It is not an argument every time someone brings up gun deaths as a problem to note that car accidents kill a lot of people and we don't take away cars. Or some other event leads to so many deaths that we are able to live with, so whats the big deal with a few kids getting shot in a school so I can own a gun.
All arguments should be centered around, do you think we are doing enough to prevent kids from being randomly murdered by terrorists in our schools. The reality is the majority of other 1st world countries avoid this problem, at least on our scale, by restricting gun ownership.
Its probably not the only means to accomplish a reduction in deaths but to insinuate that no action is needed is ridiculous.
The NRA's sometimes ridiculous stances are clearly founded in their need to market for higher gun ownership. Which is no small feat in a market completely saturated with guns.
Just going to leave this here:
Don't be misled by the publicity on shootings: For kids, schools actually are the safest refuges from gun violence
I agree very much with that article. Gun violence in schools is very noticible, but it's a symptom of a larger problem. That's why real gun nation-wide controls are necessary, not wasted measures like arming teachers and turning schools into hardened bunkers of learning.
It is not an argument every time someone brings up gun deaths as a problem to note that car accidents kill a lot of people and we don't take away cars. Or some other event leads to so many deaths that we are able to live with, so whats the big deal with a few kids getting shot in a school so I can own a gun.
All arguments should be centered around, do you think we are doing enough to prevent kids from being randomly murdered by terrorists in our schools. The reality is the majority of other 1st world countries avoid this problem, at least on our scale, by restricting gun ownership.
Its probably not the only means to accomplish a reduction in deaths but to insinuate that no action is needed is ridiculous.
The NRA's sometimes ridiculous stances are clearly founded in their need to market for higher gun ownership. Which is no small feat in a market completely saturated with guns.
It's hard to look at other countries gun control and transpose their success to the US.
- The US has more guns than the rest of the world combined
- The US has the largest military in the world
- The US has an incredibly diverse population
- The US has a problem with violent crime using illegal guns in urban communities
That's just a few of the major cultural differences that make the US unique. There is no other country like this. Even US sports like our 'football' are ridiculously violent compared to real fubol played by the rest of the world.
It's unlikely to replicate the success of Australia or any other country because they started 90% closer to the goal than where we are today. The culture is changing (slowly), and incremental progress over time will be most productive. Trying to change too much too soon will backfire with the opposing side digging in their heels.
The US has more guns than the rest of the world combined. Yep. It's the easy access to these weapons that is (at least partly) driving the problem.
The US has the largest military in the world. Yeah, but I'm not seeing a clear link between this and nationwide gun violence.
The US has an incredibly diverse population. Uh, nope. Most world studies put the US somewhere in the middle for diversity, typically well below Canada for example. Despite what Fox rants about, you are still a predominantly white, Christian, English speaking nation.
The US has a problem with violent crime using illegal guns in urban areas. This isn't unique at all. Most urban areas have problems with violent crime. What's unique about the ?US is the way that you've made it extremely easy for criminals to get guns, and extremely hard to prosecute those who supply them.
Just to be clear, it's not really "we" that have made it easy for criminals to get guns. Guns started off as accessible because of the 2nd amendment and have remained that way largely because of 2nd amendment supporters. Criminals have easy access to because (1) of the drug trade, largely through mexico. (2) because of the domestic drug trade (think drugs come from chicago to Mississippi, guns (mostly stolen) go from Mississippi to Chicago), and (3) prosecutors are elected positions and in the areas with the worst problems, such as Chicago or Baltimore, prosecuting straw purchasers is politically damaging, because even if straw purchasing is made a felony (in many jurisdictions its not), you're talking about democrat politicians putting girlfriends, grandmothers, aunts etc. with otherwise clean records in jail for buying a gun for their felon boyfriends/relatives who can't pass a background check, and most of those girlfriends, grandmothers, aunts, etc. are going to be from voting blocs that the politician relies upon to get elected. The different mechanisms for getting guns are enabled by different political factions, with left and right historically supporting the drug war, left and establishment right not wanting to have effective border control, the left being the primary obstacle to prosecuting straw purchasers, and I'm not sure there is a current political faction to blame for the domestic gun/drugs trade. That genie was let out of the bottle a long time ago and I don't think there is an easy (or even hard) way to stop it that's feasible. Even if the war on drugs were ended, the criminal infrastructure is there and they'd just move to using their guns to pursue other criminal enterprises that might be more damaging than the illegal drug trade, since it won't involve victimless crimes.
You say that things are slowly changing over time, but I'm not sure that's true. Restrictions around guns have only been loosened in my lifetime. Can you point to what you consider movement in the right direction?
Until recently, violent crime rates were on a long and steady drop. Lots of theories as to why (unleaded gasoline, more abortions, higher incarceration rates, more concealed carry) that may not really be the "culture" of violence changing, but a good trend regardless.