By Michelle Mathis | Asst. Opinions Editor
Gun control. Two words that have been on everyone’s mind in light of the rapid increase of mass shootings and crime across the United States.
Since 1982, there have been at least 62 mass shootings across the country, with the killings taking place in 30 different states from Massachusetts to California.
25 of these mass shootings have occurred since 2006, and 16 of them took place in 2012.
Not to mention the many shootings that occurs on a daily basis in many urban areas.
From a horrific mass murder in a small-town movie theater in Colorado to the unfathomable nightmare at a Connecticut elementary school, the U.S. is mourning many tragedies and is seemingly looking for a way to prevent this new epidemic from spreading.
The first thought that comes to most people’s minds is to get rid of the problem we seem to think are guns or at the very least create stricter gun laws that in most cases will prevent a vast majority from owning guns.
The reality is that taking away people’s rights to bear arms or making it almost impossible to own a gun will only make matters worse. The citizens will be left unprotected and criminals will emerge left and right because of the various opportunities they have to commit crimes.
Let’s be honest with ourselves for once, how many criminals actually buy their guns legally in the first place? Can you think of any? I didn’t think so. So we aren’t left with too many options that leave us safe regardless if the laws become more strict or not.
It seems the majority of people that are fighting for the elimination of our right to bear arms grew up in rich suburban areas that are less populated with criminals. This leads them to forget that our nation’s poverty rate is increasing dramatically and therefore the number of crimes are rising as well.
Wouldn’t one think that these lunatics who want to commit these heinous crimes would be attracted to the areas they know people will be unprotected? If anything, crime will increase because people will not be able to defend themselves against thugs, burglars, and the once rare but now popular mass murderer.
With the psychopath trend at an all-time high, I don’t think we can solely rely on the good of people and the hope that they will stop committing crimes.
Our world is cruel or at least the people are, so do we really think that these fools won’t act on an even more perfect opportunity to get what they want in killing and injuring people just because they weren’t loved as a child?
I don’t know if there is something in the air that is causing all of this craziness or it’s just our sad excuse for humanity in general but I do know that these psychopaths are shooting up places they know are going to be unarmed such as malls, schools, hell even spas.
If we have learned anything these last few months it’s that we’re unsafe almost everywhere and although I understand people just want to eliminate what they think is hurting people but the fact is, as cliché as it may sound, guns don’t kill people, people kill people.
It’s like saying cars cause accidents; sorry it just doesn’t work like that and people need to take responsibility instead of trying to put the blame on inanimate objects, plain and simple.
Cops can only be in so many places and at so many times, so maybe if we had more guns given to trusted officials and better security to protect people, these maniacs wouldn’t even bother going to these places to perform such atrocious acts.
The fact remains that until our nation can at the very least come to a compromise that benefits both people being able to obtain their rights in owning guns as well preventing an abundance of deaths in the U.S, people are always going to be in an uproar.
Unless someone actually does something more productive rather than just talking about it on social media websites there is nothing more that we can do but sit and hope no one else dies because of our lack of action.
I guess times truly are hard huh? Damn.
