Does Gun Control Improve Safety - Essay Example

People wish to keep guns to enjoy their autonomy and guarantee their safety when they meet robbers, criminals, and terrorists. Armed citizens feel their strength in protecting themselves and their families from physically stronger criminals. If guns are banned, the wrongdoers will still obtain guns and ammunition from illegal sources. And who will be at loss? The common man. Owning guns is one of the people’s constitutionally protected rights and when one has a right to something, one does not have to validate the need for it. Banning guns will lead an individual to look for other dangerous things to create violence, and when there are so many other dangerous things one can think of then why is only gun control thought to be the only measure to improve safety? When a common man will intend to kill someone, he can do so in an automobile accident too. So, gun control seems to be outdated.

            Nothing is good or bad but its use makes it so. Guns are merely tools. What these guns will be used for is decided by the hands that hold them. Guns are evil, or more guns mean more crime, are only myths. According to NRA’s America’s First Freedom (qtd. in “South Bay Open Carry”), “private firearm ownership has risen by 70-75 million from 1991 to 2008, yet the murder rate dropped by 43% in the same period” and “crime rate dropped throughout the nation from approximately 750 per 100,000 to less than 480 per 100,000 from 1991 until 2008”. These statistics support the fact that owning guns is not related to an increase in crime; instead, it is helpful for citizens to ensure their safety. Also, the argument that gun control will reduce accidental gun deaths, is illogical because if it were so, then cars, machines, toothpicks, and swimming pools should also be banned as they also threaten human life because of accidents.

            Hence, it is concluded that gun control is not effective in improving the safety and well-being of society. Safety can be threatened by many other dangerous things. Guns are not to be blamed for destroying security. Also, it is also a myth that gun control will keep guns out of the reach of criminals, according to Professor Gary Mauser of Simon Fraser University. Criminal intent will not change when guns will not be available. Gun control only disarms innocent citizens who have no intention of committing a crime. Thus, what is the point of gun control when safety is still being threatened?