Opinions on gun control laws?

Question

What are some of the pros and cons of current gun control laws?

What can we do to improve them for the safety of citizens?

Thanks in advance!

Answer 1

This is just what I think, nobody take this personally.

Okay, now think about this for a second. Which kills more people: car accidents, or gun accidents? If you listen to the radio or watch the news, you'll probably hear about at least five car accidents a day. Not five gun accidents, at least very rarely. It's not what people use, it's how they use them. Should the government just take away all the cars and say we all have to uses public transportation or something because people get killed? No way! Heck, you could kill someone with a kitchen knife, and they don't ban kitchen knives and they still sell them all over in stores!
Also, the constitution GUARANTEES the right to bear fire arms, unless you're some kind of criminal or something. But we HAVE THE RIGHT to have guns, enough said. I mean, this is the US Constitution, and we just can't disobey it. I mean, these are our founding fathers, and they must have been pretty wise to practically start a country.
And I think the gun control laws are too strict, I mean people need to be using them responsibly, but there's lots of unnecessary laws. Think about Virginia tech, people are saying if students were allowed to carry guns (with a permit of course) they could have defended themselves! And even though there was a rule saying no guns on campus, that evil guy still brought it. What I'm saying, is
1) With all these laws, we can't even defend ourselves.
2) Bad people will still use them if they really want to, and when they do people won't be able to protect themselves because they can't even carry or shoot a gun w/out special permits. (that most people don't have.)
I target shoot, (and I'm 12!) and I know that if guns are handled safely and responsible, and if they are used the right way, there's no harm in them.

(I hope I'm not making myself seem like an idiot, I'm in sixth grade this year and I've never done this Yahoo Answers thing.
I hope to get to know some of you guys! :D)

Answer 2

The old tired rhetoric that pertinent gun laws are already in place and it is an enforcement issue doesn't ring quite true. I think there should be more controls on owning a gun. Everybody is certainly entitled to own a gun for self protection, but for the intentional killing of living things, including game, to my mind is arrogant and cruel inasmuch as we wear species blinders. It is no scientific or biological mystery that a deer, for example, feels pain. Why would anybody cause pain in another living thing, for the "fun" of it? I know this is not a popular point of view, but I have yet to hear a good reason why killing for sport is morally just. I know some distant relations in Alabama that actually do hunt deer for the venison, so I suppose that's a valid justification. But really, that is the exception, not the rule. If those kinds of firearms could be prohibited, it would at least put a small dent in the proliferation of deadly weapons on the market. As for owning a handgun for protection or self-defense, the statistic irony is that those in-home guns mostly end up being used to settle a domestic dispute. There is no good answer to this question. If some people were allowed to carry a concealed weaon at Virginia Tech, the shooter would not have been as effective as he was. The question then becomes, WHO is entitled to carry a concealed weapon. My best answer is that there might be a type of person that is qualified to walk around armed. Just not everybody.

Answer 3

Pros? Let's see, if your, a person who has been trained in the use of a weapon and you have a weapon in your hand and it's loaded and ready to fire, sitting in your living room, and your home is suddenly invaded by crazed criminals, you may just have a chance to kill or wound and or frighten off the invaders. This is very rare if indeed if it ever happened.
Otherwise, gun laws today allow anyone to own a gun unless they're a certified nut case.
Our currant laws allow just about anyone to own deadly automatic hand weapons with over sized ammo magazines. The oft repeated suggestion that gun laws in the United States don't work doesn't hold water because the jurisdictions are imaginary lines which anyone can cross and buy a gun in jurisdictions where restrictions for buying deadly weapons are less stringent.
The oft repeated suggestion that law abiding citizens would be the ones who would suffer is disengenuous. The law abiding citizen is a law abiding citizen until he/she kills someone with their legally purchased automatic handgun after an arguement in a parking lot or experiencing road rage.
Gun controls do work. Just look at which so called developed country has the most deaths by guns. United States if you didn't know.
Thanks

Answer 4

The problem with Gun Control is the fact that the words "Gun" and "Control" are put together and applied to violent crimes. What about Car control, Bomb Control or Kinfe Control? There should be regulations on firearms but they will never be effective until they deal dirrectly with the misuse of firearms and not the ownership. I don't agree with the comments that some people make that say that if every law abiding citizens carried a gun these ramapges wouldn't happen. I will agree that there is a huge problem of the wrong people using firearms and effective measures to intervene and stop a shooting spree are not available.

Answer 5

The idea of the Second Amendment was to encourage and foster a standing militia. We wanted everyone to be prepared to fend off attacks foreign and domestic. It was a smart way for the government to minimise drafting.
It was also a great idea because it made people feel united in protecting their nation state and feeling part of America.
That aspect hasen't been entirely lost. The NRA is powerful and its continued existance prooves that many people still support this basic idea.
Cho may have been shot by his first victim, the RA. If only the RA had a gun. That's the problem as I see it; not enough Americans carry guns. If most Americans carried guns, as once was the case, violent crimes, especially mass shootings, would be greatly deterred (or at least minimized in casuallty). Simply put, it shouldn't be easy for people with guns to kill people with guns.
Of course, the government should offer training, do background checks, and require those who want to carry guns to pass competency tests. As with a drivers licence, it's a right and a privelage. A car is a much better weapon for mass murder, but people don't often use cars for that purpose. Why? Think about it.

Answer 6

I doubt there will be anything like gun control or gun banning or whatever you want to call it. Guns are a money making business. If you look in the news all you see is someone got shot or some country is fighting another and what are they using.....guns. If there were no guns.....then the NRA would not exist......less wars.......less crime......it would be difficult to wage a war if all you had was guns......etc
There are no pro's or cons. People may kill people but the tools made available to them make it even easier. Isn't it harder to throw a knife from a distance that can kill someone instantly?..........

Answer 7

I do not know what the current gun control laws are and I dont own a gun but I think we need gun control not gun banning.I think a lot of people get confused between gun control and gun banning.We have the right to bear arms and it should stay that way.There will always be criminals and criminals will get guns regardless of the law.You have to do what you can to protect yourself and your family.
Bad things happen in life .But we cant go around banning things because they are dangerous.knives are dangerous are we going to ban those too.
We cant be scared of the criminals.

Answer 8

Everyone has the right to bare arms although they should be a tighter restriction and backround check on obtaining one.....If everyone had a gun, no body would have the upper advantage to take abuse of a less, non armed volunerable person. Maybe people would think twice bc the person next to you is equally protected.

GUNS DO NOT HARM PEOPLE, PEOPLE HARM PEOPLE!

ANYTHING can be used as a deadly weapon if someone had the intent to harm another. The gun doesn't have a mind of its own. If someone wanted to inflict harm upon someone else they will find a weapon to do so with, no matter if a gun is available or not.

Answer 9

obvious pro is since the introduction of the new guns laws in australia - no mass shootings. The only way to improve them for the safety of the community is to ban them all together. I dont know how governments can make a sport legal that when aimed at anything, it will kill the target - doesnt make sense to me.

Answer 10

Australia had a spate of mass public shooting in the 1980s and '90s, culminating in 1996, when Martin Bryant opened fire at the Port Arthur Historical Site in Tasmania with an AR-15 assault rifle, killing 35 people.

Within two weeks the government had enacted strict gun control laws that included a ban on semiautomatic rifles. There has not been a mass shooting in Australia since.

Speaks for itself.