Gun_Laws

Gun Laws in America I think that gun laws are becoming too strict I America. The second amendment of the United States Bill of Rights is the right to bear arms. That’s because it gives you the basic human right to defend yourself, using any means necessary. Just like your right to eat, sleep, live, love, and laugh. And you have the right to defend all these things that make up your identity. The people who created the Bill of Rights recognized how important it is for people to have the ability to protect themselves from all kinds of threats small and large. To be able to bear arms gives every individual small amount of power to defend themselves and the ability to join together and fight against any enemy. People seem to forget that our country was pretty much founded on guns. There is an article written by Dave Kopel, called America’s fascination with firearms, this book explains the significant role that firearms played in securing our nations independence. If Americans didn’t have guns then the United States probably wouldn’t even exist. The United States won there independence from Great Britain by using firearms. We are not the only example of this either, many countries today came from people having a revolution and changing their ruling powers. Every nation should have an armed society to keep it’s government in check. There are many people who would argue that the large amount of people who own guns in the U.S. contributes to the crime and murder rate in our country. But there are two sides to every issue, for instance Switzerland, with one of the the highest rates of gun ownership in the world has one of the lowest crime rates. In Switzerland all men are trained in the use of military grade assault weapons, and they are required to keep these weapons in their homes. An article written by Stephen P. Halbrook , brings to light how common it is to see Swiss people living everyday life with a rifle slung over their shoulder. Shooting to the Swiss is like sports to Americans… Its their national past time so they don’t see it as a big deal. Switzerland is an excellent example of how a high gun ownership rate can actually make a country safer. According to the American firearms institute, one of the main reasons Japan was reluctant to invade the U.S. in World War Two was because the amount of citizens that own firearms. One question that I am asked fairly frequently is if I am one of the 25% of Americans that according to the National Firearms Institute owns guns and the answer is yes I am. The next question is usually, why' Well il have always been interested in firearms since I was a kid. I find it incredible that something can launch a piece of metal accurately for up and past a mile. So my interest started as a hobby, target shooting and such. But as I grew older I began to recognize the importance and responsibility of gun ownership. And I began to understand that as a gun owner I have a responsibility, as a citizen of the United States, to protect the ideals of the constitution and the freedoms we have. Its easy for people to label me as a “gun nut”, which may or may not be true but I feel that people like me are essential to our society. These statements could be continuously argued from both sides of the issue. But some of the statistics are hard to ignore, for example a company called GunSafe organization states that roughly fifteen thousand gun homicides each year are in the U.S. Gun laws are a heated topic in U.S. politics for this reason. Some think the solution is passing laws that won’t allow Americans to own firearms, but this is one of the things that makes our county great. They would argue that it would reduce violence and shooting related crimes, which would be fair to give up guns for. But the fact of the matter is the only people that are actually following these gun laws are not the ones out there committing crimes. All these laws could do would be to make it harder for law abiding citizens to defend themselves from hardened criminals and also the threat of tyranny from an overpowered government. The country we live in we are insured in almost any scenario. If you crash you car you have insurance to help cover damages, if you break your arm health insurance will cover medical expences, there are many other material things that we cn cove with insurance. The importance of insurance could not be stressed enough by our laws. So I cant help but wonder way people don’t want to insure themselves from being the victim of a violent crime, or being mugged of burglarized. While its true most people don’t think these thing will happen to them, they also don’t think they will get in a car wreck but they will still insure their car. If there was some way that people could co-exist in this world peacefully I would be all for it. However the fact is according to The American Firearms organization, an estimated 270 million guns in the U.S., and 875 million in the world. So until the time that all these weapons are gone I will hang on to mine. Article written by Dave Kopel:Americas fascination with firearms: www. Davekopel.com www.americanfirearms.org Right to bear arms: Macmillian Social Science Library www.gunsafe .org www.stephenhalbrook.com