18/05/2018
‘Thoughts and prayers’ are not going to bring back these lives, or stop more mass shootings.
It is time America woke up to the fact that people use guns to kill people.
These multiple murders aren’t carried out by common criminals, who (when they use their weapons) use guns to help them perpetrate crimes to generate revenue. It doesn’t serve their purpose to murder innocent people.
That doesn’t mean the criminals should be excused for their use of firearms, but the argument that implementing gun control would mean that only the criminals would have guns misses the point.
Compared to 22 other high-income nations, the U.S. gun-related murder rate is 25 times higher. Although it has half the population of the other 22 nations combined, the U.S. had 82 percent of all gun deaths, 90 percent of all women killed with guns, 91 percent of children under 14 and 92 percent of young people between ages 15 and 24 killed with guns. In 2010, gun violence cost U.S. taxpayers approximately $516 million in direct hospital costs.
People with a criminal record are more likely to die as homicide victims. Between 1990 and 1994, 75% of all homicide victims age 21 and younger in the city of Boston had a prior criminal record. In Philadelphia, the percentage of those killed in gun homicides that had prior criminal records increased from 73% in 1985 to 93% in 1996. In Richmond, Virginia, the risk of gunshot injury is 22 times higher for those males involved with crime.
Criminals having guns increases the risk of criminals being killed by guns. The general population having guns increases the risk of children being murdered in their schools, of children accidentally killing other children or their parents whilst playing with guns and of people committing suicide with a gun.
If America introduced proper gun laws, the number of criminals carrying firearms is also likely to gradually reduce. If open and concealed carrying of weapons by civilians were made illegal, criminals would probably begin to realise that the risks of being caught and prosecuted for firearms offences would increase disproportionately to the benefits.
It is time, quite simply, for America to wake up to reality.
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