Let me start by saying that my utmost sympathy goes out to any and all people who have lost a friend/ relative/loved one due to gun violence, it is a terrible tragedy, and I do not diminish your loss by one iota. That, however is not the thrust of this post. I would also like to say that I am not a member of the NRA and I do not own a handgun or do any hunting or recreational shooting.
I have been reading about the organizers of this march, and while I applaud their intentions ( In the broad sense- to lessen violence and accidental gun deaths in the U.S.), I also wonder what they think they are going to acomplish. AFAIK, the things they are protesting most fall into two main catagories:
Number one, those innocent people, mostly children, who are the victems of accidental gun violence. You see the stories all the time in the paper and on the news, usually they start the same way: “XXX ws shot today when he/she and a group of his/her friends were playing/examining/fooling around with a gun that turned out to be loaded…”
Number two would encompass all those who have been shot by someone who was commiting a crime.
I’ll deal with these one at a time. First, catagory one. It is without a doubt one of the saddest things in modern American life to see the story of a young life ended in such a senseless way. Everyone I know of bleeds for the families in these situations. What is the solution? Well, I agree that throwing all the guns in America into the Atlantic Ocean would eliminate this, but that’s not going to happen. The 4th ammendment is pretty clear, in spite of what all the anti-gun folks think, and even if it weren’t, there is no way you could muster 2/3 of Congress to pass a counter ammendment. What’s left? Legislation jsut signed into law here in Maryland by Gov. Parris I-hate-Baltimore-in-spite-of-the-fact-that-it’s-the-economic-physical-and-cultural-heart-of-my-state Glendenning requires that gun locks be sold with every handgun purchased. Great idea, but who is gonna make sure they are USED? What I propose is gonna smack of the NRA, but to me it is about the only thing that makes sense. Education. That’s right, let’s teach kids how dangerous guns can be. I said I don’t own a handgun, but when my kids are 6-7 years old, I intend to buy one. I will then teach them what it is, what it does and how to handle it safely. How many of these deaths could be prevented if the victem left the room when he saw someone playing with a gun, or was smart enough and trained enough to pick up a gun and unload it if he came across it? How many children are going to find the lure of the forbidden in something that they are familiar with and have used themselves in controlled circumstances? Not many, I bet. I DO see the potential downside of this- that wackos like Harris and Kleibold may be more familiar with the weapons they intend to use( I put them more in group two, anyway. Someone who wants to kill can always find a way.). But think about last year. How many tragedies like Columbine were there? Balance this against how many kids were killed unintentionaly from fooling around with guns. I think the numbers speak for themselves. ANY GUN DEATH IS TOO MANY, but weight a handful against thousands. I would have to think long and hard about opposing firearms training as a part of a general education. I don’t know what I would decide.
Group two is easy. Passing laws to prevent CRIMINALS from breaking them is like legislating against tornados. Neither one is gonna give a rats ass for the law, they are already breaking it. In fact, takeing guns from law abiding citizens can leave them more vulernable to the crooks. Remember a few years ago when several tourists were killed by robbers in Florida? Several of the men caught for the crimes said they had targeted the tourists specifically because they knew that a tourist would not be armed, while the liberalized concealed carry laws just passed made this less of a certainty when acousting native Floridians. Here’s a partial solution. Anyone convicetd of firing a gun while commiting a crime against another person would get life without parole. Even strenuoualy enforcing the laws on the books would help. Instead, States and the Feds seem to be more determined to send the potheads up the river for long sentences. Does this make sense? How many of y’all know a pothead? How many of them are violent? I know several, and none of them is violent.
Again, let me reiterate: I understand why many of the people who will participate in the MMM tomorrow are going to do so. I deplore senseless violence and death. I just wonder if all this energy could be better spent persuing more realistic and maybe more effective goals. From an outsiders perspective, the two “sides” in this debate, except for extreme factions on each side, are in accord on what they want. I think the NRA AND most of the anti-gun lobby want to end useless violence, gun abuse and unnecessary death. If they could work together, with common sense and not knee jerk jingleism as their watchword, they might just acomplish it. Comments anyone?
