GlenJ
Member
For all you in the Tidewater and DC area especially read this and respond.
Since he throws in stats let's respond with pro-gun stats. His phone number and e-mail address is the bottom of the article.
Adding guns won’t make D.C. less violent
The Virginian-Pilot
© August 6, 2005
Robbery victims throw their hands in the air to show they’ve given up — and to tell the perps, “please don’t shoot.”
In my hometown of Washington, D.C., some residents are, figuratively, throwing up their hands. But this time they’re the ones who want to shoot.
They’re asking for an end to the city’s longtime restrictions on firearms, saying they haven’t done enough to eliminate crime in the nation’s capital.
I wish they wouldn’t surrender so easily, though I understand the frustration with crime. Meanwhile, many residents still believe the city’s gun laws, among the toughest in the nation, are better than the alternative. Given statistics that show crime is significantly down compared with past years, gun control advocates should keep firing ... the facts.
Washington’s gun regulations have been in the news lately because of attempts in Congress to overturn at least one of those provisions. Since 1976, it’s been illegal to possess handguns in the District. (The law “grandfathered” handguns that residents owned before that time.) Businesses and homes could keep shotguns or rifles, but the guns had to have trigger locks or be disassembled.
Of course, thugs don’t usually follow the rule book. The advent in the 1980s of crack cocaine, as well as other illegal drugs, exacted a bloody, mounting toll on my hometown.
However, gun control advocates contend, and I agree, that limits on guns reduce the chances of injury and death in arguments, domestic disputes, road rage and other incidents. Children are less likely to die accidentally from firearms when there aren’t as many around. Fewer guns mean fewer chances of innocent bystanders being shot. And a study released in July by the nonprofit Violence Policy Center notes that, from 2000 through 2002, no District child 16 or younger died by shooting himself in a suicide attempt. (Alaska, which had the highest rate among the states, had 14 such deaths during that span.)
While a reporter, I spent way too much time speaking to grief-stricken parents about their slain children. Some of the kids were violent; some were innocents cut down before they’d had a chance to live. I still find it difficult to believe that more guns would solve the madness.
More recently, the number of homicides, which District police say mostly involve gunshots, have decreased fairly steadily in the city. In 2000, there were 242 homicides; last year, there were 198. That suggests that the city’s firearms policy, though not perfect, is helping the community.
An editorial last month in The Washington Post put it simply: “Perhaps District residents support their gun safety laws because they now see crime in their city at a 20-year low.”
Those statistics mattered little to federal lawmakers. Pandering to the powerful National Rifle Association, unfortunately, carried more ammunition.
Congress, which often maintains a lord/vassal relationship toward city residents, has decided again to dictate to District leaders. The City Council can make its own laws, but residents still face a federal process that meddles in local affairs.
In late June, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an amendment attached to the District’s appropriations bill. The amendment would allow residents and businesses to keep shotguns and rifles loaded and assembled. Handguns bought before 1976 could be loaded and assembled, too.
At a gun control rally attended by more than 200 people last week, a vocal gun rights contingent placed organizers — including the police chief and mayor — in their sights. Several said they deserved the right to defend themselves when confronted by attackers. Some had been victims of crime.
But because it was a gun control forum, most of the participants, obviously, offered a different view. Some had lost relatives to gun violence. Others, fully cognizant of crime in the city, still backed the police and community efforts.
As a former college classmate who lives in D.C. told me this week, the proliferation of guns is the problem. “There are too many of them,” he says. The notion of fixing that problem by adding more firearms — even in the hands of law-abiding citizens — doesn’t make sense.
Roger Chesley is associate editor of The Pilot’s editorial page. Reach him at 757-446-2329 or [email protected]
Since he throws in stats let's respond with pro-gun stats. His phone number and e-mail address is the bottom of the article.
Adding guns won’t make D.C. less violent
The Virginian-Pilot
© August 6, 2005
Robbery victims throw their hands in the air to show they’ve given up — and to tell the perps, “please don’t shoot.”
In my hometown of Washington, D.C., some residents are, figuratively, throwing up their hands. But this time they’re the ones who want to shoot.
They’re asking for an end to the city’s longtime restrictions on firearms, saying they haven’t done enough to eliminate crime in the nation’s capital.
I wish they wouldn’t surrender so easily, though I understand the frustration with crime. Meanwhile, many residents still believe the city’s gun laws, among the toughest in the nation, are better than the alternative. Given statistics that show crime is significantly down compared with past years, gun control advocates should keep firing ... the facts.
Washington’s gun regulations have been in the news lately because of attempts in Congress to overturn at least one of those provisions. Since 1976, it’s been illegal to possess handguns in the District. (The law “grandfathered” handguns that residents owned before that time.) Businesses and homes could keep shotguns or rifles, but the guns had to have trigger locks or be disassembled.
Of course, thugs don’t usually follow the rule book. The advent in the 1980s of crack cocaine, as well as other illegal drugs, exacted a bloody, mounting toll on my hometown.
However, gun control advocates contend, and I agree, that limits on guns reduce the chances of injury and death in arguments, domestic disputes, road rage and other incidents. Children are less likely to die accidentally from firearms when there aren’t as many around. Fewer guns mean fewer chances of innocent bystanders being shot. And a study released in July by the nonprofit Violence Policy Center notes that, from 2000 through 2002, no District child 16 or younger died by shooting himself in a suicide attempt. (Alaska, which had the highest rate among the states, had 14 such deaths during that span.)
While a reporter, I spent way too much time speaking to grief-stricken parents about their slain children. Some of the kids were violent; some were innocents cut down before they’d had a chance to live. I still find it difficult to believe that more guns would solve the madness.
More recently, the number of homicides, which District police say mostly involve gunshots, have decreased fairly steadily in the city. In 2000, there were 242 homicides; last year, there were 198. That suggests that the city’s firearms policy, though not perfect, is helping the community.
An editorial last month in The Washington Post put it simply: “Perhaps District residents support their gun safety laws because they now see crime in their city at a 20-year low.”
Those statistics mattered little to federal lawmakers. Pandering to the powerful National Rifle Association, unfortunately, carried more ammunition.
Congress, which often maintains a lord/vassal relationship toward city residents, has decided again to dictate to District leaders. The City Council can make its own laws, but residents still face a federal process that meddles in local affairs.
In late June, the U.S. House of Representatives passed an amendment attached to the District’s appropriations bill. The amendment would allow residents and businesses to keep shotguns and rifles loaded and assembled. Handguns bought before 1976 could be loaded and assembled, too.
At a gun control rally attended by more than 200 people last week, a vocal gun rights contingent placed organizers — including the police chief and mayor — in their sights. Several said they deserved the right to defend themselves when confronted by attackers. Some had been victims of crime.
But because it was a gun control forum, most of the participants, obviously, offered a different view. Some had lost relatives to gun violence. Others, fully cognizant of crime in the city, still backed the police and community efforts.
As a former college classmate who lives in D.C. told me this week, the proliferation of guns is the problem. “There are too many of them,” he says. The notion of fixing that problem by adding more firearms — even in the hands of law-abiding citizens — doesn’t make sense.
Roger Chesley is associate editor of The Pilot’s editorial page. Reach him at 757-446-2329 or [email protected]
Fewer stupid, irresponsible, immature and socially-arrested people would have a much greater impact on the types of death and injury cited above than the availability of firearms. It's faulty logic. If they don't use guns, they'll use something else, you can';t change human nature - people prone to violenhce will use whatever's available. RE: children, if you don't 'kid-proof' your home, there's no shrtage of things that will hurt kids.
