I
am taking a moment and offering my condolences to the families of the slain journalists
of WDBJ news station in Roanoke, Virginia. I will not attempt to make a political
case for/against guns…but I will make points regarding the gun debate in the
United States. Hopefully, within the near future we will finally have a grip on
the reduction of gun violence in America.
President Obama continues to push for more common sense
gun legislation during his time in the White House. He signed legislation allowing
guns to be carried in National Parks, which the NRA never addresses. He advocates
for the second amendment. His support for Congress to act on gun control by
passing legislation to expand background checks is gaining support. Even within
the circles of the NRA, 74% of members support background checks (this is according
to the Washington Post and an overall 89% of Americans support the idea as
well). I always consider background checks to be an essential part of gun
ownership as it serves as a sort of liability insurance for the owner of their
gun – and it serves the best interest for both the owner and the general public
respectively (example – it protects the gun owner financially in the case of
being criminally negligent regarding homicides if their gun is used and it
benefits the victim’s family regarding funeral costs). If it is stolen or used illegally, the owner would be fined and
would be suspended from buying a gun during a certain amount of time (my
personal preference is five years). Better yet, if you own a firearm and it is
abused, then you should be fined – it would be called the firearm tax. That
would allow responsible gun owners to continue to obey the laws and only hinder
those that break the law. This ensures the second amendment is still protected.
I’ll make another observation: two journalists were
killed, Church members in South Carolina were killed, a theatre in Colorado,
and a elementary school in Connecticut has children lose their lives due to gun
violence…a military recruiting station in Tennessee was a place where four
lives were lost due to gun violence. Why is it that the only place that had
citizens step up and protect the members of the military? If you want to help
the military and veterans, hold members of Congress that vote against their
interests like housing and veterans assistance regarding work, education, etc.
I don’t recall after any of the other tragedies that citizens got so fed up
that they took up arms and started protecting theatres, churches, schools, news
stations, or shopping malls. We want to stand up and patrol our [southern]
border with guns but we don’t want to stand up and patrol our parts of our
communities that benefit everyone within it – unless it’s a military
recruitment station? I know we can protect both without being hypocritical –
not to mention we can hold members of Congress accountable if they don’t vote
in the interests of military members (veteran, active, and reserves), teachers
& school personal (current and
retired), emergency services that assist in such tragedies, etc. One final note
about those that decided to “protect” the military recruitment stations, the
U.S. Army sent memos to all recruitment stations to be on the lookout for these
vigilantes and “keep their distance and alert law
enforcement of their presence” according to Lt. Gen.
Mark Brilakis, the head of Marine Corps Recruiting Command, and also advised
troops not to support the "armed citizen" volunteers in any way.
Some of my ideas seem extreme, but at least I’m talking
about the issue head-on and coming up with solutions instead of playing the
blame game that occurs whenever a tragedy happens. Common sense gun laws are
necessary to ensure the safety of all citizens – just like taking steps to
ensure guns don’t get into the hands of those that are not mentally competent operate
them. I think it is ludicrous to talk about Gun Control & Mental Health as
two separate issues when there have been multiple incidents and a direct
correlation can be found.
I hope at some point the United States will join the rest
of the world and reduce its gun-related deaths by at least 20% within the next
50 years. In order to do this, we need to get serious about the issue and
determine which one is more important: clinging onto our “guns aren’t the
problem” mindset or common sense gun legislation that protects and saves all
lives of United States citizens.
