It's time we find a sensible solution to gun violence
For starters, keep firearms out of the hands of people who are mentally unstable
So how do we keep guns out of the hands of people who might be violent or irresponsible with them?
One of the ways we can prevent more gun violence is by doing a better job of keeping firearms out of the reach of mentally unstable people. In an online article, by Rebecca Kaplan and Rebecca Shabad of CBS News, “Five ways the U.S. could reduce gun violence,” the writers discuss recent efforts in Congress to keep firearms out of the hands of mentally ill people. “This bill in Congress aims to improve treatment for people with serious mental health issues like schizophrenia and bipolar disorder and increase the availability of beds for
psychiatric patients.
These strategies would both reduce the chances that those with mental health issues become violent and get more people into mental health treatment - and into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System, so they can’t purchase guns,” write Shabad and Kaplan.Another way to prevent gun violence is to keep guns out of the possession of criminals, who only have access to guns illegally. Kaplan and Shabad write, “Legislators could also look at ways to try to crack down on illegal gun sales. This would involve a gun trafficking statute, ‘...so you can go up to people who are buying guns in big quantities and selling on the street, going after gun stores that make a lot of illegal sales, going after what are called straw purchasers - people who purchase guns for others,’ said, Jim Kessler,” (the senior vice president for policy at centrist thinks tank Third Way). I believe that these are two ways we could seriously reduce gun violence in this country without repealing or threatening the Second Amendment. Sane people don’t just murder others because they have guns. Regular people obey sensible gun laws. Let’s see what we can do in these two areas before we do anything rash.
What has this world come to? On the news I see a lot of gun violence and terrorism. It’s not only terrorists causing the violence. It’s also people just going out with a gun senselessly pulling the trigger to hurt another human being. The problem with this is that it is creating huge problems for the majority of gun owners who are responsible and threatening their second amendment rights. About “43 percent of American households own guns,” according to an on-line article by Christopher Ingraham from The Washington Post entitled, “The average gun owner now owns 8 guns— double what it used to be.”While not a majority, this represents a huge number of people in this country that own guns. Even considering the large number of Americans that die every year, “13,404 in 2015” according to Gun Violence Archive, a not for profit corporation that tracks statistics on gun violence in the U.S., it’s obvious that most Americans who own guns do so responsibly.