Ban Guns, surely you Jest
Congratulations to our young people for standing up for the rest of us. Recent polls show that the vast majority of voters are in favor of improved gun control. Some folks interpret that to mean banning guns. That could not be further from the truth. The vast majority are in favor of gun ownership, never mind the 2nd amendment. Certain elements, on both sides of this subject, are creating an unnecessary polarization and as a result no action is being taken.
The facts are that the US leads all first world countries in gun violence and not by a small margin. My impression is that there are two main contributors to this. First is the issue that our young people are pursuing. When I say “young people”, almost all of these advocates are younger than my grandchildren. Among the elements and at the forefront is minimizing the availability of assault weapons. That is easy to resolve if only our elected representatives would take action. If it is so easy, then why has it not happened. My suggestion is, as usual, follow the money.
The 2nd issue is not so easy. It has to do with the culture of violence that we have facilitated in our country. We have 5% of the world’s population and incarcerate 25% of the total world’s inmates. Our homicide rate is 5 times that in Australia and when a homicide occurs, who is always the first person of interest according to the police? It is always the spouse and next it is family members closely followed by “friends”. In fact, the majority of homicides in our country are committed by this group. I have no idea how to resolve this issue, but it definitely deserves some thought. Banning assault weapons will have little positive impact on this issue.
What I do know is that there is plenty of room for agreement by the majority that will have a positive impact in reducing gun violence and the homicide rate. Australia proved that it can be done without violating our right to gun ownership. It is extremely sad that the “adults” in our society have so far failed.