Gun laws in America

Ashton Moreland, Managing Editor

Whispered prayers, tear stained cheeks, eyes squeezed shut to block out the reality of the situation. Shots echo around the room, striking paralyzing fear into the very core of every person in the room except one. The one with the gun.

Unfortunately, for too many innocent people, reading that sentence would incite horrifying PTSD or flashbacks to a time when they almost lost their life. Due to non constricting gun laws in most of the United States, this situation was made a possibility.

37 states in the nation require a permit to carry concealed firearms in public, and the other 13 have either restricted rights on guns or do not require a permit at all to carry any type of firearm. Meaning, if I had a piece of paper that justified my desire to carry a weapon with me to the pet store, it would be perfectly legal and unquestionable to the majority.

In a world where violence is fueled by the simplest of disagreements or differing points of view, this is exactly what we don’t need. It’s been proven time and time again that people, whether they are deemed sane or not, will open fire when and wherever they please just to prove a point. Innocent civilians have their lives stolen from them for being in the wrong spot at the right time, and are left unjustified in their death as their killer pleads mental health issues to gain sympathy.

If it were harder to carry a gun in public, or even to own one for that matter, friends and families nationwide could be assured that they would get to return home from their daily errands in one piece. No one should go to school in the morning only to find out that the inside of their history classroom is the last thing they’ll ever see before tears weld their eyelashes together.

But, sadly, this fear is too valid in the United States. Outside of the U.S., homicides and mass shootings do not take place anywhere near the frequency as in the home of the brave.

Australia has not had a mass shooting since 1996, when a massacre in Tasmania opened the eyes of the government and they strengthened their gun laws. Germany questions the sanity of anyone under 25 who wants to own a gun. They do psychiatric evaluations on those wanting to buy a gun, and if that doesn’t say something, I don’t know what does.

In France, those wanting a firearm must have no criminal record and pass a thorough background check, evaluating the reason for purchase and criminal, mental, and health records. The United Kingdom and Japan both choose to play on the safe side, making handguns illegal for private citizens. Due to these laws and restrictions, these countries are significantly safer than the United States.

Who would’ve guessed? While there is no way to completely prevent fatal incidents involving guns, restricting the availability of them to the general public would be a nice way to start. No one needs to carry a firearm on them in public, no matter what string of scenarios they provide to support their claim.

If firearms were taken more seriously in this country and harder to possess, we could actually live in a world where the fear of dying at the hands of a radical gunman was irrational.