Introduction
Gun control refers to as laws and policies that have been enacted to regulate the manufacture, transfer, possession as well as the use of guns by the civilians. Gun control in the United States came at a time when massive shooting, killing, suicide, and gun related violence was on the rise in the United States. It is because of this that President Barrack Obama and his committee decided to propose the gun control policy. The annual review of public health statistics shows that gun related deaths tally to approximately 33,000 annually (Wintemute and Garen 9). For information on the gun control data, this paper has considered both arguments for and arguments against gun control. The report outlines different fields including facts, effects of gun control, and tentative solutions. Additionally, the paper strives to compare gun control in the United States vs. in Australia, undertakes to define the future of gun control, and finally opposition of gun control.
Facts about Gun Control
According to Al Jazeera’s ‘The Inside Story’ on President Obama’s gun control plan aired in 2016, there have had intense reaction from different figures. Ever since President Barrack Obama introduced the gun control policy, Americans have had their view of the same. For example, there are facts for and against gun control. Just like American politics, democrat, and republican leadership have remained divided on this issue. Democrats have been for the gun control policy whereas Republicans have tried to oppose the gun control policy brought forth by President Obama. However, their differences have differed more so on the grass root level whereby American citizens have shown solidarity in some facts (Krouse). In this argumentative research paper, both points that are for gun control and against gun control will be considered.
First, Americans have supported the need for a thorough check for the gun buyers and manufacturers (Wintemute and Garen 317). According to a reliable survey carried out by Kahan, Dan, and Braman (150) on the issue, 79% of Republicans and 88% of Democrats have supported background checks for any acquisition and selling of private guns. Moreover, certain laws have been recommended to monitor gun users and seeing to it that any person with mental illness is denied the right to own or acquire a firearm (McGinty and Emma 411).
Overall, there has been a slight margin whereby 88% of Democrats have supported the need to track down gun sales but on 55% of Republicans have been of that opinion. Contrary to this, other facts that have proven to differ from gun control policy. One main reason as to why it is hard to control guns in the United States is a cultural problem denoted as the Home Depot. Home Depot is whereby every raw material required to manufacture firearms is available to the public. Electricians, plumbers, blacksmiths, and repair people have what is necessary to make homemade guns. Therefore, the government will have a hard time regulating the rate at which people are acquiring firearms (McGinty and Emma 414).
Second, in 1999 most people claimed to own guns for hunting purposes. Later on, in 2013, the reason for owning a gun changed to protection aims, as violence escalated among the citizens. During this juncture, they claimed that they were safer with the guns in their homes. In addition to that, others simply enjoyed owning guns and keeping them in their homes. Because of the stated realities, the number of those who owned guns increased in the United States. Therefore, the tenets outlined point to the necessity of gun control. On the other hand, there were those who could not have the weapons in their households, their reason being; they are not comfortable with the guns in the households since there may be cases of accidents caused by individual holding these guns, especially in times of arguments or disagreements.
Effects of Gun Control
There exist varying advantages and shortcomings of gun control among the masses. According to (Spitzer and Robert n.p.), access to guns by every citizen is disastrous since there are increased the number of deaths including suicides by individuals holding the guns. Hillary Clinton, the democratic presidential candidate, expresses the tenet. Tentatively, she supports that there should be restrictions on access to guns to save lives. It is evident that gun control helps to reduce 33,000 annual gun deaths of the citizens of the United States of America.
Another positive impact of gun control includes reduced crimes. Individuals who are in possession of guns tend to take the law into their hands especially when they open fire. The youths being a primary concern, should be restricted from holding the guns illegally since the same will help reduce cases of crimes like robbery and rape cases (Jones and Catherine n.p.). Consequently, the overall outcome is the promotion of security and peace in the country. Contrary to this, there are arguments on the negative effects of gun control mostly by the Republican nominees in the country.
Donald Trump insists on being against gun control together with others including Ted Cruz. According to Ted, gun control has led to more crime rates and murder. The underlying belief is that those without guns cannot protect themselves from those harboring illegal guns during violence. In such cases of inequality, one party is viewed as being oppressed, as they are not deemed to enjoy the same levels of self-defense. The duo of Trump and Ted believe in self-defense and so are strongly supporting that citizens should have free access to guns. Tentatively, the government should not strive to curtail access to the same.
Solution to Gun Control
In a column that appeared in the Washington post on the 15th day of October 2015, writer Krauthammer declared that the only way to ensure that gun control is effective is by engaging in a massive buyback of firearms. Buying back of these firearms will make sure that the number of guns held by the public has been cut down. However, the political and institutional impact on this mode of gun control would be impossible to impose. Since the buyback is not highly appropriate, the only way of gun control that stands out is by issuing buying permits to customers.
However, gun control has been put to practice in different states. Krouse and William’s article have emphasized this on their book “Gun control legislation. First, different states have enacted laws that are expected to govern guns. Some of these laws include, any perpetrators and domestic violence victims are denied the right to hold a gun. Denial to hold a gun shows a promising future whereby violence and other criminal activities will go down. However, critics will always be witnessed, Myths about the future of gun control states that even if gun control is implemented, gun violence will never stop. The reason behind this is that, in America, the number of firearms that are possessed by the public is the highest amongst the developed countries. Connecting this to gun control, countries with fewer guns will automatically register low cases of gun-related violence. On the other hand, America has a large cache of weapons, and with a large number going unregistered (Hummer and Claire n.p.).
According to David B. Koppel’s article on The Ideology of gun ownership and gun control in the United States, criminological and legal approaches have been used. Over time, guns have been cherished and have led to what Koppel refers to as a feeling of individualism and equality. However, not everyone owns a gun. A huge group of people owns guns, and they tend to display their individualism and self-reliance.
Gun Control in the USA vs. Australia
Just like in the USA, Australia has had a taste of extensive gun ownership in the past. The trend continued until gun control was introduced after Port Arthur massacre almost twenty years ago (McPhedran, Samara, and Baker 6). Australian government successfully implemented gun control policy and its citizens received it positively. Australian Prime Minister John Howard had an exclusive interview with US broadcaster CBS’ Sunday Morning TV program. In his interview, he emphasized that it is possible to implement gun control policy and benefit from it. However, criticism will always be there and this time, critics say that while gun-related incidences have decreased, other forms of violence and crimes have come up. More criticism came from US President aspirant Ted Cruz who argued that cases of sexual assaults have gone up ever since the implementation of gun control in Australia. Another criticism from the Gun Control Australia Organization is that after gun control application, more than 9,000 illegal firearms have penetrated the black market (Hummer 68). The 1996 incident in Australia led to a unison acceptance of the policy (McPhedran, Samara, and Baker 6)
Comparing Australia to the USA on gun control, a large number of the latter are not willing to part with their guns (Hammer and Claire n.p.). Any that brought before Congress bordering on gun control, faces extensive opposition with minimal chances of approval. However, United States government should consider borrowing from Australia on the buying back scheme. The buying back scheme aimed at buying guns from the Australia citizens. The Australian citizens who were willing to collaborate with their government mostly effected the success of this project.
Future of Gun Control in the USA
According to Hammer and Claire’s article, the year 2016, in American soil, the Congress will never allow gun control to be implemented in the United States. In addition, Americans do not want any gun related laws to be applied in their country. Other arguments say that mass shooting should not be blamed on guns since this happens even when gun control does not work. Americans find it hard to implement gun control policies in that they are not willing to part with their guns claiming that they are for self-defense (Haynes 51).
Moreover, Americans have borrowed from Switzerland and Israel arguing that the duo has lived without gun control and their day-to-day life has been peaceful. Still, on the future of gun control in the United States of America, its borders are open, and anyone can bring in firearms especially through illegal immigrations. To add on that, lawmakers are worried about losing their jobs if they support gun control (Krouse and William 117). From the above discussion, it is, therefore, hard to fully implement gun control in the United States of America considering all the opposition it faces.
Opposition to Gun Control
According to Krouse (221), there is clear evidence that there is the need for gun control in the United States of America. However, there are some of the resistances to this issue by the citizens themselves. First, it is not easy to collect a large number of guns from the citizens. The reason being, there is approximately one gun for each citizen in the United States. Therefore, making it hard to have them all collected. The people had gathered the guns for home defense purpose earlier before and so clearing them away from them is not easy. Another reason why gun control is opposed in the United States is that most plumbers and electricians can make the guns in their workshops. The materials required are readily available and affordable. Due to this, it becomes difficult to control the access to guns by the citizens (Wintemute and Garen 17).
The third reason why gun control is opposed in the United States is that of the threats caused by the terrorists. Due to of the terrorist attacks, most people try to have a personal gun for own use for protection against these terrorists. Therefore, it is hard to control this since the terrorists are a threat even to the entire country.
The fourth resistance towards gun control is the case of breaking the laws by the citizens themselves. Usually, each member cannot follow the rules set by a state strictly. In retrospect, a few individuals break the set rules: Albeit the strength of the same. Such people will always sneak and access the prohibited guns. The ensuing scenario is one where the struggle for gun control ensues. The fifth reason why gun control is opposed in the United States of America is that there are cases whereby the armed civilians are allowed to help the police surface the bad lot. In some circumstances, when the police are overwhelmed in their fights, they may ask for aid from the nearby-armed civilians.
The aspect gives rise to a situation where the flow goes against gun control, as individuals are not allowed to use the guns for a wrong purpose. Lastly, the opposition of gun control is pegged on the usage of guns on soft targets. In this case, the targets include churches and institutions, which is a deviation from the expected usage. Tentatively, it is difficult to pinpoint areas where illegal guns can found. The underlying situation further fuels the opposition of gun control (Wintemute and Garen 311).
One outstanding argument that has been put across by different people is that the government should assure the safety of its citizens before disarming them. According to Wintemute and Garen (p. 316), the argument is that citizens should be made to believe that they are safe free from terrorist and other individuals with a hidden agenda. In most cases, people advance weak excuses for holding automatic machines that can wipe out hordes within a short time. The populace is of the opinion that they require the same for self-protection and hunting. However, according to Spitzer and Robert (2015), the politics of gun control have created a divide amongst the citizens and therefore it will be hard to let them understand each other. The supporters of gun control plan will be willing to believe that government will offer them maximum protection. However, those in opposition will always criticize the move and undermine the capability of the government.
Conclusion
The positive effects being reduced crimes and death. On the other hand, the respective effects encompass a lack of self-defense. In addition to all these, there are also solutions to gun control including introducing buying back scheme of guns and bringing up a policy that guns should be bought with a permit. Another point in the report is the comparison between Australian and United States gun controls. In this case, the United States citizens are advised to borrow from the Australian successful gun control procedures. There is also the future of gun control, this being, the possible outcome of gun control in the United States. Under this, there is an indication that gun control may not be successful in the United States because of the strong opposition from many Americans.
Works Cited
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