Gun control will always be a controversial and touchy subject in America. But, no matter what, the argument keeps going in circles and the laws stay the same. With the Parkland shooting being so recent, it will not be a surprise when it stops being news. When was the last time the Las Vegas shooting was discussed? There have been eight school shootings since the beginning of the year and it is only the first few months of 2018. Shootings happen, people die, we get mad, and then we hardly talk about it again.
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The Parkland shooting was incredibly traumatic for the students and their families. Mass shootings like this happen way too much in the United States, and no matter how much we talk about them, they still happen again and again.
There is a lot of debate about whether the country needs to focus on gun control or mental health. Yes, mental health issues are so very important and the mass shooters that we have encountered have had mental illnesses or had traumatic things happen to them. But, mental health is not the only reason mass shooters go about doing their deadly deeds. Easy access to too many different kinds of guns is an incredible problem in the United States.
The fact that people put such an emphasis on mental health rather than gun control creates a huge stigma against nonviolent people with mental illnesses. It creates a way of thinking that mentally ill people are bound to be lonely, shy or they need to be kept an eye on. It is insulting and putting other mentally ill people in that box is incredibly toxic. Even though mass shooters can be mentally ill, it does not excuse their crime; they are still bad people. Yeah, sad backstory, still murder, buddy.
There are people who argue that if the government bans guns or establishes stricter gun laws, there will still be ways to obtain firearms and shootings will still happen. That is true, but only to a certain extent.
For example, I was in Oslo, Norway when Anders Behring Breivik bombed the downtown area and shot up a nearby island on July 22, 2011. 77 people were killed that day. He was sentenced to twenty-one years in prison, the maximum penalty in Norway. That was seven years ago and there has not been a shooting since. Yes, there are people who can get a hold of dangerous firearms when gun laws are strict, but it is so rare and these kinds of crimes are taken very seriously by the government.
Recently, President Donald Trump said that he would be willing to give teachers “a bit of a bonus” to arm themselves if they are adept “with military or special training experience.” If this absurd action were to actually happen, wouldn’t teachers need to go through a difficult test and background check before getting armed? If they did need to be trained and checked, shouldn’t that be the general rule? If teachers must go through a hard test to be armed in school, shouldn’t everyone go through a hard test to be armed in general? I mean, I’m just saying.
The country doesn’t need to ban all guns; there is always going to be a back and forth on it. But, ban weapons like the AR-15, something that is made specifically for killing in the military. Going to the shooting range and getting hunting rifles really does not cause any harm, but being able to easily retrieve a semi-automatic killing machine with just a state ID does. It should be so much harder to get certain guns. Background checks should be a miniscule task for someone who really wants a gun. There is nothing wrong with going through a series of background checks. It is such a safety hazard for anyone over 18 to able to obtain a gun so easily without being checked out, and it should be fixed.
Effective gun restrictions can save lives. People don’t want thoughts and prayers. People want change. People want reform. Yes, there are people who like to hang onto the Second Amendment, but that was when slavery was prevalent in the United States. It’s time for change. Mental health isn’t the main issue.