EDITOR: On July 20, 2012, Colorado was changed forever; a gunman in an Aurora movie theater shot and killed 12 people and injured 70 others. Because of this massacre, the gun control debate was brought up again: Should firearms be limited, or even illegal altogether? The answer to this is “no.” Laws only matter to citizens, not criminals.
Although there are currently ways to get illegal firearms, if they become limited, the black-market for guns will skyrocket. None of these guns will be taxed, but most importantly, anyone will be able to have access to them. Currently, there are certain restrictions on who can buy guns, if that changes, the massacre rates won’t go down, they will go up. Guns became much more of an issue after being banned in Britain. Colorado government needs to realize that the mentally disabled, the depressed, the sociopaths, etc., will all have access to these guns through the black market. Shouldn’t we allow citizens who are trained to handle firearms properly carry guns to protect people from the others who buy guns illegally? People who believe that gun control will stop massacres from happening are wrong.
If gun control restricts the good people who carry guns, who will be able to stop the people leading the massacres? Only the police will, and there aren’t enough of them to protect every citizen from illegal violence. According to Governing.com, in 2010 there were approximately 607,051 people living in Denver. However, there were only a total of 1,470 active officers. This means that one police officer is responsible for roughly 413 people. These statistics prove that citizens cannot always rely on police officers to protect them when needed.
It would be unconstitutional to take away our guns and leave us defenseless with all the craziness around us. Criminals will always find a way to get around the law, and the gun violence will continue to increase. Guns don’t kill people, people do.
Jessica Williams, Aurora
via letters@aurorasentinel.com
“Some have made the argument, bordering on the frivolous, that only those arms in existence in the 18th century are protected by the Second Amendment.
We do not interpret constitutional rights that way. Just as the First Amendment protects modern forms of communications, e.g., Reno v. American Civil Liberties Union, 521 U. S. 844, 849 (1997), and the Fourth Amendment applies to modern forms of search, e.g., Kyllo v. United States, 533 U. S. 27, 35–36 (2001), the Second Amendment extends, prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding.”.” ~ the Supreme Court of the United States in _District of Columbia v. Heller_, October 2007
The criminal will always have guns. When the law abiding citizen lose their guns through government control, criminals take advantage and home invasions, robberies, rape all goes up! The armed citizen is a large deterrent.
Yesterday I saw a gun (rifle) made from plastic on television demonstration made using 3d printer, that fired automatically like a machine gun. After use, could easily be melted down to block of plastic, similar to that used in milk jugs. How will government and the gun control folks control that? Make it difficult to buy guns and use them legally, and folks will go back to making their own as they did in colonial days. Even made cannons, and own gun powder in the frontier towns.