Op-Ed: If Guns Are the Problem, Why Do We Convict Shooters?
Like clockwork, within hours of the shooting and murder of 21 people in a Uvalde, Texas, elementary school, Democrats were calling for gun control.
“What are we doing? Just days after a shooter walked into a grocery store to gun down African-American patrons, we have another Sandy Hook on our hands,” Sen. Chris Murphy said on the Senate floor.
“There are more mass shootings than days in the year. Our kids are living in fear every single time they set foot in a classroom because they think they’re going to be next. … This only happens in this country and nowhere else. Nowhere else do little kids go to school thinking that they might be shot that day.”
Why is it that Democrats are selective when deciding whether the gun is the problem or the shooter is the problem? If this had been a police officer shooting a black man, Democrats wouldn’t be calling for gun control — they would be going after the police officer.
However, using the Democrats’ logic, the police officer wouldn’t be to blame. The gun would.
Why is it that Democrats continue to believe that gun control is the answer to violence, particularly when the evidence has shown time and again that’s not the case?
Cities like New York, Chicago and Washington, D.C., have some of the strictest gun control laws in the country and are led by Democrats. Have those strict laws reduced violence in those cities? Given their crime statistics, it can be argued that they haven’t helped. Perhaps if more law-abiding citizens in those cities were allowed to own guns, the numbers would drop.
Studies have shown that firearms prevent about 1.7 million incidents a year. The Department of Justice has even found that 57 percent of felons are more worried about armed citizens than police.
So why is the default position of the Democratic Party to try to take firearms from the very people who might actually prevent mass shootings?
You can also bring up the hotly debated assertion that armed teachers might have prevented the Uvalde shooting from going on as long as it did or even happening at all. Perhaps the gunman would have decided on another plan had he known that teachers might shoot back at him. His rampage would have certainly gone on longer if not for the heroic actions of the Border Patrol agent who rushed into the school and shot him.
Of course, following leftist logic, we should praise the agent’s weapon because the person who pulls the trigger is not responsible.
This brings up another flaw in the “guns are the problem” logic. If the gun is the problem, why do juries convict shooters?
The flawed logic also ignores the old adage, “where there’s a will, there’s a way.” If someone wants to commit violence, he will find a way to do it.
In London, where firearms are essentially outlawed, criminals have simply switched to using knives. Last year, a man drove an SUV into the crowd at a Christmas parade in Waukesha, Wisconsin, killing five people and injuring four dozen others. How many times have rioters used Molotov cocktails in their violence?
Something needs to be done to address mass shootings, but the problem isn’t the tool used in the violence — it’s the perpetrators.
The mass shootings that are often played up in the media are the result of complex issues, including progressive politics and even mental health. Politicians like Murphy won’t take on the root causes of the violence, in part because one cause is his party and its position on crime and criminals.
The views expressed in this opinion article are those of their author and are not necessarily either shared or endorsed by the owners of this website. If you are interested in contributing an Op-Ed to The Western Journal, you can learn about our submission guidelines and process here.
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