An enormous issue making its way around households, communities and congress is the gun control debate. I am sure everyone is familiar with the Second amendment (adopted in 1791), it protects the right of the people to keep and bear arms. Should there be more control and laws or is it fine the way it is? How is our communities, home and country affected? Let us take a deeper look into politics and personal views on this very concerning situation.
The two contemporary political parties in the United States are the Democratic party and the Republican Party.They are on opposite ends of the playing field, the Democratic Party has several followers including Nancy Peloski, Joe Biden, our current president Borack Obama and several others. Today, Democrats support more social freedoms and want more control when it comes to the gun control issue. They want mandatory child safety locks, requirements should include a photo I.D, a background check and a gun safety test to be able to purchase a handgun. One way they plan to keep firearms from criminals and terrorists is by closing gun shows and creating a database that would allow the ATF (the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives) to track all gun sales. On the other end, you have the Republican party. Amongst several members are George W. Bush, John Boehner and Mitt Romney, who was defeated by Obama in the 2012 Presidential Election. The Republicans strobgly support the Second Amendment, defending the law-abiding citizen's God-given right of self-defense and preserving the right to obtain and store ammunition without registration. The Party honors the great American tradition of hunting and they applaud efforts by the Bush Administraion to make more public land available to hunters, to increase accss to hunting clinics and safety programs for children and adults and to improveopportunities of hunting for americans with disailities. Republicans still believe in federal and state firearm laws, especially when guns are used in violent or drug-related crimes but do not believe that law-abiding citizens should suffer from invasion of privacy with the licensing and registration.
I know you have heard the saying "guns don't kill people, people kill people". A firearm is an object incapable of thinking, feeling or making decisions, therefore it can not take the blame for killing someone. So who should be blamed? The government, parents, society, mental illnesses, or the widespread amount of violent media. There are so many fingers being pointed in all directions but we all know it is the living, breathing, capable of thinking human being that has that gun gripped in their palm and their finger on the trigger. Another huge number of innocent children who have been murdered by a firearm due to curiosity at home, drive-bys and school massacres - how can we prevent this? Every parent would love to keep their child in a harm proof bubble but we know we cannot. We can only teach them and protect them as much as we can. Schools and other public places should improve their security to help prevent these senseless occurencess and in return parents will feel that their kids safety is taken care of while they are not present. A Leon County officer explains, " kids are curious by nature, if we tell them guns are bad and they cant see them, touch them or know anything about them then curiosity will get the best of them and they will see what it is all about on their own and not knowing anything about them is when something tragic happens. Thats why I believe it is a great idea to show them to the kids and explain what they do and what can happen if they are played with, teaching them in a safe way will take the curiosity away". A stay-at-home mom from Bellmead suggests, " each county could have a free gun safety class for its residents twice a year to help teach and promote gun safety in the communit".
Whether gun ownership is legal or illegal there will still be people who own them and will continue using them for hunting, personal safety, and for illegal purposes. As with everything in the world, there are seperate opinions when it comes to gun control laws and regulations but what it really comes down to is how can we as a unity get together and create a way for the hunters and law abiding citizens who are not doing anything illegal keep their guns and at the same time restrict access for the criminals and mentally ill who do not need to own a firearm. Let us improve gun safety with the Second Amendment still in play.
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