It has been almost a week since 17 students and teachers were slaughtered in a Florida High School, and the aftermath has played out as they all do: Republicans in Congress refuse to act while reasonable Americans must suffer through endless gun defense clichés from 2nd amendment apologists.
As Mass Shootings become an almost daily event in America, these defenses are becoming more absurd and tiresome. They do nothing to prevent these massacres from happening and instead attempt to halt any meaningful dialogue that could lead to positive change.
So if you are someone using any of the following excuses to keep our archaic gun laws, just know the rest of us stopped listening ten mass shootings ago.
We are tired of hearing this
- If guns kill people, then spoons make you fat.
Spoons are a tool that makes eating more efficient just like guns are a tool that makes killing more efficient. But there is a slight difference; you can’t break out the window of a Las Vegas hotel room with a spoon and make five hundred concertgoers fat. By the way, you aren't clever; you are in fact part of the problem.
- Gun Control doesn’t work just look at Chicago
Pro-gun enthusiasts love to point to Chicago as their entire argument about why gun control is ineffective.
However, if they did even the least bit of research, they would realize that, according to law enforcement officials, the vast majority of guns used in Chicago crimes are traced back to neighboring states such as Indiana and Wisconsin where gun laws are far less strict. All Chicago proves is that until we have universal gun laws, criminals will simply take a drive to the nearest state with relaxed gun laws.
- Knives kill people, are we going to ban knives?
If you genuinely believe that knives are just as effective at killing people as guns, then why do you even want to own a gun? You should replace all your guns with knives if it makes no difference. Let’s send our soldiers into battle with just knives. We could save a fortune on ammo.
The problem is that you don’t believe this and therefore it is a worthless argument.
- Are we going to ban cars or trucks?
A car’s primary purpose is transportation, not putting an end to someone’s life. Fatalities are an unfortunate byproduct. And over the years there have been tons of safety regulations set in place that have saved countless lives already, and there is still so much more we can do. How about making texting while driving a felony, or what if every car had a breathalyzer installed so that people could know they are over the limit before even entering the vehicle? You could also make the driving test to get a license much more difficult and make people retake it every time their license is renewed.
Any of these ideas could potentially reduce car fatalities.
Large trucks have become a popular choice of weapon used by terrorists, and there are measures we can take to prevent this as well. The mayor of New York City recently announced that 1500 bollards would be placed in areas of high foot traffic as a way to protect pedestrians. The point is, yes, car fatalities are a significant problem in America, and we should continue to strive to make them safer, just like we should with guns.
- More guns equals less crime
A 2007 U.N. survey found that of all the civilian-owned guns in the world, Americans owned 50 percent of them. If a nation’s crime rate dropped based on the number of available firearms, America wouldn’t even have a jaywalking problem.
- Someone forgot to tell drug dealers that drugs are illegal
This snarky comment is becoming more and more popular as a way to argue that making things illegal doesn’t work. But despite many poor choices in America’s struggle to keep drugs at bay, law enforcement has been able to stop many shipments of drugs from entering the United States and put many dangerous drug dealers behind bars. Have they stopped all drugs? Hell no they haven’t, but they have stopped some. Gun control measures will not stop all mass shootings, but what if they prevented one Pulse nightclub, or Vegas concert, or Aurora movie theatre, or Parkland High School shooting? Would that not be worth it? It probably would be to the families of the 17 people who died last week.
No more excuses
Arguing that nothing can be done to stop this endless murder is absurd. There are countless things we can do. End the private sales/gun show loopholes. Universal laws putting every state on the same page so criminals in cities like Chicago can’t go to neighboring states and easily buy weapons. Denying anyone convicted of domestic abuse from purchasing a gun. Any of these ideas could have an impact on gun deaths.
And guess what, gun control measures probably won’t make an immediate dent in the problem, but that doesn’t mean should give up on them. We can always update and improve the laws until we start getting the results we want, but it is going to be a long process, and we must be resolute.
Suggesting that unless we stop 100 percent of mass shootings, it isn’t worth trying to prevent any is foolish and quite frankly, evil. If it were your kid that was murdered in their math class, you would have wanted us to try something.
