Though I try to keep these posts fairly unbiased, it is almost impossible for any article of any type to be completely unopinionated. This may show in this post more than others, so this is a heads up for that.
Gun control is a widely discussed topic across the board of many countries. Guns are the easiest, quickest, and most efficient killing machines, and have caused the death of millions. Though the person pulling the trigger is responsible rather than the gun itself, guns certainly make killing easier and more accessible.
Usually for these articles, I find images to make the post isn’t just a boring block of text. Typing ‘gun control’ into Google Images was a surprising adventure though, as 70% of the pictures were against gun control. These are the first two pictures relative to gun control:
However, changing ‘gun control’ to ‘gun control statistics’ shows a different story. These are the first two pictures relative to gun control:
So what does this tell us? The facts and propaganda are clearly separate, so who is right? Well, that’s up to personal opinion.
One of the places gun control is discussed the most, is the USA, as you can see above, that’s where the propaganda and statistics are based. America’s second amendment protects ‘the right to keep and bear arms’, essentially meaning they are allowed to have a firearm if they wish. This is one of the main arguments against gun control, as it would be deriving from tradition and a breach of rights.
However these amendments (the main 10) were created in in 1789, and ratification was completed in 1791. Since then times have changed, and guns have become more efficient, accessible, and overall deadlier.
Lets look at the statistics.
Firstly, let's compare statistics between countries. The two articles I chose to cross reference the data between gun control and deaths by firearm were very extensive over 49 countries. In the interest of not having to wade through mountains of data, I have chosen just 8. South Africa, Canada, Mexico, United States, Japan, United Kingdom, Australia and Sweden. (Please note that these locations were unbiased choices.)
From this, we see that countries with the stricter gun control laws have less gun violence. The United Kingdom has the least gun violence, and is the only country on the list to have an outright ban of most firearms. This is a clear correlation, and makes us wonder why other countries don’t have a similar gun control laws in place.
Here’s why.
In 1976, the Washington, D.C. City Council passed a law generally prohibiting residents from possessing handguns and requiring that all firearms in private homes be 1. kept unloaded and 2. rendered temporarily inoperable via disassembly or installation of a trigger lock. The law became operative on Sept. 24, 1976.
During this time, the Washington, D.C. murder rate averaged 73% higher than it was at the outset of the law, while the U.S. murder rate averaged 11% lower. The spike in death rates caused the law to be struck down in June 26 2008 by the U.S. Supreme Court in a 5-4 ruling as the law was unconstitutional.
There was a similar case in Chicago in 1982, as the city instituted a ban on handguns. This ban barred civilians from possessing handguns except for those registered with the city government prior to enactment of the law. The law also specified that such handguns had to be re-registered every two years or owners would forfeit their right to possess them.
Since the outset of the Chicago handgun ban, the percentage of Chicago murders committed with handguns averaged about 40% higher than it was before the law took effect. In 2005, 96% of the firearm murder victims in Chicago were killed with handguns.
In June 2010, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled (5-4) that Chicago's ban was unconstitutional, and it was repealed.
This is evidence against the effectiveness of gun control in the United States, and contradicts evidence of successful gun control in other countries.
Why?
There are many possible factors of this, perhaps due to the culture, media differences, individuals, politics, religions, or the fact that there is no limitations on travel between states, and that people with guns from other states could have easily spied Chicago and DC as easy targets during these times. The point of gun control is to restrict criminal activity with guns, not to restrict the protections of victims. Due to the lack of state border control, these bans did not reduce the criminal activity, just the citizen activity, and therefore they did not work. That’s why gun control in countries work, as they have strict border control.
It seems that without a consistent ruling across all the states in the USA, something that is practically impossible due to the individual rulings and governments of the states and the way their political systems work independently, gun control will be ineffective. However this doesn't mean it won't work in other cases, as the USA is not the only country to have problems with gun violence.
Sources:
I also recommend watching this video, as it is an insight into teenagers views of gun control and the youth of America’s opinions about their country, something that is often overlooked.
Hello! Guns and firearms should still stay legal in my opinion. At least in USA. Because there are a lot of simple people that want just to protect themselves. Aren't they?
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