Gun laws America’s worst nightmare
Re 50 die in worst mass shooting in U.S. history, June 13 The shooting deaths in Orlando should come as no surprise to a country that has experienced the number of mass shootings and gun deaths as has the United States. Criminological research shows that there is a direct link between the wide-scale availability of firearms and the numbers of suicides, murders and accidents with guns in the U.S. The easy access to guns now presents another more serious problem and that is that citizens who become radicalized can easily obtain as many guns as they want.
Consider the state of Florida, where there is no gun registry, where you can carry concealed handguns, where there are no laws governing assault weapons, where there are no magazine capacity restrictions, where you don’t have to reveal to anyone or anybody including law enforcement about the possession of a firearm, where no background checks are done and where no licences are required for gun owners.
The United States is facing its biggest threat from within its own borders by making it easy for anyone to obtain and own as many guns as they can afford. The U.S. has in effect created the ideal situation for terrorists to carry out mass shootings like the one in Orlando.
What is frighteningly ironic is that this rigid adherence to a constitutional right to bear arms that was passed by the U.S. Congress hundreds of years ago is, in the 21st century, a terrorist’s dream and the worst possible nightmare for the American public. Darryl T. Davies, criminology instructor, department of sociology, Carleton University In a world where the language of “us” and “them” prevails; where capital can be so readily withdrawn from communities, leaving devastation in its wake; where the 1 per cent can show such brutal disregard for the enormous social responsibility of privilege; where the rhetoric of politics is so vile and vitriolic and destructive; where so-called “social” media provides both platform and cover for the most devastating ignorance imaginable; where “Black Lives Matter” actually has to be stated explicitly; where human trafficking and child pornography have a thriving market; where a person can walk casually into a shop and purchase an assault rifle — it seems almost ludicrous that in the aftermath of the mass killings in Orlando we actually ask the question, “Why?” James McKnight, St. Catharines, Ont.
Another mass murder in the United States and more clichés from the gun lobby that people, not guns, kill. Sadly the Second Amendment, adopted in 1791, needs to be amended. Max Desouza, Toronto