Every year, watching the U.S. Open tennis tournament makes me so proud to be a New Yorker and an American. That was especially true this year, as both the men's and women's finals represented everything that is great about tennis. But unfortunately this year's incredibly deserving champions, Serena Williams and Andy Murray, are also a reminder of another part of our nation - something of which we should all be decidedly un-proud. They serve as a powerful reminder of the tragic toll of gun violence and our nation's unique failure to do enough to prevent it.
Both Andy Murray and Serena Williams were touched by gun violence.
In 1996 Andy Murray was eight years old when a gunman killed 17 children and teachers at his primary school in Dunblane, Scotland. Andy was heading to the gym when the gunfire broke out there. He and his brother hid under a desk until the shooting was over.
Nine years ago -- almost to the day - Yetunda Price, the oldest sister of Serena and Venus, was shot to death in Compton, where the Williams family grew up. Yetunda was 31, a mother of three, a registered nurse who assisted her tennis-playing sisters.
How did citizens and lawmakers in the two nations respond?
In the United Kingdom it took both Houses of Parliament just eight days to vote to establish a tribunal to investigate the Dunblane massacre and make recommendations about how such tragedies could be prevented. That report formed the basis for a strong legislative response the following year, in which handguns were virtually banned. Parliament had already greatly restricted access to firearms in response to an earlier mass shooting in 1987.
America's response, of course, has been the polar opposite. Our political leaders have done virtually nothing to make it harder for dangerous people to get guns despite over a decade of numerous mass shootings -- in Columbine High School, Virginia Tech, Fort Hood, Tucson, Aurora, and elsewhere -- and 30,000 killed with guns in America every year (including many other prominent athletes and members of their families, as noted in a recent Brady Center report, Guns in Sports.) In fact, in recent years Congress has given special legal protections to gun companies who supply criminals.
The result? In 2009, the homicide rate in the US was more than 4 times higher than the murder rate in the UK. Our firearms homicide rate is over 40 times higher than that of England and Wales.
It's not that Americans are more criminally-inclined or more violent than Brits. It's that our criminals have far-too-easy access to guns.
It's not that America should enact the same laws as the United Kingdom. On the contrary, a U.K.-like ban of handguns and other firearms is not advisable, even if it were Constitutional, which it is not. The point is that our political leaders should be engaging in a thoughtful conversation that explores real, effective solutions to our national gun violence epidemic.
As a nation, We Are Better Than This.
Serena Williams and Andy Murray represent far more than the tragedies that touched their lives, or a crisis that so severely impacts our nation. They showed us that they represent the perseverance, heart and will that it takes to be a champion - to be truly the best. We Americans rightfully believe we live in the greatest nation on earth, But as it relates to gun violence, we are embarrassingly far from it. It is time we show the heart and resolve that so defines our national character, to rid ourselves of the problem of gun violence once and for all, and show that this really is the greatest nation in the world.
Follow Daniel Gross on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@bradybuzz
You failed to mention that before the UK "virtually banned" handguns, their homicide rate was nearly the same as it is now.
What do YOU want? Honesty, man.
The Dunblane shootings were a tragedy where seventeen people lost their lives, sixteen of them children. The ban that occured later punished almost 67,000 gun owners for that crime, literally none of whom were actually responsible for what happened.
It cannot be disputed that the ban was *wrong*.
Mr Gross, you say that bans like we have are not a good idea, the first truthful thing I've heard from someone in that position at the Brady Campaign.
That said, it'd be more truthful to say *any* ban that affects innocent people is a bad idea. That includes your groups golden calf, the AWB.
If you want meaningful, thoughtful discussion, consider that the advocates of responsible law that your group derides as "the gun lobby" are constantly expected by you to give up several concessions without anything in return. Next time you advocate the AWB for example, think of current bans of equal value you're willing to give up. The Hughes Amendment would be a small start, yet a token of your willingness to be reasonable, I believe.
Guns need to be taken out of politics. Politically it may work for an election here and there, but it will totally spank us down the road.
Things need to be looked at more scientifically and thoughtfully. We immediately object to Republicans hacking away at symptoms,objects, blaming victims with dumb reactionary judgement but it's entirely ok for us to do it?. Begrudgingly admit that constitution protects firearms for self defense but advocate exactly slashing away those rights for an illusion of safety/security?
The right to a rigorous self defense, of family and loved ones is pretty uniquely American but should be a basic human right. People of color and poor folks have fought for and deserve these rights. In our country it has been upheld in court that police are not under legal obligation to protect citizens. All humans have value and inherent rights that are worth defending with violence and love and nonviolence and love. Regulate firearms to something pathetic and you will have to regulate cutlery next like the UK because of knife crime but you will strip away a most effective,handy, and popular means of self defense while building a "War on drugs"-esque "War on guns" that hurts everyone.
Take firearms out of politics, out of this conversation for a good while to thoughtfully address the violence problem in a great and more honestly productive American way.
"You cannot invade the mainland United States. There would be a rifle behind every blade of grass." ~ Isoroku Yamamoto, Commander-in-Chief of the Imperial Japanese Navy during World War II
We the People are our nations strength. As former law enforcement and a current US Marine Deploying in two days and looking at intel of what's going on in this world I can wholeheartedly say that our nations future is in it's peoples rights and freedoms being preserved. I hope while I'm protecting our nation from without, someone's carrying a gun back home to keep it safe from within.
Columbine High School, Virginia Tech, Fort Hood, Tucson, Aurora......are "gun free zones", thanks to ignorant legislators and groups like the "Brady Campaign". (Fort Hood being a military base, is one that makes anybody's head spin).
Stop being afraid of the gun. Responsible gun owners, train with their sidearm. It's only in the hands of someone who lives in the criminal, or unstable mind-set...(same)... that you have to be looking out for. It is those who choose to live a life, that disregards the lives of others, that you must recognize as the problem.
It's still a bad idea, considering that people who know right from wrong, that carry, wouldn't shoot a politician no matter how mad they made them. And had some of those that gathered at Giffords "townhall" been carrying, the outcome would have been different.
Are you attributing as a "result" of something a condition that was in place before the cause you're attributing it to happened?
Isn't that basically the same thing as lying? If not, what is the difference?
If Mr. Gross admits that a total handgun ban like the one in the UK would be "not advisable" and unconstitutional in the US, what was the point of holding up the UK as an example? The point is nothing short of a total handgun ban like the UK has would possibly have any impact on "gun violence" in the US, but that isn't going to happen. It is unconstitutional and 74% of the American people don't support such a ban. So having a "thoughtful conversation" about the ineffective, useless half-measures (closing the "gun show loophole", magazine capacity limits) the Brady Campaign wants is a waste of time. Those proposals would only infringe on the rights of law-abiding gun owners while having negligible effects on "gun violence".
And in 1987 the homicide rate in the US was more than 7 time greater than the murder rate in the UK. So your point is that gun control does not work?