The Pros And Cons Of Gun Control

Guns; Made to Protect not to Harm If guns kill people, then pencils misspell words, cars make people drive drunk, and spoons make people gain weight. The 2nd Amendment under the Constitution states, ¨The right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed¨ ( qtd. In Burgan 38). Today the decision of whether to infringe on the right to bear arms is a heavily debated topic. Over recent years mass school shootings and terrorist attacks have increased, but taking away gun rights is not the solution to the issues. Guns do not pull their own triggers; the people holding them do. Guns are not responsible for the damage caused by the people wielding them, and taking them away would leave law abiding citizens defenseless, as shown

That seems like a common sense answer, but it is in many ways incorrect. There is no connection between the amount of gun laws a state has and their crime rate. For example, Vermont has few regulations on guns and ¨consistently has the lowest rate of gun violence¨ (qtd. In Cunningham 9). Gun regulations not only increase crime, but they also increase the chance of a person getting attacked by a criminal. ¨With just two exceptions, since at least 1950 all of the mass public shootings in the U.S. have occurred in so-called gun-free zones, places where citizens cannot have guns for protection ¨ ( qtd. Cunningham 128). Elliot Rodger was responsible for killing six people in Santa Barbara, California. Rodger wrote a manifesto and explained that he did not shoot certain people because he was afraid that they would have a gun to stop him (Cunningham 129). James Holmes killed many defenseless people in a movie theater that he specifically chose since the theater banned sealed handguns. He expressed this cruel plan in his diary (Cunningham 129). Taking away our rights as Americans to bear arms, places more power in the hands of terrorists, who can easily gain access to illegal weapons. The people who would need those weapons to protect against the criminals harnessing illegal weapons, would not be able to purchase a gun to protect themselves if that right was taken away. This would result, insufficient means for innocent people to protect themselves, if an attack were to