After reading both essays, I can’t fully agree with either and because I have heard the rhetoric from both sides before it’s difficult to say anything presented was compelling. It is so easy to want to simplify a complex issue because addressing all the variables seems impossible. Gun ownership and availability affects crime in both positive and negative ways and quantifying these variables is nearly impossible. How many crimes are prevented by gun ownership? How often is a life protected by gun ownership? My father is 72 and he and my mother live in the country. They live too far away to expect help form the police in an emergency and would have no protection against a younger, stronger attacker if not for gun ownership, it has saved their lives twice.
Mountains of statistics and anecdotal evidence can be presented by both sides of this debate to support their arguments. As a nation we all want to prevent violent crime and when horrific mass shootings occur they are emotionally traumatic. We want to do something, we think the sky is falling and things are so much worse now than in the past. But is that perception accurate? And will doing away with gun ownership lower violent crime? Homicides in the US in …show more content…
Both Australia and Great Britain severely tightened up their already strict gun ownership laws after experiencing mass shootings in the 1990s. While gun related deaths declined in Australia they have doubled in England and homicide rates stayed relatively the same just now knives and blunt objects are the top weapons of choice. Violent crime has increased in both countries with the latest data showing the rate of similar violent crimes in the UK is twice as high as that in the USA. Is this because the weak can no longer defend themselves sans gun ownership? I don’t know. Homicide rates in both countries are lower than in the US and were before the gun restrictions were heightened. Is it a cultural
Mountains of statistics and anecdotal evidence can be presented by both sides of this debate to support their arguments. As a nation we all want to prevent violent crime and when horrific mass shootings occur they are emotionally traumatic. We want to do something, we think the sky is falling and things are so much worse now than in the past. But is that perception accurate? And will doing away with gun ownership lower violent crime? Homicides in the US in …show more content…
Both Australia and Great Britain severely tightened up their already strict gun ownership laws after experiencing mass shootings in the 1990s. While gun related deaths declined in Australia they have doubled in England and homicide rates stayed relatively the same just now knives and blunt objects are the top weapons of choice. Violent crime has increased in both countries with the latest data showing the rate of similar violent crimes in the UK is twice as high as that in the USA. Is this because the weak can no longer defend themselves sans gun ownership? I don’t know. Homicide rates in both countries are lower than in the US and were before the gun restrictions were heightened. Is it a cultural