The Tipping Point on Gun Violence
I haven’t talked much in the Salon about gun violence, but it has been one of my focuses for the last decade. First, I am a gun owner; I own shotguns, long guns, revolvers, and semi-auto handguns. I have a Texas license to carry a handgun, will carry on occasion, and shoot sporting clays and birds. Second, I do not own an assault style rifle because these weapons have no place in civilized society. Third, I resigned from the NRA over 30 years ago after it went nuts and Charleton Heston started shouting, “From my cold, dead hands!” Lastly, my position on guns has been evolving since Gabby Giffords was gunned down during a constituent event in 2011. That tragedy, and all the ensuing tragedies, have continued to drive a personal urgency to push new public policy.
I have always been a Second Amendment supporter, but have also also believed that gun policy should be established and enforced by adults, not gun nuts and weirdos, which is our current reality in the US. Unfortunately, with the sole exception of the assault weapons ban, we’ve been going backwards on gun policy since the late ’80s. We took a giant step backwards when Congress stupidly allowed the ban to expire in 2004, marking the beginning of a new and growing chapter of gun violence in America. About five years ago, I established a Facebook group called Gun Owners for Reform, to discuss gun ownership and public policy around guns. For those five years, we have been calling for gun law reform, attempting to be a reasoned voice to balance gun rights with common sense.
Here’s the issue…beginning in 1977, when the NRA was taken over by the gun manufacturing industry, it became one of the strongest lobbying groups in the US, deploying hundreds of millions of dollars in bribes to politicians who vote with them, and unleashing hoards of drooling gun nuts against those who don’t toe the line. For over 30 years, the NRA has maintained a stranglehold on Congress and statehouses all over the country. Since then, we’ve seen research on gun violence at the CDC and NIH banned, a porous background check system implemented which includes the odd feature of making state crime reporting to the database voluntary. It has vehemently defended the private sale and gun show loopholes, which allow private sales and exchanges of weapons without background (or even ID) checks. It has pushed internet sales of guns and ammo in unlimited quantities. It has bribed state politicians all over the country to weaken, and even eliminate gun safety laws. Ironically, as pointed out by the Smithsonian, gun laws in Tombstone Arizona are now weaker than when Wyatt Earp was the town marshall in the 1880’s.
The NRA has even pushed the US government to turn a blind eye to the threat of “ghost guns”, those that are assembled from partially finished parts and components, completely circumventing ATF laws and regulations. Even worse, they have steadfastly pushed the proliferation of assault style weapons like the AR-15 and variants. These high capacity, high powered weapons were designed for the battlefield, intended to inflict massive wounds with lightweight, high velocity rounds. The ammo fired from the AR-15 travels at 3 times that of normal handgun rounds, resulting in massive wounds and shreded internal organs and arteries. The AR-15 is now known as the weapon of choice for mass shooters and anti-government weirdos, and it’s long past time to take these weapons out of our society. Finally, legislation pushed by the NRA forbids a permanent registry of guns sold in the US. Why? Because the NRA has successfully brainwashed the gun culture that ANY record keeping of gun sales is an automatic gun registry that allows the government to come for their guns. The notion is completely idiotic, as if some beer-filled redneck is going to fend off the US military with an AR-15 and a box full of ammo. Stupid.
My position for years has been that banning these weapons now that there are unknown millions in circulation is not practical. I always pushed for magazine limits and lethality limits on ammo sold to the public. For this position, I’ve been called everything from a snowflake to a communist, and I and my family have been harassed, apparently by “good guys” with guns, unhappy with my opinions.
I’ve finally decided that enough is enough. The Second Amendment is a relic of 18th century America in a time of slave-holding. The Amendment was added to the Constitution to defend the states and the new federal government from standing armies (like the British). The US was never supposed to have a standing army, but now we do, rendering the Second Amendment unecessary. The other reason the amendment was adopted was to protect locals from insurrection (read slave insurrection) which was bad for plantation business. The Second Amendment has no more place in the Constitution today than the article that allotted 3/5 personhood to each slave for the purposes of apportioning congressional districts. It’s long past time for it to be repealed, replaced with sane gun laws that protect everyone, not just goofballs and weirdos waving guns around in demonstrations in front of the Alamo.
I’m not naive enough to think repeal, at least for now, is very likely; however, banning assault style weapons and associated ammo, is. Also, enacting universal background checks for ALL gun transfers is common sense that the vast majority of Americans support. Limiting magazine capacity, making crime and mental data available in the NICS (instant background check system) should have been done decades ago. All of these steps should be enacted immediately.
Lastly, we adults in the US have failed our children miserably, and the school massacre in Parkland Florida was 100% avoidable. This kind of violence happens nowhere in the developed world but the US. Now that we’ve failed, our children and grandchildren are shaming us into doing something about gun violence in America. It’s long past time for us to stand up on our hind legs and do the right thing. Our entire society depends on it, and the whole world is watching.