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Gil Voremberg

Ms. DeWinne & Mrs. Stoller

English Writing & Research

22 December 2020

GUN CONTROL IS WHAT THE U.S. MUST HAVE!

Gun control is the answer to this nation’s needs of unnecessary deaths, as its people to be

protected safely every day. Gun control is the right path to the solution needed because the

problems that guns hold in citizen’s houses, with individuals who don’t know how to use a gun,

make mistakes using it, and people with a mental problem are dangers to the society. The many

problems society has had with guns are: the number of shootings at schools, churches,

synagogues, concerts, movie theaters, and homes and in the streets. Guns cause many deaths

within the households of many families when they think an intruder is trying to break into their

house, but it is someone in a person’s family and then they would shoot on instinct to protect

themselves. Proper gun control can prevent the unnecessary deaths in the country.

Shootings are a very big problem in society today with many of them happening every

year with many lives lost too young to old. There is research on how gun control can work and

could have worked if the government did it before and could have saved many lives. In

LATIMES the article says, “We’ve cross-referenced their data with five types of gun control

proposals. The analysis reveals that if all of these policies had been in effect at the federal level,

they would have had the potential to prevent 146 out of 167 shootings, including all but one

shooting in the past five years” (Mukherjee). This research shows how if there was gun control

sooner many more lives could have been saved and that it can still help now by lowering the
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amount of shooting significantly each year if gun control would be in place. Gun control would

help solve the crisis in the U.S. by preventing most shootings all over the nation.

With the amount of suicides that are in America, guns have just increased much more

causes of suicides every day. Another reason why guns cause many problems is that because it

has caused so many suicides without any notice because a person would just press the trigger and

then they are gone and if they were to try to commit suicide another way their family could stop

them because there is no instant way besides a gun because people can tell themselves to not do

it and think, so a family or friend could help people but a gun is instant death if used. Gun are the

causes of the quick way out when individuals feel that they are not needed, are just depressed

and can’t get helped by others or the family or friends around them, or people with traumatic

stress. Guns are a huge problem by increasing suicidal deaths in the U.S. by every year. This

article says, “Nearly two-thirds of all gun deaths in the U.S. are suicides, resulting in an average

of 63 deaths a day. And the problem is getting worse: Over the past decade, U.S. firearm suicide

rate has increased by 19 percent” (Everytown Research & Policy). This shows how guns are a

big factor in suicides today by the amount of people who use guns instead of anything else from

its being the quick way compared to anything else and if the U.S. were to get rid of that

possibility, the U.S. can help those people keep on living. Suicides with guns will decrease

greatly if gun control would be put in place as a law all over the nation.

People every year die in household deaths by family trying to be safe but intern killing a

loved one. Household deaths are usually fatal or nonfatal accidental shooting, criminal assault, or

suicide attempt than to injure or kill in self-defense and are all caused by guns and shows how

guns cannot be kept in homes. There are many household shootings all around the U.S. in self-

defense or accidental deaths. In an article it states, “During the study interval (12 months in
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Memphis, 18 months in Seattle, and Galveston) 626 shootings occurred in or around a residence.

For every time a gun in the home was used in self-defense or legally justifiable shooting, there

were four unintentional shootings, seven criminal assaults or homicides, and 11 attempts or

complete suicides” (Banton). This is proof that all these deaths in homes are unnecessary and

that if there was gun control it would help decrease the amount of death due to guns. Gun control

would help stop all of these unnecessary deaths that makes people suffer.

If people were to get a gun it must be a requirement to take training so citizens know how

to use it so it would be used safely if people were to own a gun. Proof that gun safety courses are

required everywhere in the U.S., would be that it decreases the amount of death by people

knowing how to use a gun and show when they would use a gun. Gun safety courses must teach

the important safety issues such as gun are a main issue on suicides and gun also cause domestic

violence or that guns can get stolen in crimes. This would teach people to know how to use guns,

where they should hide guns from kids or robbers, teaches people to not use it for bad reasons.

By having gun courses as a requirement for owning a gun it would be harder for people to get a

gun so that they would have to put real effort into getting the gun. Gun control would teach

people who can get a gun to know how to use it correctly so no accidents happen.

People who have a mental problem can’t use guns because most shooting are people who

have a mental problem. There is a federal law in all 50 states that people with a mental problem

can’t have a gun but due to failures in background check people with issues still gain access to

guns. Due to this issue gun control is the solution to stopping by having thing in place to stop this

like background checks. The main problem the U.S. has now is that it is easy for people with a

mental problem to get guns in today world. In this article it says, “In the U.S., it is easier to get a

gun than it is to get mental health,” said Angela Kimball, NAMI’s acting CEO. “We need to flip
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the script. It should be easy-not hard-for people to get the mental health care they need”

(Siemaszko). This shows how getting mental health is harder than getting a gun which is a big

problem and cannot be a possibility ever again with gun control. Gun control would not allow

people with mental problems to have guns at all because most shootings are from people with

mental problems.

Gun control would make background checks a mandatory thing if a person were to ever

buy a gun and the government would have to know everything about the persons mental state

and any illnesses a person has ever had or any crimes a person has ever committed. Some places

people are not required to even run a background check on the buys. This article states, “Private

sellers, such as those at gun shows, are not required to run a background check on purchasers”

(Mukherjee). This shows that at the place where most guns are sold there isn’t even a

requirement for background checks and with gun control that would be added so it would be hard

for anyone with a criminal record or mental illness to get a gun as easily as gun going to a gun

show and just getting one and causing a shooting and killing many lives. With the very little

amount of background checks there are just more and more shootings with people who have

mental problems or have a criminal record. This scholarly source states, “In the wake of a series

of gruesome mass shootings perpetrated by individuals who legally purchased their murder

weapons, it is becoming abundantly obvious that merely expanding background checks is not

enough. We must strengthen the system itself so that individuals with a history of dangerous

behavior can no longer clear it’s low bar” (Horwitz). This shows that background checks need to

be better to make sure mass shooting do not happen and that we need to find another way better

than background checks to make it that people don’t get guns easily. With gun control we can
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help many lives with making background checks a mandatory thing if you try and get a gun so it

makes it so criminals or the mentally ill not get guns.

Gun control will make crime go down so much because most crimes are done by using

guns and if people were not to use guns it would be very difficult for people to commit crimes

without them. Guns control will make crimes nearly a thing of the past because without the use

of guns the best weapon would be a knife and knives can be removed from a person. Many

countries I the world have stricture gun control laws which make them safer. While the U.S. fails

to make any significant laws regarding gun control due to political reasons the NRA lobby. In

the scholarly source it says, “The U.S. firearms regulation legislation lags severely behind that of

other developed nations. It is limited and weak in curtailing gun-related violence, injury, and

death nationwide and the policy formulation process is sluggish and inefficient (Fleming 2012)”

(Kamal). This shows that the U.S. is lagging behind in gun control and with gun control it would

decrease gun violence and deaths such as what happens in crimes. Gun control can stop many

more crimes by taking away guns from the robbers so with gun control the government can make

the U.S. a little safer place to live.

People believe that guns protect them but guns cause more harm and protection. With

guns by people sides people can protect themselves from criminals who will try and rob

individuals or try and kill people but if we were to have gun control people would not have to

protect there lives from robbers because they would not have guns as well, so individuals would

be able to stop the robbers. People believe that with the second amendment everyone should be

able to use guns but that would only cause more death than we would already have so gun

control would be the solutions to where people can still have the right to have gun but has to get

background checks to see if they are able to get them to make things more safer in the U.S..
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All in all, gun control is what America needs to successfully help decrease the amount of

deaths, so the U.S. is a safer place to live. There are certain societal problems due to lack of gun

control and resulting in violence and deaths in schools, places of worship, sheets and households,

there for there is a need towards getting gun control laws all the nation. Gun control helps stop so

much death and proof towards that is how other nations are using gun control to solve these

problems.
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Works Cited

Corky Siemaszko, (August 06, 2020), Trump made it easier for the mentally ill to get guns when

he rolled back Obama regulations, December 22, 2020

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/president-trump-made-it-easier-mentally-ill-
get-guns-when-n1039301
Everytown Research & Policy, (August 11, 2020), Firearm Suicide in the United States,

December 22, 2020

https://everytownresearch.org/report/firearm-suicide-in-the-united-states/
Horwitz, Josh. "Background Checks Need to Be Expanded and Strengthened." Gun Violence,

edited by Noël Merino, Greenhaven Press, 2015. Opposing Viewpoints. Gale In Context:

Opposing Viewpoints, link.gale.com/apps/doc/EJ3010223277/OVIC?

u=spri26149&sid=OVIC&xid=78caf464. Accessed 20 Dec. 2020. Originally published

as "Expanding Background Checks Necessary, but Not Enough," Huffington Post, 9 Mar.

2014.

Kamal, Rifat Darina, and Charles Burton. “Policy Gridlock versus Policy Shift in Gun Politics:

A Comparative Veto Player Analysis of Gun Control Policies in the United States and

Canada.” , vol. 181, no. 4, Dec. 2018, pp. 317–347. , doi:10.1177/0043820018814356.

Kellermann AL, Somes G, Rivara FP, Lee RK, Banton JG. Injuries and deaths due to firearms in

the home. J Trauma. 1998 Aug;45(2):263-7. doi: 10.1097/00005373-199808000-00010.

PMID: 9715182.

Rahul Mukherjee, (February 26, 2020), How many mass shootings might have been prevented

by stronger gun laws, December 22, 2020

https://www.latimes.com/projects/if-gun-laws-were-enacted/
Rand Corporation, (April 22, 2020), The effects of firearm safety training requirements,

December 22, 2020

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https://www.rand.org/research/gun-policy/analysis/firearm-safety-training-

requirements.html