Hi readers,
I wanted to avoid this topic as much as I possibly could, but it is difficult when the top tweets are all about anti-gun laws. These appeals to emotion are cause for action, but appeals to emotion are also commonly known to be a fallacy. My argument is not to take away from the tragedy in Florida in the recent past. The fact is the children and adults died, and that should always be the header first and foremost in tragedies like this. It just shouldn't
ever happen.
The bottom line, and before I type
any further, is that the world needs to be a safer, happier place, and it's appalling that we live in a world where the mentally ill has access to the tools and locations to commit a mass shooting anywhere, but schools in particular.
I also want to make it clear that I am not a self-proclaimed republican or democrat. The two-party system is broken, and all it ever does is divide the nation.
Guns are a Proverbial Boogeyman
Bernie Sanders, the president hopeful from 2016, recently tweeted:
I couldn't agree more with his thoughts, except the last point, and it's only by about half. This blog post is going to stray wildly from my typical content (games and animation), and I swore to myself I would let politics go and never tweet or post about them again (because we all know we sometimes just need to take a break since political frustration is
everywhere), but here I go. In a final hurrah, this is my last post about politics and political action I will ever post. My blog is new and has very few followers, so I'd be surprised if this got much attention anyway...but please bear with me. I'm not blindly making a case to support firearms. I agree almost wholly with Sanders, and I'll explain myself about the assault weapons later. At the end of the day, this is my opinion. I am open for debate, but be open-minded while reading this. Think critically, and let's keep it peaceful.
The NRA
This is my first point that I need to get out of the way. I am an owner of numerous firearms, even of a semi-auto assault weapon. I enjoy shooting targets even though I haven't for quite some time, and in my general opinion, slinging lead down-range quicker is almost always better; More fun, and a bit more exhilarating. To some, that makes me mentally unstable which is incredibly offensive; that kind of thinking is completely uncalled for. In the right operating environment it's completely safe (a completely secluded field with a 100% safe backstop [large dirt mound, miles of forest] is a must for any shooting range).
With all of that being the case, the NRA is a truly scumbag organization. My grandfather was probably rolling in his grave as I said that as he was a diehard member, but it's true. Nobody can argue with that, and it needs to change if the second amendment or gun owners in general are to retain any form of integrity.
The NRA constantly blocks legislation that would make it more difficult for the ill-minded to obtain firearms. They blindly lobby for more guns, including assault weapons, to be available in a variety of ways. One such way includes gun shows which severely lack any adequate safety net to keep them out of the wrong people's hands.
I was going to research more about the NRA to see their dirty tricks, but everything that popped up was a far left article. It's not that I don't care for liberals and democrats, I just hate extremist media. Far left
or far right is a no go for me, so I won't be supplying links or sources for this portion of the article. I just know that the NRA makes gun safety a very difficult thing to accomplish, and they are a major hurdle in getting America safer. Everything with the NRA needs to change, and sooner rather than later.
Gun shows
I've been to many gun shows in my time. They're fun, and can be an interesting place especially if you enjoy history. I've never had a lot of money, so buying anything was never an option, but you can buy firearms dirt cheap. The issue here is that gun shows are not the only "unofficial" way to buy weapons. There are other weapons floating around the country that are traded, bought, and sold outside of the government's watch. I can't give proper evidence to support this, but just as illegal drugs are moved, you can bet illegal weapons are moved as well. The underground cartels and gangs love unregistered firearms, and there was even a story on the local news sharing details on how anyone with an internet connection can order unregistered carbine parts to build their own semi-auto AR-15 like the one recently used in Florida.
So, yes, blocking sales at gun shows is a must. If you ask me, it should be just like a car show where registered owners take their guns, and can show them off, but sales should be banned at gun shows altogether. If people want to sell military clothing, airsoft guns, non-firing replica guns, or something else for war enthusiasts, that's fine...but it's no place to be selling real firearms.
The Mental Health Issue
This is a largely overlooked contributing factor when thinking about gun control. There is one thing in common with nearly
all mass shootings: Mental illness. The Aurora, CO shooting suspect was detained and tried, only to be found that he was mentally ill. He is going to rot in a prison cell for the rest of his life, which doesn't really offer all that much closure. He gets to sit in a cell getting a few decent meals a day at our expense? The best defense to this sort of absurdity is (no, not the death sentence, you neanderthal) accessibility to affordable and regular mental health screenings.
The healthcare system in this country is absurd for the US being a "first world" country. The only thing that's ever first within US borders is money. Not the citizens, not their health, not their happiness, but the wealth of the leaders who run this establishment. I don't understand how the citizens aren't more up in arms about the healthcare system...Oh wait, they're too angry at inanimate objects and far too angry at their opposing political party to think rationally about a true solution to the ever-growing issue.
Affordable healthcare (including mental health coverage) would raise quality-of-life standards in the nation. People might not be so stressed and angry if they didn't have to worry what they'd do should they need to see a doctor in a life-or-death situation. This is perhaps the
only first-world country where you have to choose whether or not to get life-saving surgery because it will bankrupt you.
Apologies for going on more of a rant here as opposed to level-headed discussion, but it's a major issue, and no politician ever wants to talk about it. If they ever do talk about it, they either "forget", are bribed, or go back on their word; they are often blocked by the frustrating government system and big pharmacy in this country; or they just never get a chance to even try (Oh I'm feeling the bern, alright).
Obama had a decent idea that involved "affordable" health care, but the major problem here is that it wasn't necessarily affordable for all, and it was forced upon the nation. Not in the way that they voted on it, and it passed, and there was nothing we could do. No, I mean, if you didn't buy health coverage, you were fined more than if you didn't have it. So it was either be poor and pay for something you couldn't afford, or be stuck paying even more, and actually have zero dollars left. That's
NOT what this country needed.
The country needs affordable (free, universal, accessible) healthcare. If we had that, maybe we could avoid some of the mental issues that plague the nation and cause these tragedies in the first place.
Monitoring
Some time before the Florida shooting incident, the suspect posted to their social media that they had an AR-15 and that they were going to kill people. How is this overlooked?
The last thing I want is the government snooping
more into our daily lives, be it social media, automated home assistants, our personal computers, internet traffic, location services, etc.
I thought there was a bill in place that was supposed to monitor and "tick" when someone was showing signs of mental illness or a possible terrorist threat. Where was that system when the would-be home-grown terrorist started saying these things?
Better yet, why did none of his friends or family speak up? The parents
had to know something was wrong. Why are parents not monitoring their children's use of social media? The young man was nineteen years old, so technically he wasn't a child anymore, but what kind of parent are you if you're not keeping in touch with your child? Maybe they were like me and never go on Facebook, but still, millions of people use Facebook every day, and I'm sure he had to have friends who saw the post.
From one perspective, you can't just take everything you read on the internet seriously, but in today's day in age, you have to be wary of that kind of thing; Especially so if the person has a history of posting about violence, weapons in a malicious context, etc.
A friend wants to show off a new rifle he just bought? He posts a picture. That's not a problem.
A friend posts a picture of him holding a pistol, saying some crazy nonsense or something offensive? Might want to speak up.
Two more large contributing factors that involve monitoring are parental guidance and bullying.
Parents need to be doing their job from day one. The moment that child is born, the parent has an obligation to shower it with love, affection, and guidance until the day that child turns 18. Anything less, and the parent has failed. It's not easy, and "love and affection" are relative (your idea of caring for a child may differ from mine, but you
have to teach the child right from wrong. Don't leave it up to the school system or anything else). That's the cost of being a parent.
Bullying is another can of worms, but it can lead to distraught children (and adults). The school systems need to offer a better way to fight bullying, and this also reverts back to parental guidance.
Parents need to teach their children right from wrong. Bullying is wrong. What's so hard about that?
Background Checks
If people want to own an object that could make mass-killing easier, they need to be getting a more rigorous background check than what's currently in place.
Instead of just checking criminal records, why not check their gun ownership history? They've never owned a gun before, but all of a sudden are taking an interest? Red flag. This shouldn't make it impossible to buy a firearm because anyone who's never owned a gun could ever buy one again, but put them on a list for say ten years, and monitor their social media for that duration. Any upticks in malevolent posts, and they get a visit from law enforcement or mental health agents.
How about more mental health screenings and tests. You can't become a police officer without taking rigorous mental tests that challenge the aptitude required to safely operate a firearm. In the military, it takes weeks of training before you're granted permission to serve with your firearm, why should civilians be treated any differently? If people want semi-auto assault weapons, put them through the same qualification trials. They'll either prove their mentally fit, or they'll not want to go through all of it and pass on buying altogether.
So, those are my main talking points regarding what Bernie Sanders said in his tweet, but now I would like to try to share with you my opinion on some of the fallacies--not in Sander's tweet--but of most anti-gun advocates.
Inanimate Objects
A gun is just that. It doesn't matter if it's sitting in a closet somewhere, sitting out in the middle of a room, a gun locker, whatever - It's never going to be any more than a hunk of steel, machined in such a way that it can sling lead really far and really fast.
Yes, it makes the act of killing effortless, but in order for it to do that, you need to insert a human aspect. It's the mental issues of mankind that bring a firearm to kill. It's not the gun itself. People may not be fit to have access to these sorts of tools, but it's most certainly
not the gun's fault.
Where I live, 95% of the population own firearms, and I'd be willing to bet upwards of 40% of that number own some sort of semi-auto assault weapon. Take a miniscule number like 10% and I'd say that's how many have licenses to own legal full-auto weapons and attachments like suppressors. Take another 5-10% from that same forty and that's probably how many rig their legally owned semi-autos to shoot full-auto through after market parts or personal tinkering with the gun internals.
Okay, that was a lot of technicality that I have no evidence to back up, but that's just a personal estimate, and I truly believe that to be accurate for most rural areas in the country. That being the case, that's hundreds of thousands (if not millions) of firearms in the hands of Americans. In my area alone, a largely rural county in which 358,000 people call home, that's a lot of firearms. Based on those numbers, if guns
were to blame, we'd be seeing mass shootings twice a day. That's not the case. There are millions of law-abiding citizens maintaining their firearms on a daily basis. It just takes a single bad apple, once a month (who needs mental help) to ruin it for the millions who are lawful and safe.
Going back to touch upon the number of guns in the country, I did find a statistic from
pewresearch.org that shows that there are 270 to 310 million firearms in the country today. Even though only a small number of Americans (37%) own a firearm or know someone who does, that's a lot of guns compared to the handful that are misused.
My point is not to justify the acts of these monsters. Obviously. Guns need to be restricted from their use, and they need mental help more than anything else in the world, but I am only trying to point out that the guns are not to blame. For all the firearms that are in this country, there should be way more mass killings if the guns are indeed to blame.
Why Assault Weapons?
This is a big question that's not that hard to answer. It's a perfectly sane hobby.
The basic answer is: No they are not needed. Coming from a sportsman's standpoint, it's the same as saying why does a vehicle enthusiast need to upgrade his engine so he can go faster and save on efficiency. Why does a gamer need to put a few thousands of dollars into a gaming PC when around $800 can buy you the bare minimum to enjoy today's games? It comes down to hobby.
The biggest rebuttal to this is that sports cars and video games are not capable of mass murder. Yes, this is a perfectly valid, good point, but thousands of people lawfully enjoy shooting targets. There's an Olympic competition that revolves around shooting targets. Just because war is evil, and firearms are the basic method to eliminate the other forces, it doesn't mean guns have to be associated with malevolence.
Skeet and stationary target shooting is a valid test of strength and dexterity; hand-eye coordination. It can be a fun, relaxing competition. So why are assault weapons needed? The best answer I can give you is efficiency. Like the person who upgraded their car to get from point A to B faster and more efficiently, an assault weapon with a slightly larger magazine and the elimination of cranking the bolt after every shot, allows the shooter to concentrate more on sending lead down range. The force of the gun kicking back is also amusing to some. Guns are powerful objects and should be taken seriously with no exceptions. They are dangerous, but with the proper training and handling, they are nothing more than an inanimate object, assault weapons included.
Just as the car collector likes to own numerous vehicles, a video game enthusiast may collect games or even consoles, a gun hobbyist might want to collect several firearms. As much as you want to believe it,
that is not a mental issue. Using them to kill others is.
2nd Amendment
This isn't going away.
By me saying that, I'm not trying to toot gun owners' horns. I'm not trying to be obnoxious or facetious. I'm honestly just saying that the government has been explicit in that they don't want to take away single action firearms from the people. Which is good. Most representatives, Sanders included, just want to make assault weapons illegal.
That said, I want to make it clear why the 2nd amendment was created in the first place. The amendment was enacted to ensure the nation had a means to fight back a tyrannical power.
This Live Science article about the second amendment says, "Having just used guns and other arms to ward off the English, the
amendment was originally created to give citizens the opportunity to
fight back against a tyrannical federal government."
Would we ever need to fight a tyrannical government entity? I don't think so, but for as hard as our forefathers fought to make the country what it is, I personally believe the amendment should be untouched, which includes assault weapons.
Why? Regarding the point to make a stand against a tyrannical government, any modern government would easily outgun bolt action rifles, pump shotguns, and revolvers. Some may say that the world doesn't work like it did back then; tyrannical governments don't exist. I beg to differ. Whether or not we live in one is irrelevant. It can happen, and in the odd situation that it would occur in this nation, I would feel better knowing the people had a chance to stand up against oppressors.
Yes, it's a lot closer to fantasy than fact at this point of Earth's timeline, but that's the basic purpose of the amendment, and I'd rather it be kept intact.
Final Word
This article has honestly gone on long enough. There are other points to be made, I'm sure, on both sides of the argument. For instance, all the points I made supporting gun ownership, even in a severely monitored and restrictive state, may not be enough to thwart terrorists. As long as guns exist, I expect there will be shady ways to get them either on home soil or abroad. Like illegal substances like hard narcotics, they're illegal and banned in the states, yet it's an epidemic.
Mass shootings are often twisted into a red herring, meant to make us feel scared and helpless against these inanimate objects. Maybe it's to take our minds off of the president and the government as a whole? Maybe it's meant to misdirect our attention off of a failing democracy and healthcare system? Maybe it's something bigger and deeper altogether.
Yes, assault weapons are dangerous, but in the right hands, they're no more dangerous than a butter knife. A box truck was used in London to kill nearly the same amount of people, so the logical conclusion is to ban box trucks, right? That was a religious statement, and in my opinion, religious extremism (following
any faith) is also a mental illness. The motives are still unclear for the Florida massacre, but it's no more than a mental health problem.
With all that said, there comes a point where I even say "try it.", but I truly doubt it will make a big difference. If it does seem to stop the killings, I will be vaguely suspicious--happy that the mass killings have stopped--but suspicious and eager to see what happens to our quality of life after that.
Talking Points:
Technology
Why can't gun manufacturers make technological attachments to firearms to biometrically lock them? The game Metal Gear Solid 4 comes to mind - every weapon was locked behind nano-machines that were detected by the gun lock. When the owner was holding the weapon, it would function normally. In anyone else's hands, it was locked.
This kind of technology isn't science fiction. At the very least, the firearms could be locked with a fingerprint and pressure sensors similar to those seen on the back of a 1911 (see picture). A firearm could be initially unlocked with a thumbprint, and then could remain unlocked so long as that pressure plate was held down. As soon as the plate is released, the gun would lock again. It's not a hard concept to grasp, and I think that alone would curb deaths by firearms in the country.
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| Image courtesy of Cheaper Than Dirt |
Alternatives to Shooting
As I mentioned before, I am an owner and advocate of firearms. I enjoy collecting and shooting, though I don't get to the range hardly at all anymore. I haven't discharged a real firearm in over three years, and I'm no worse for wear. Guns are as superficial as owning a fancy sportscar, or having the nicest house on the block, you really don't need them unless your home is being burgled, you're being attacked by a wild animal, or something of the like. I do think they're a great deterrent for burglars, but outside of that, they're just fun to use at a gun range. One reason they're fun, you can test your dexterity and coordination by shooting targets at various distances. Believe it or not, yes, that can be fun. The second reason is feeling the power of the weapon. It's a bit unnerving how much power is held in one of those small rounds, but that's part of the allure for many.
Both of these attractions can be otherwise delivered...again by technology. Virtual reality is making a huge leap forward with ongoing support for Vive, PSVR, and Oculus Rift among others. Even haptic feedback is getting a boost in development with a company formerly known as AxonVR creating a
force-feedback haptic glove for virtual reality.
If you combine a hyper realistic VR game (give the industry a few years to develop further) with haptic gloves and a shoulder pad, anyone who wants to shoot targets will be free to do so in VR with NO limitations. Want to shoot ten thirty-round magazines through an AK-47 to see what it feels like? Boom. Done...kick and all. Want to take your mile-long shot with a Berrett .50 caliber long rifle? Also easy peasy in a virtual world, and you
never have to worry about harming others. I think this is the best option to kind of appease everyone. Shooters still get access to guns, just in a different format, assault weapons can be banned, yet enthusiasts can still shoot targets. It's a win-win, unless a tyrannical government comes into power. Then we're screwed.
So, there you have it: My extremely long-winded rant/article about gun control, assault weapon bans, and possible solutions. I am 100% open to debate, and I'm not a blind gun advocate. I realize there are major issues at play here, and assault weapons are one of them. They're dangerous. People die, and it's a tragedy that NEEDS to stop. I do, however, think that blind
anything is a bad idea, including opposition to firearms and even assault weapons. Thoughts and prayers aren't meaningless, but they certainly won't put an end to anything. The time to act is now, but whatever steps are taken need to be carefully examined.
First thing I'd suggest? Let's replace the head of the NRA so that they make rational decisions, and let's also change legislation changing the ease of gun sales, and
most importantly get health care reform moving. It needs to be universal health care, anything short of that would be criminal on the government's behalf.
