It’s one of the most controversial topics at the moment. Each side of the argument has valid concerns, but at what point do we drop our own personal fears and allow a parent to protect their child, a woman to protect herself on the way to her car after a hard day of work, or a proprietor to stop a robbery? Do we say that honest men and women can’t legally own a gun, and take the guns away from law-abiding citizens, but not from the criminals?
To carry a gun or not should be a personal choice, and one that should not be taken lightly, because it is in fact, a deadly weapon. The legal right to carry a weapon should always exist. That right shouldn’t be taken away from the millions of Americans who have been following the laws for decades, because of the handful that want to abuse the freedom. But the right to carry a weapon, which our Founding Fathers found so important that they wrote it it as the second amendment to our Constitution, should be preserved for this generation, and the next. Those first ten amendments, known as the Bill of Rights, are there to protect our freedoms from a tyrannical government, so why now, after all of the wars fought to protect those rights, are we going to surrender those rights? Do we tell the hundreds of thousands of American soldiers who died preserving our freedoms that they gave a good effort, but that we’re just going to disregard their bravery, and their life that was lost? I agree that not just anyone should be able to carry a gun, I think that there should be limitations, just as there are with any law. Gun owners should be trained in safety, and pass criminal and mental background checks. There are those who think that passing laws to restrict gun ownership will cause those disregarding the law to just hand over their guns. The logic in this in it of itself is absurd. An example of this is Chicago, where concealed carry is illegal, and yet Chicago has one of the nation’s highest gun related murder rates, which shows that the criminals are carrying guns. In 2012, guns which were, and still are illegal to carry, claimed the lives of over 500 residents. Those with sincere and honest reasoning for owning a gun are the only ones who will be punished for these laws that are supposed to protect. By taking away the right to carry a gun, we only weaken our protection against those who these laws are supposed to protect us from.
The intentions of the lawmakers who are attempting to confiscate these rights aren’t flagitious, they’re merely trying to protect Americans. What they don’t realize is that the only way that you can be completely sure that someone is safe, is to allow them to own something to keep themselves safe. If a thief intends to rob someone, they would be more likely to think twice, and decide not to commit the crime knowing that the person who they are demanding money from, and instilling fear into, could possibly be carrying a weapon. The idea that having access to self-protection would cause an...
