Gun control – now!

A modern-day Slaughter of the Innocents in the run-up to Christmas in the USA surely cries out for a curbing of many Americans addiction to the gun. The events in Newtown, Connecticut are of a different order to the three mass shootings in as many months over the summer and 15 in total in 2012, but they were all avoidable tragedies, since in virtually all cases the guns were purchased legally.


No doubt the National Rifle Association will hold a swift rally in Newtown in defence of the pernicious Second Amendment – a change to the original constitution to counter the very real threat of British re-invasion and authorising only “well-regulated militias,” i.e. not the individual, to bear arms. There are plenty who see the ‘tyranny’ of King George III replicated in today’s US federal government – a charge as absurd then as it is now but the myth is powerful. There is a way around this and that would be restricting all legal arms to eighteenth-century flintlock pistols as envisaged by the Founding Fathers because that would be constitutional. Incidentally, the right to bear arms doesn’t distinguish which arms – theoretically that could include nuclear devices – why doesn’t the US government throw open the assets of Strategic Air Command to public auction? Surely the only way for ordinary Americans to protect their families and homes is with atom-splitting explosives and Mutually Assured Destruction though at the moment MAD is being played out already. The only shame is disaffected gun nuts never save their fury for NRA conventions, instead of shooting the largely defenceless but cowardice has a big streak in such people. Whither the NRA then?

There will be more who want to extend irresponsibility by arming all teachers but, aside from adult accidents (plus the biggest cause of fatality among American cops is from gunshot wounds inflicted by their own weapon when the suspect grabs it), there would be countless (and unreported due to the small number of killed) times when a teacher is absent-minded with their weapon and a child picks it up and plays with it. We are all fallible.

There was a mass stabbing at a Chinese children’s nursery this week, which is becoming a dangerous pattern in China, yet the carnage would have been even greater had a gun or guns been used. The refrain is ‘guns don’t kill people, people kill people’ yet far fewer die when guns are not used or is life so cheap to some Americans that a few more dead doesn’t really matter?

Barack Obama’s response to the deaths of 20 children and eight adults (one of whom being the gunman, a victim – we should not forget – of gun-mad social structures and serious mental issues) was exactly right, not making a political issue out of it – unlike Mitt Romney and the Benghazi attack – and showing even his No-Drama Obama image has ordinary emotions. His tears reminded me of Walter Cronkite – a tough man – weeping on reporting the assassination of JFK. The situation is so grave that it is entirely natural. Obama murmured during one of the presidential debates about introducing some form of gun control though that was as far as it went. Though there are staunch cherishers of guns from both sides of the political divide, right-wingers will oppose restrictions most, but even a Republican-dominated House of Representatives will find it hard to block a considered bill with such weight of moral authority behind it. There has to be a permanent ban on at least some weapons, unlike the intellectually redundant ten-year moratorium on assault rifles in 1994. Every victim of gun shooting is a victim of the obsolete Second Amendment, which itself needs to be amended. These children need not have died but let their death bring some good to discourse on gun ownership, that fewer tragedies like this in scope and number occur in the future.

Pray for the departed souls.