Guns, Part 4: Conclusion

From an organization called the Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence we get these statistics:

In 2010, guns took the lives of 31,076 Americans in homicides, suicides and unintentional shootings.  This is the equivalent of more than 85 deaths each day and more than three deaths each hour. 73,505 Americans were treated in hospital emergency departments for non-fatal gunshot wounds.2Firearms were the third-leading cause of injury-related deaths nationwide, following poisoning and motor vehicle accidents.3Between 1955 and 1975, the Vietnam War killed over 58,000 American soldiers – less than the number of civilians killed with guns in the U.S. in an average two-year period.4In the first seven years of the U.S.-Iraq War, over 4,400 American soldiers were killed. Almost as many civilians are killed with guns in the U.S., however, every seven weeks.5

These numbers are (one would hope) eye-opening.  And distressing.  They can’t be explained away by bumper-sticker sloganeering, as in “guns don’t kill people, people kill people.” (Unless there are dramatically more of the types of people who kill people in the U.S. than there are in, say, Canada, the UK, France, or Germany.)  The problem of firearm injuries and deaths is clearly related to the immense number of guns out there and their relatively easy accessibility.  That’s not the only reason for the ridiculously high injury/death rate – sure, people do kill people – but it seems certain that the rate would be reduced, perhaps dramatically, if it weren’t so easy for people who kill (and injure) people, accidentally or on purpose, to get guns.

A big part of the problem is what has come to be known as the “gun culture” – a disturbingly large subset of the population that has a weird fascination with these implements – a fascination that borders on love or even worship, and one that appears to be borne of equal parts paranoia and fantasy:  We are always in mortal danger and we will be the hero of any scenario that develops when that danger manifests itself.

And so, according to reliable statistics, there are 88 guns for every 100 people in the U.S. The result of the ubiquitousness of these instruments whose primary reason for existence is destruction: Huge numbers of injuries and deaths that have nothing to do with protecting oneself or one’s loved ones from predators.

Let us be the first to acknowledge, however, that this is a complicated, multi-faceted problem for which there are no obvious (and/or easy) solutions.  The banning of guns in private hands, something that’s advocated by a sizeable number of presumably well-intentioned people, is a non-starter. – politically impossible, constitutionally questionable, and probably unnecessary.  Better to narrow the focus to steps that can actually be taken and that can be expected to significantly ameliorate if not fully solve the problem.

• Find a way to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill.  This is not a solution for all the different ways people get killed or hurt by gunshot – suicide, accident, street crime, gang activity, etc. – but it would put a dent in one of the most appalling: the slaughter of innocent people, en masse or otherwise, by people with unhinged thought processes and revenge fantasies.

• Close the loopholes in the gun laws we do have, by which buyers and sellers can avoid background-check requirements by way of private and gun show transactions.

• Make guns safer – devise and employ technology that makes it impossible to discharge a firearm accidentally.

• Abatement of gun crime by swift and severe punishment.  This may include creation of a special docket in the courts dedicated to weapons offenses -- specified judges handling bail, trial, sentencing, and supervision of offenders. Proposed legislation to create such a docket has called for such measures as minimum cash bonds of up to $50,000, and swift and meaningful consequences for people who violate probation for weapons offenses. 

Responsible members of the National Rifle Association should disavow the leadership of this organization and publicly repudiate its role as lobby and mouthpiece for gun and ammunition manufacturers. 

People who own hand guns for protection should carefully think through the need they perceive for that protection and ask themselves if theft of their gun and/or its use in an accidental death or injury is more likely than the use they imagine for it; viz., thwarting an assault.  Private gun ownership is an important contributor to the tens of thousands of annual gun deaths and injuries.  Fans of concealed carry have their own particular danger-and-fantasy demons to deal with.  Fans of open-carry cannot be reasoned with.  Fans of the need to have and use guns to defend themselves (and the country) from their own government and/or from any number of other shadowy conspiracies can’t be reasoned with either, and need to be carefully monitored.  It appears they are mostly talk, paranoia, and swagger, but they  have the potential to be every bit as dangerous to the homeland as foreign terrorists.

As for the constitutional right to bear arms, I will leave it to legal scholars to parse out and argue over the wording of the 2^nd amendment and the meaning(s) that wording was intended to convey, and suggest only this:  The motives of gun-enthusiasts who wrap themselves in the flag and position themselves as courageous defenders of the constitution are suspect.  Those folks would be more persuasive on this point if they were as passionate (and knowledgeable) about other parts of the constitution as they are about the gun part.