As you may know, I’ve been thinking a lot about gun control over the past couple of years, and I just feel more and more frustrated and cornered.
They’re just not going anywhere.
There is no political will to do anything meaningful.
I’ve become more sympathetic to the rights argument. I disagree with the rulings, but the law of the land, as determined by Supreme Court rulings, is that everyone has a right to own a gun.
The only place that leaves us (unless you have a better idea) is a hope for safer guns. Non-lethal weapons (not tasers, which are considered too harmless and can get abused). But a gun that “stops” without killing.
Surely, this can exist. The once nearly mythological project called “Ginger” is now the fairly common segway.
In other aspects of society, we’re seeing moves away from violence. For example, many parents talk openly about not allowing their kids to play football for fear of concussions. The NFL itself has SLOWLY begun to acknowledge the problem. There is more emphasis on sports like soccer and lacrosse, which can get contentious but aren’t full contact.
I don’t know what a safer gun looks like, but I can imagine one, and I can also imagine social pressure to have them rather than lethal weapons.
We aren’t ignoring the gun problem. There are lots of citizen groups — but none to rival the NRA.
With the party out of power, we can’t expect bold steps on this (though I’d argue this is the very time to take them). So what do we do?
jconway says
I appreciate your candor Jim. People called me defeatist two years ago when I outlined a plan on how to reduce gun deaths without touching the third rail of gun rights/gun control.
It’s actually funding and implement violence prevention programs to reduce the carnage in our inner cities. Operation Ceasfire in Boston and Chicago, Operation Lipstick in Boston, and other restorative justice alternatives to mass incarceration and conflict resolution can really cut the gun deaths by a third. It already happened in cities where these programs have been implemented.
The second area is suicide prevention. The federal government spends a paltry $8 million on veterans suicide prevention and $0 on the general population. Really pushing hard to drop the number of suicides will dent the second third.
The third major area is domestic violence. Making it illegal for domestic violence abusers to have firearms, forcing them to go to counseling and upping the mental health funds to stop it, and being more vigilant about removing women and children from homes of abuses can tent the third third.
What about mass shootings you ask? They make up less than 1% of 1% of all gun related deaths in the US. We should treat this as a public health and public policy problem and focus on harm reduction rather than firearms reduction.
As for smart guns they were opposed by gun control advocates and supported by the NRA in the 90s and now they are anathema within the gun culture and only backed by gun control advocates. That’s how far to the right and co-opted by the gun industry the gun lobby itself has become.
That said I’d mandate that all federal, military and law enforcement personnel be required to use them. It would reduce unintentional shootings and incidents like the Navy Yard, Ft Hood, and Dallas police shootings. It would also severely decrease the price and make them cheaper than dumb guns which might be the only way to get gun owners to switch.
jconway says
And prosecute gun shop owners whose guns keep getting traced to crime and open as many civil suits against gun manufacturers as possible. Treat them like Big Tobacco and you’ll see the momentum shift against them as they past legal costs onto consumers and ask for a more taxes and regulated market to stay afloat. And elect leaders like Maura Healey who give a damn.