THESIS: Laws on gun control are emplaced purely on cause and effect basis. When in actual fact more importance should be attached to the right to own a gun as opposed to the potential harm gun ownership can inflict.
(P1) Gun control laws are increased or decreased in regards to their relationship with crime. If gun control decreases gun violence which common sense may dictate it should be increased but if it doesn’t it’s useless.
(P2) Gun controls effect on crime is arguable either way as countries like the UK has a complete ban on hand guns and strict penalties on illegal firearm ownership but there is still gun crime.
(P3) The main focus on gun control should be balancing crime and the right to have firearms, his hypothesis is that the right to own gun is more relevant than any tentative relationship gun’s may have with crime, after all crime existed long before guns.
(P4) More emphasis on the utilitarian principles of gun control i.e. the greatest happiness for the greatest number than there is to individual rights of ownership and self protection. Which incidentally is the main criticism of utilitarianism as a theory, it works in general but only if you’re a part of the greatest number, those in the minority just go unnoticed. The rights of individual citizens are sidelined because of the danger of guns but in theory anything in the wrong hands can be dangerous
ANALYSIS
- Gun control is a tentative issue and Huemer tackles the main issue which I think is pivotal, that more focus is on the word ‘gun’ than the word ‘control’. His point which is a valid one is that preserving human rights and the rights for someone to defend themselves from harm is more important than the possible dangers of firearms in the wrong hands.
- (P1). Instrumentality when used in reference to weapons is the hypothesis that the increased availability of weapons in a certain area also increases that areas likelihood of weapon based offences. Essentially the increased availability of guns increases the chances that a criminal will choose a gun as their weapon of choice for committing crimes, not to mention this also increases the range of crimes this criminal can initiate. (Cook, 1991; Zimring & Hawkins, 1997).
- (P2) if a criminal substitutes a knife for a gun a robbery the likelihood that the victim may be hurt or killed increases because guns cause more serious wounds that knives, they are more effective at long range and they can be used to assault multiple people, not to mention gun accidents are a very real threat.
- On the other hand the instrumentality hypothesis does not in any way suggest that crime will increase because of increased gun availability just that the likelihood that criminals will substitute knives and other weapons for guns will increase thus resulting in more homicides.
ASSESSMENT: To conclude, John Stuart Mill agreed that the rights of the individual are more important than the dangers, .i.e the dangers of not having rights is worse than actual physical harm. As long as that individual is not causing harm to others there should be no government interference, therefore a one size fits all solution to gun control (just making it tougher) is not the answer.
Huemer, M. (2003) Social Theory and Practice
Mill, J.S. On Liberty in focus, edited by Gray, J & Smith, G.W (2003)
Schmalleger, F. (2012). Criminology today: An integrative introduction (6th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.
