My close friends know that I’m a strong supporter of the Second Amendment.
In a mature enough society, gun ownership promotes both individual responsibility and social cohesion. As intended by the Founding Fathers.
At the time when the US Constitution was drafted, the American state didn’t have a proper army, nor any real need for one. The neighbors were few and very far away, in contrast to what was going on in Europe at that time.
It didn’t make sense, at that time, for a strong army to be mentioned in the Constitution but the Founding Fathers very aptly told their constituents to build up a strong self defense capability. You never know what might happen in the future.
Hence the “well regulated Militia” which was deemed “necessary to the security of a free State”. NB, for a “free State”, not for any random individual citizen who wishes to free himself from a democratically elected government…
In this sense, the Second Amendment should be primarily defended as a stringent need of the entire society, instead of being promoted mainly as an ‘individual right’.
And it should be enforced accordingly. Keeping in mind the needs of the entire society, not only those of particular individuals.
Periodically, we are reminded of what may happen when society forgets to actually ‘regulate’ itself. When rules which have been agreed upon are put in practice in a ‘creative’ manner.
One has to pass ‘back-ground checks’ if he wants to buy a gun from a store but he can also buy one anonymously from a gun show.
Assault guns have been forbidden yet until this very morning those who ‘needed’ one could legally buy a ‘bump stock’. A “device” which “causes the gun to buck back and forth, repeatedly “bumping” the trigger against the shooter’s finger. Technically, that means the finger is pulling the trigger for each round fired, keeping the weapon a legal semi-automatic.”
Not only that people kill themselves using their own guns. Not only that gangsters kill each others in turf wars. Not only that policemen get killed in the line of work.
Not only that from time to time individuals attempt a particularly murderous form of suicide – by indiscriminately shooting people and waiting for the police to shoot them back.
Time and time again students, some of them very young, are brought back from school in coffins.
And after each of such incidents, various ‘authors’ attempt to put things into ‘perspective’.
It’s exactly this kind of warped perspective which makes it perfectly intelligible what’s going on. Some people would say anything which seems to prove their point. Only to make it obvious how wrong they are.
Cars are meant for transportation and are widely used by their owners. For the reason they were meant to. Therefore, death by car accident is just that, an accident.
Guns are meant to be deadly. Reasonable people use them for for practice and, only when they absolutely have to, to defend themselves. In theory, death by gun shot would exclusively be accidental or as a result of people rightfully defending themselves or their property.
So, should we compare those two numbers?
15,549 more or less intended gun related murders – this figure doesn’t include most suicides, with the 41,000 of more or less unintended car accidents?
Are these two figures really comparable?
If we compare apples to apples, then yes, guns are less accident prone than cars. 2,015 shootings – let’s assume all of them were fatal, versus 41,000 death by car accidents.
We can also say guns are a little less deadly than cars. According to the CDC preliminary published data, in 2016 the total number of gun related deaths – including suicides, was 38,000. Almost 10% smaller than the number of car related deaths.
But then again, how many cars have been used to intentionally kill someone? Or to commit suicide?
And since it’s true that guns don’t kill by themselves, it’s obvious that’s up to us to solve the situation. For no other reason than ‘we are the ones who might get killed otherwise’!
nicichiarasa 