Pros And Cons Of Banning Assault Weapons

The “Assault” on the Rifle Is there anything more gut wrenching than reading or hearing about another mass shooting that has taken the lives of innocents? Of course not, and it is that outrage that fuels gun control advocates desires for bans like the U.S Assault Weapons Ban of 1994 that expired in 2004. The debate continues, and is heightened with each tragedy. Although advocates for and against banning assault rifles could agree that common sense gun laws, including universal background checks and a federal database of gun sales that prohibits ownership for those convicted of domestic violence and bars people with mental illness from buying guns are ideas that could make us all a bit safer, banning assault rifles is not the answer. A ban

As President Trump said during his campaign, when referring to various incidents of gun violence, “If you had guns on the other side, you wouldn’t have had the tragedy you had.” (DeFilippis, et al., “5 Arguments against Gun Control and why they are all wrong”). A national survey conducted by John Lott in 2002 found that approximately 95 percent of the time that law abiding citizens used guns in a defensive manner, they only had to show the weapon to break off an attack. (Lott 3) That is a tremendous statement toward the benefit of weapons, including assault rifles, being allowed in the hands of law abiding citizens. The common misunderstanding of assault rifles being the same as machine guns, capable of firing multiple bullets with one squeeze of the trigger, fuels the ban debate. In actuality, assault rifles are semi-automatic-like most handguns today-and fire only one bullet per pull of the trigger. The general public finds their appearance scary, but assault rifles do not necessarily fire bullets faster or more powerfully than other weapons available to average citizenry. In fact, the average hunting rifle has 900 more foot-pounds of muzzle energy than the assault rifle, and almost double the effective range. A 2004 study commissioned by the Department of Justice concluded that the ban on assault rifles caused no measureable decrease in gun

“John R. Lott, Jr., PhD, stated, the problem with such {gun control} laws are that they take away guns from law-abiding citizens, while would-be criminals ignore them.” (ProCon.org). Criminals determined to have an assault rifle could get one, including by stealing them from others. As a society we would not be safer simply by banning weapons labeled assault rifles, because people would substitute rifles or handguns with the same capabilities as the weapons banned. (Davidson, “A Criminologist’s Case against Gun Control”) There is no way to prevent, via gun bans or otherwise, the determined criminal from obtaining a gun in a country where millions of guns exist. Creating gun-free zones, like many Universities have done in recent years is an attempt and preventing criminal actions with guns including the assault rifle, but naming something gun-free does not make it gun free. (Wilson, “Gun Control is not the Answer) As Taya Kyle said during a CNN town hall, “If you put an assault rifle in my hands or yours, I am not going to murder anyone, and I am guessing you won’t either. But what makes gun control advocates think that someone who decides to kill will not use any means necessary to do