I have been contributing recently to some blog posts on Simon’s blog – BEFOREiFORGT – about guns in America linked to the Virginia Tech shootings. There were some interesting comments made and I would like to put some thoughts down here about the issue.
Although there are laws about guns in America (and this differs between states) it is clear that the laws are not as they are in Europe and that they allow members of the public to own and carry guns.
I believe that there is no place for guns in the community and therefore the laws need changing. I don’t even think that the police should carry guns as this in many ways only encourages those that take on the police to do the same, bringing guns into society. Simon mentioned some of the things that he would like to change in terms of the laws. Surely we can make it more simple than that. Ban all guns, full stop for the general public.
There will be people out their that currently take part in the sport of shooting, that will say that this will loose a lot of revenue and they are right. However this could be solved by having ‘gun clubs’ where you go to shoot. All the guns used could be stored at the club under strict lock and key, perhaps even with airport like security to get in and out to prevent them being taken off the premises. This would allow the sport of shooting to place in a controlled safe environment that people could enjoy. After all the thrill and adrenalin kick of shooting a gun must be good (I have never has the chance to try this).
I think that this is the best thing as I cannot envisage a situation where a member of the public would need to own a gun for something other than hurting someone.
In these blog posts many have said that they need them to protect themselves. Well I think that my response to that is that it is the job of the police to protect the public and therefore it should be their responsibility. A lot of comments came up suggesting that if you were being burgled the gun could be used to defend themselves. Do these people think that killing someone because they are robbing you is right?
Guns cause death and injury and therefore when not in a safe controlled environment then they should not be used and certainly not be readily available to buy in shops!
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I Enjoy Firing Guns – BEFOREiFORGET
It was with horror that I read a headline on the BBC News website today, which announced that the Chief Justice for England and Wales (Lord Phillips) has said that murderer’s are in jail too long. What?
Lord Phillips argument was that we are going to end up with with prisons full of “full of geriatric lifers”. So what? I cannot believe that once again we are hearing that people who are committing criminal offenses (particular of this nature) and being spared from a proper sentence, no doubt because our prisons are too full.
Who doesn’t agree that if you murder someone then the sentence that you serve should be life. In other words you spend the rest of your life in prison. I cannot believe that someone so high up in the justice system cannot realise this.
Once again this week we have heard several incidents on the news of some ‘gun crime’ shooting in London and in Manchester. It seems as though the UK is catching up to the USA in the problem of guns of Britain’s streets.
I have become more and more concerned at the number of incidents that are involving guns on the streets of the UK over the last couple of years. It seems as though every month or two there are incidents to report. The question that the public is asking the government is what are you [the government] going to do about this problem so that we do not end up like the USA?
It seems that the government have introduced a lot of ‘ideas’ but they haven’t really put forward any solid policies which are going to help in the short term. Earlier this week Mr Blair said that he wanted to lower the age of the compulsory 5 year jail sentence for carrying guns from 21 to 17. This seems OK, but why not increase the sentence to 10 years while we are at it. Surely that would be a large deterrent. 10 years out of your life in prison will have a big impact whereas 5 is clearly not the same. Maybe the reason the term is staying at 5 years is due to the lack of prison. Not long ago John Reid announced that only serious offenders would be going to jail. There certainly seems mixed messages here!
Of course it is not just the punishment that needs tackling. Treating the causes of why these youngsters feel the need to take the lives of others to solve their problems and disputes is something that also needs to be changed. Stop the problem at its source. How do we do that? Why are these youngsters growing up with this culture? Parents? Violence of TV? These are all questions that need to be investigated in order to try and implement a solution.
In my opinion the government should do what they said they would. This labour government announced 7 years ago that they would be “tough on crime and tough on the causes of crime”. Well only locking up the really serious, is that carrying out this plea. Bill Bratton who was the former police chief of New York, suggested “zero tolerance”. I think it is time to take that stance.
