Bianca Barreto Side

Americans are notorious for loving their right to bear arms. In fact, there are more than 270 million firearms in the U.S., with gun sales doubling every year since 2011 (according to npr.org). Growing up, having guns in our home is a very normal thing; I was taught how to properly shoot a gun before I even knew how to ride a bike. But is it really practical to have firearms readily available to almost anyone?
People often argue that guns aren’t killing people, but the people behind them are, or that people are going to find ways to obtain guns illegally even if we ban them as a whole. Although these arguments are valid to side with, it’s ludicrous to rule out all of the benefits we’d have ifwe enforced strict gun control.The whole point of gun control is to push for security and safety in our communities. The majority of violent crimes are committed with firearms, so it should make sense to make guns less obtainable,right? As a country we can’t just act like sitting ducks the next time a mass shooting or another gun related tragedy happens. The faster we are to prevent people from obtaining firearms, the more likely it is that there won’t be a “next time.”
Enforcing more strict gun policies also prevents guns from ending up in the wrong person’s hands. I may be able to consider “guns don’t kill people, people kill people” as a viable argument, but we still need gun control to stop people from harming others. According to mother-jones.com, three quarters of the mass shooting in the US over the past 30 years were aided by legally obtained firearms. Regulating stringent background checks for those purchasing guns prevents potential criminals from owning these weapons which in turn, makes our communities more safe.
Despite its controversy gun control can really only benefit us in the long run.It’s idiotic to think that doing nothing about gun violence in America is the right answer when all we do is complain about how gun violence affects our lives. As Americans, we are all tied to a relationship of mass shootings and gun violence. We go about our daily lives desensitized to the consequences of owning firearms because we take advantage of how readily available they are. There have been about 279 mass shootings this YEAR ( gunviolencearchive.org).

Manuel Zamora Side

As one of the fundamental parts of the country, firearms tend to spark quite a bit of controversy. Past events have shown us that when in the wrong hands, the results could be very tragic. Regulations are, of course, set.
Some may argue that the laws make it too simple to own these types of weapons. Others think that they should be banned for good. However, these regulations don’t stop gun
violence.
First, lets look at the numbers. Americans alone own 50% of all civilian owned guns in the world. Americans only make up 5% of the world’s population. There is 88 guns for every 100 Ameri-
cans which essentially means that there is almost one gun for every person. About 3% of Americans own half the guns in the country. More than 30,000 American deaths are
caused by guns each year, about 2⁄3 are suicides and $31.8 billion are the economic impact from guns.
Events like the recent Las Vegas massacre show us how much evil a person can cause, not the gun. After all, a trigger can not pull itself. A firearm in itself is not such a bad, thing. When used correctly, you can use it for protection, use it to hunt, and even use it recreationally.
To ban these arms would do almost nothing to help. Most of the criminals that murder people do not go into their local gun store to buy a gun. They do it illegally which means even if you ban them, they will find a way around it and it is possible they will use it to cause destruction. You only end up taking the protection away from citizens.
Granted, getting a gun is not too difficult, but it really depends where. California, the strictest of states has no where in its state’s constitution that it will guarantee the right to bear arms, they are allowed to restrict it. All gun sales and transactions must go through a California licensed firearms dealer. More lenient states like Utah have laws that allow a person with a permit to carry a concealed loaded weapon. All weapons are used for bad at one point and this gives them a very bad reputation. The most important thing to remember is that the people who do these malevolent deeds are the people that should not be able to acquire them so easily.