America are homicides, and just the access alone to a firearm increases the risk of death by two times according to www.everytownresearch.org. America fails to realize that allowing more guns is equivalent to allowing more deaths. Black Americans constitute the age of gun killing victims. African Americans exist ten times more likely than white Americans to suffer from the wounds of firearms. Firearms represent the 2nd major cause of death of American kids and adolescents, and the primary major cause of death for colored kids and teens (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention 1). Many may argue that government officials should not have stricter gun laws. For example, if you take away guns or make them harder to obtain then it would be much more difficult for a good guy to help the public. Their theory behind not having stricter gun laws is, the only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun. One may say that having stricter gun laws will make it harder for a good guy to own a gun, but many oppose. If government officials have stricter gun laws, why would it be much harder for a good guy to purchase a firearm? If a good guy is really a good guy, then why would it be a hassle to be given background checks etc? An honorable American citizen would not have to worry about having to go through a harder process in order to have a gun because they would easily be granted access because of their clean records, assumingly. Gun regulations should be much stricter because it would have such a more positive effect on society. As mentioned, with the amount of deaths and mass shootings rising day by day, it is only wise to attempt to enforce stricter gun laws. If gun regulations were not only monitored, but enforced, society would not always have to keep their guard up when it comes to gun safety. Children and even adults themselves would be able to have a peace of mind and would not have to always be thinking about the What ifs.. and could be able to simply do their daily jobs at ease. The Human firearms Act of 1934 was ratified by chairman Franklin D. Roosevelt after high-profile gangland offenses, including this St. Valentines Time Murder at 1929 that left seven dead in Chicago. Even back then weapons were an issue and Presidents and government officials attempted to fix the issue, then why are these events still taking place today? Majority of people support gun control but the real issue is getting it to actually take place. There is a vase difference between having a law and enforcing a law, society today needs to enforce gun laws. The world would be a much safer place if they were enforced. The web has opened up information choices for people to buy guns. Individual merchants will usually transport within their own government without making a background check. To send to another government (interstate sales), they would have to take the licensed vendor as an intermediary. In those instances, the seller must do the background check, as authorized dealers usually have to do the BC on and offline. Individuals who wish to obtain a firearm are too easily granted. In the USA, there are more than 55,000 authorized weapon traders, according to the 2015 Office of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives account. This includes everything from tiny privately-owned gun stores and sporting goods stores to large chain shops that hold guns, like WalMart. Additionally, there exist more than 8,000 pawn stores that are certified to trade and sell guns, according to this ATF. Both authorized gun dealers and pawn stores are required by national police to perform background checks when dealing with guns. But not every gun-buyer moves the gun shop way, and in the number of states, firing vendors that are not licensed wont be needed to do the background check, according to the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Almost every time a school shooter commits a crime, they are hit with a mental disability, if shooters are so called mentally disturbed, then how are they able to purchase their weapons? Many of the mass shooters nowadays are surprisingly very young ranging from teens to just early adults. How are these criminals able to own their firearms? Legally owned guns are frequently stolen and used by criminals. According to www.washingtonpost.com, A June 2013 Institute of Medicine (IOM) report states that [a]almost all guns used in criminal acts enter circulation via initial legal transaction. [18] Between 2005 and 2010, 1.4 million guns were stolen from US homes during property crimes (including burglary and car theft), a yearly average of 232,400. [19] Ian Ayres, JD, PhD, and John J. Donohue, JD, PhD, Professors of Law at Yale Law School and Stanford Law School respectively, state, with guns being a product that can be easily carried away and quickly sold at a relatively high fraction of the initial cost, the presence of more guns can actually serve as a stimulus to burglary and theft. Even if the gun owner had a permit to carry a concealed weapon and would never use it in furtherance of a crime, is it likely that the same can be said for the burglar who steals the gun? [20] The Second amendments grants persons to own a firearm, and there are some restrictions out today that can help prevent criminals from obtaining a gun; but what good is it if the criminal can and will just steal a firearm? America needs a good founded and solid system to ensure the safety of its citizens. If citizens are constantly worrying about their safety then what good are the laws set in place to supposably protect them? The principle behind gun regulation is simple†the fewer guns at peoples hands, that lesser chances for gun violence and fatalities to happen. This purpose is harm reduction, not the destruction of killing and aggression altogether. Thiss never going to happen. Gun power is about making certain guns do not go into those wrong hands. That means things like general background checks, determining the types of guns that world has access to and other common-sense rules. Country is an example of the nation where gun power went. After 35 people died at the Port Arthur Murder, Country banned specific semi automatic and mechanical weapons. Australians are still allowed to have guns if they take the appropriate licenses and have the reason for having these weapons besides physical security.