Kacie Stephenson

English 1010
Issue exploration- gun control debate
7/29/2016

Gun control refers to laws or policies that regulate within a jurisdiction the manufacture,
sale, transfer, possession, modification, or use of firearms by civilians. The purpose of gun
control is to regulate who in a jurisdiction is to have a firearm, and to prevent the use of firearms
in acts of violence, in suicides and accidental shootings, as well as in acts of terrorism or political
violence. In this essay we will look at different viewpoints of where the gun control issue started.
For every one firearm death four people suffer non-fatal firearm assaults. Arguments are
solely based on dealers of firearms and the legality of sales with civilians and criminals. From
the new laws taking effect in 2006 the results seemed to help, but still have a long way to go.
Only 17 states require licenses for gun dealerships, and only half of states require gun
dealerships to keep records of who they sale guns to. Six states requiring a dealers license
impose few, if any, conditions to obtain the license. Other states, though, impose a
comprehensive set of criteria including: minimum age, background check provisions,
fingerprinting, checks of citizenship, and mental health history checks (Vernick). As all states
do not require records, background checks, and more requirements to a buy a gun I believe it is
fair to say this is definitely where a problem lies for gun sale problems as far as criminals getting
guns. If the proper safety checks are not in balance there is room for error.
The debate over gun control started as a political debate and is fairly recent. The politicalleft became advocates for sensible gun control laws, the political right became defenders of the
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Second Amendment. Persons in urban environments are less likely to have experiences with
firearms than those in rural areas. This is account of higher rates of ownership of guns for
sporting purposes, lower rates of crime and violent crime. A person growing up in a rural area is
more likely to be introduced to guns at a younger age. While differences between rural and urban
dwellers can explain the political differences over gun control the explanations are lacking in
other areas. Why do people with more conservative background support the second amendment
regardless of where they were born, raised, or lived? We believe the essential element is fear
(Primm). As Americans we believe that there is a huge crime problem, when gun crimes have
fallen in numbers since the 1970s. I think this boils down to Americans educating themselves.
There are challenges when creating new laws and regulations regarding firearm
ownership by the mentally ill. The challenge is conserving the constitutional rights of the
mentally ill, but we still need to protect citizens from the mentally ill who could act violently and
harm others. With the many massacres that have happened with mentally ill people this is
definitely a loop hole with gun buying that needs to be closed. There are some mentally ill
people that are capable of living a normal life daily but that doesnt mean that they should be in
control of a firearm. The National Institute of Mental Health reports that more than 90% of
those who commit suicide have either mental disorders or substance abuse issues (Sterzer).
While many people just need the proper care we should be doing what we can to prevent suicide,
rather with gun control or other means.
Strict gun control is a legally sanctioned restriction designed to impose firearm scarcity
on civilians. Imposing gun control on general citizens would not be effective in reducing crime
or homicide rates, the factors that also need to be taken into consideration is the mental abilities
to kill someone. A preference tor victim submission does not rule out a criminal's contingent
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willingness to inflict injury. Nor does it exclude his having a comparatively high susceptibility
to preference inversions regarding violence that may be triggered by seemingly trivial situational
factors such as his victims having an 'attitude' (or even having a contemptible lack of it), "The
criminological dynamics of labile preferences amongst opportunistic criminals has been well
described (Stell).
With all the different opinions of gun control its obvious the issue needs to be further
investigated to see what could really be done and what would really help to fix the crime rate in
America. There are definitely many underlying issues to the gun control debate but the only way
to fix the issue is to know exactly where the issue lies.

Sterzer, Jason. "The Good, The Bad And The Ugly." Journal Of Legal Medicine
33.1 (2012): 171-199. Academic Search Premier. Web. 27 July 2016.
Stell, Lance K. "The Production Of Criminal Violence In America: Is Strict Gun
Control The Solution." Journal Of Law, Medicine & Ethics 32.1 (2004): 38-46.
Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 July 2016.
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Primm, Eric, Robert M. Regoli, and John D. Hewitt. "Race, Fear, And Firearms:
The Roles Of Demographics And Guilt Assuagement In The Creation Of A Political
Partition." Journal Of African American Studies 13.1 (2009): 63-73. Academic Search
Premier. Web. 22 July 2016.
Vernick, Jon S., et al. "Regulation Of Firearm Dealers In The United States: An
Analysis Of State Law And Opportunities For Improvement." Journal Of Law,
Medicine & Ethics 34.4 (2006): 765-775. Academic Search Premier. Web. 22 July
2016.

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