When news broke of the murders at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin on August 5th, people of all faiths and backgrounds and the first responders who came to the scene to help were horrified by the ambush on men and women as they prepared for worship services. Leaders across the country quickly denounced the hate crime and the FBI immediately began investigating the attack as a possible case of domestic terrorism. But as easy as it was for all of us to be outraged by another senseless attack and heartbroken by the congregation’s stories, it was difficult to be surprised by how it took place again in a nation unwilling to curb guns designed just to kill lots of people in the hands of lawless people. Would this have happened without a semi-automatic gun and high-capacity clips of bullets?
The shootings at the Sikh Temple of Wisconsin came only two weeks after James Holmes allegedly killed 12 people and injured 58 others at a movie theater in Aurora, Colorado, in one of the worst mass shootings in American history. Would this have happened without an AR-15 assault rifle, a Remington 870 12-gauge shot gun, and a semi-automatic handgun with high-capacity clips of bullets? After the Aurora massacre, the Denver Post published an interactive timeline listing some of the others:
August 1966, University of Texas at Austin, Texas: 16 people killed, 31 hurt. July 1985, a McDonald’s restaurant in San Ysidro, California: 21 people killed, 19 hurt. October 1991, a Luby’s Cafeteria in Killeen, Texas: 23 people killed, 22 hurt. May 1998, the community of Springfield, Oregon: four people killed, 21 hurt. April 1999, Columbine High School, Colorado: 13 people killed, 26 hurt. April 2007, Virginia Tech University, Virginia: 32 people killed, 27 hurt. February 2008, Northern Illinois University, Illinois: five people killed, 16 hurt. March 2009, Coffee and Geneva counties in Alabama: 10 people killed, six hurt. April 2009, a community center in Binghamton, New York: 13 people killed, four hurt. November 2009, Fort Hood, Texas: 13 people killed, 24 hurt. Other shootings, like the January 2011 shooting in Tucson, Arizona that killed six people and injured 13, including U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, could be added to this list. Would any of this devastation have happened without semi-automatic guns and high capacity clips of bullets?
Every time another mass shooting happens in the United States, the debate over gun control comes fleetingly to the forefront -- until political fear paralyzes courage and action. Inevitably, some people repeat the argument that the solution to preventing mass shootings is not better gun control laws -- even control of assault weapons, which have no place in nonmilitary hands -- but getting even more Americans armed. The apparent fantasy result would be something straight out of Hollywood where every single time a bad person stands up with a gun a good person with their own gun would quickly rise up out of the crowd, shoot the bad person, and save the day.
But arguments like this ignore both common sense and scientific evidence about the connection between the ready availability of guns -- including assault weapons and guns with large ammunition capacity -- and the epidemic of gun violence in America. Daniel W. Webster, professor and co-director of the Center for Gun Policy and Research at Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and a panelist at the Children’s Defense Fund’s recent conference, wrote after the Aurora shootings:
We should not brush aside discussions of gun policy as too politically difficult to expect meaningful change, or "the price for our freedoms." Instead, we should reflect on why the U.S. has a murder rate that is nearly seven times higher than the average murder rate in other high-income countries and a nearly 20 times higher murder rate with guns. And we should consider how flaws in current gun policies contribute to this disparity... Following mass shootings, gun control opponents have not been bashful about pushing for laws to remove restrictions on carrying guns in schools, bars and churches. Indeed, calls for removing restrictions on carrying concealed firearms will not stop mass shootings. Research indicates that so-called right-to-carry laws don’t reduce violence, and may increase aggravated assaults. But studies I have conducted indicate that stricter regulations of gun sales, whether by retail dealers or by private sellers, are associated with fewer guns diverted to criminals. Moreover, national surveys show that a large majority of citizens favor these reforms to our gun laws, including most gun owners.
It is way past time for common-sense gun law reform in America. Many of the victims of mass shootings have been strangers -- sometimes children -- who were personally unknown to the shooters but were simply in “the wrong place at the wrong time,” even if the “wrong place” turned out to be going to class, attending a worship service on a Sunday morning, or going to the local movie theater on a summer evening. In other words, they could have been any one of us.
What will it take for us to do something about it?
Follow Marian Wright Edelman on Twitter: www.twitter.com/ChildDefender
Now this is one of the issues that I'm passionate about, and want to debate when I come on Huffington Post. I don't want to be sidetracked by gun banners and feel the need to defend a guaranteed right. I want to discuss issues that really matter. Like ending the drug war, safe access for medical marijuana patients, social equality for women and gays, ending voter suppression, keeping religion and corporate money out of politics, ending childhood poverty, universal healthcare, putting violent criminals in prison for much longer sentences, energy independence, pollution, global warming, the pile of garbage three times the size of Texas floating in the ocean, overfishing of the oceans, killing whales and dolphins and gorillas and all other endangered species, ending our oligarchy, our pathetic congress, racism, cutting back on the military, ending our war culture and empire, diabetes cancer aids etc, educational inequality, excessive tuition cost, homelessness, monopolies, gigantic banks and their fraud, government waste, nuclear warheads, ending the death penalty, ending for profit prisons, police brutality, and a few other things.
But gun ownership is a right guaranteed by the constitution and until it isn't, it really isn't up for debate. If you don't like it, change the constitution. If that works, I will get started on an amendment outlawing cars.
The scariest thing in that arcticle is that your the president of some childs defense thing.
Uh... I don't know Marian... but why not ask your buddies over there on the South side of Chicago?
If you tightened the gun law there is less guns to deal with. By doing so, you create a place where, unless you are a member of the military, police or security industry, if you have a gun you are a bad guy.
If someone is raping your daughter I would think that a machine gun would kill the assailant WITH your daughter.
A teacher in CA couldn't buy gun in time to kill people after going insane from the suicide of his son. He had to resolve to "just" set the school on fire and some buildings. Gun control worked, no one died even though he was determined to make the world pay for his loss, by killing others.
You think that a "good guy " with a gun could have shot the insane person wearing the full body armor in the darkness of a theater? WIth the gaz released, the panicked crowd running in all direction do you think that, death from friendly fire just like in NYC ( Professionals with training couldn't control ricochets hitting the bystanders) would have been a good idea?
And without the civilian population having the access to firearms Millions would have been killed annually. Also, why would Americans want to be like other western countries?
As for your " It's just too easy to kill with a gun and that's a fact!" your wrong. Guns are loud. There are much easier ways to kill people, just ask any Doctor, they've killed more people in error the guns ever have. Imagine what they could do on purpose! (food for thought)
Your forbidden fruit in the garden there isn't guns in grease, but rather ignorance and apathy.
Your premise here shows faulty reasoning and a willingness to express opinion as fact.
You seem to want to believe that these weapons jumped off the shelf and committed mayhem on their own. In fact, a human being had to plan choose and use these weapons. You of course will believe that if the weapons were not available, these tragedies would not happen. The facts disagree with you.
No firearms are needed for unbalanced individuals to commit mass murder. Any Human with a High School education has the knowledge needed to commit such atrocities, Without a firearm.
As for your statement that “Most” gun owners support the ridiculous level of gun control that you do is easily proven fallacious. If you would have done some homework you would have saved yourself the embarrasment of this article.
James
I've been a gun owner for years, and I find your platitudinous arguments as fully bogus as the arguments that crime will stop if we outlaw guns. It is obvious that guns are a huge problem in the USA.
We need a serious and thoughtful nationwide discussion, and your participation as a listener-only might be okay.
But he could be wrong. Let's compromise! As soon as we "win" the war on drugs, we can ban guns and start a new "war" on guns.
No? Soo, that makes you a would-be criminal then???
So let's forget about safety standards to beef-up car safety -- that won't do no good. And forget the war against drugs and make that the war against people.
People with cars kill people yes, lots more people than are killed with guns (excluding suicide, it's more than three times as many).
Beef up car safety absolutely. It won't save the people killed outside of the car, but yes, by all means let's make it better.
The war on drugs has to go. It is already a war on people, and civil rights, and liberty.