Gun Control

Gun Control

Gun control versus gun rights is an ever growing debate in society. Being a hunter and outdoorsman I naturally side with the gun rights activists. Some gun control activists are lobbying to ban firearms from private ownership completely citing incidents such as Columbine and other shootings as examples why guns should be banned. I believe that these people have good reasoning but I don't think they realize what this law would really entail. The second amendment of the constitution says that we have the right to bear arms. To ban guns the federal government would have to amend the constitution. As hunting and competitive shooting are both national pastimes there is much opposition to this proposed ban. There is three main reasons I believe Americans should be allowed to own guns; self defense, sporting reasons, and finally, our culture.

Self defense is the sole reason many Americans own a gun. There is myth among anti gun lobbyists that says that using a gun as self defense is more likely to result in injury than if the victim is unarmed. A Florida State University criminologist, Gary Kleck, analyzed data from the Department of Justice's National Crime Victimization Survey. Describing his findings on defensive gun use, "In general, self-protection measures of all types are effective, in the sense of reducing the risk of property loss in robberies and confrontational burglaries, compared to doing nothing or cooperating with the offender. The most effective form of self-protection is use of a gun. For robbery the self-protection measures with the lowest loss rates were among victims attacking the offender with a gun, and victims threatening the offender with a gun." (Kleck 23)

When a person thinks about it makes sense that having a gun will really help deter burglars. If I was robbing a house and saw a guy in his pajamas aiming a loaded twelve gauge at me, I would run the other way as quickly as I could. On the other hand, if I saw a guy in his pajamas with a baseball bat I wouldn't be nearly as worried. I guess it all boils down to what you are willing to do to protect your property.

Another reason someone would own a gun is because he uses it for sporting purposes. I think that these people are the safest gun owners. Killing an animal with a gun gives you respect for what the weapon can actually do. Most responsible hunters teach their kids at a very young age about the dangers of guns and the children of these families learn to respect the weapons and to use them correctly. Most kids involved in shootings come from dysfunctional families and were not taught how to handle weapons. I believe that a child learns the negative uses of a gun not from their parents, but from video games and TV, which leads me to my next point.

America is a gun culture, there is guns in almost anything you watch, news, video games, movies and so on. If someone is not taught how to use a gun properly and just learns from modern media