Right to Bear Arms

I've talked with a number of people in the past year or so about the whole topic of the right to bear arms, as embedded in the U.S. constitution. This is something that is not entrenched in the Canadian constitution (Charter of Rights and Freedoms), but to all the anti-gun naysayers, out there, a recent tragic example shows why this is so needed for our U.S. neighbours, and dare I say it, in Canada as well.

You may have read about the tragic shootings at the missionary center as well as a megachurch in Colorado yesterday. The story seems to be evolving to detail a disgruntled former adherent or member who decided to take out his frustration on others, killing innocent lives in the process. Now, I know what you may say - if they had banned guns, no one would be hurt. But let's live in reality here - to say that banning guns will create an atmosphere of non-violent behaviour and curb people killing one another is like saying that prohibition in the 1920s curbed the distribution, consumption, and trade of alcohol. Quite the opposite, history will tell us.

What ended up happening yesterday was a female member of the church, who happened to have been armed (yes, it does seem kind of weird that someone would go to church armed, but I digress), confronted the gunman, and eventually shot and killed him. Could you imagine what would have happened had she not had a weapon at her disposal? It is almost guaranteed that there would have been many more deaths at the hands of this twisted psycho. Look at the Virginia Tech massacre - a supposedly gun-free zone, and the carnage inflicted on there. You would have to be dumb to not reflect on how different things would have turned out had students and teachers been able to carry firearms to defend oneself.

I will agree, people carrying firearms is not the ideal solution for discouraging gun violence. But it is better than nothing. Passing more restrictive gun laws will only cause those who abide by them to be hand-cuffed - it will do nothing to prevent criminals from stealing or smuggling guns, and it certainly will not change the climate in some segments of society, which seem to place a lesser premium on the value of life. In those cases, the key is to provide a positive home environment which is not condusive to the child and young adult being left by themselves and feeling alienated and bored. The key to reducing violent behaviour, in my view, is for children to grow up in loving, stable families, not this single-parent stuff which is so prevalent. Kids from these types of environments are more likely to join similar kids and form gangs and use guns as a show of manhood and intimidation, rather than as a tool for protection, hunting for food, or sport enjoyment. But of course, we don't live in such an environment, and as much as we would like to see it change, societal trends show that this is unlikely to happen. So now you have people on the street who are angry with the world (as is often the case with these mass murder shooters), feel betrayed, feel knocked down and the only way for them to deal with this anger is to grab a gun and start shooting people. The gun is the the problem. Violent behaviour and a violent culture is. As long as that permeates throughout our society, people have a right to not be intimidated by those who obviously want to wreak havoc on their lives - people have a right to live their lives and not be subject to, or have their lives threatened by these increassingly angry, mentally unstable individuals who happen to have access to a firearm with ill intentions.