"But I wish I had had a gun that day" (Frei par. 12). This was a wish of a student who witnessed Virginia's bloodbath. At Virginia Tech a student, suffering from mental problems, killed 32 students before turning his gun on himself and committing suicide. This tragedy was not the first one America has witnessed. "America has witnessed at least 19 fatal school shootings in the last decade" (par. 1). But who should be held responsible? Some say immigration should be held responsible, but it is not a reasonable accusation since immigrants have played a significant role in developing sciences and founding companies. "America's high-tech industries are powered by foreign brains…Almost a third of Silicon Valley start-ups since 1995 were founded by Indians or Chinese"("American" par.3). Consequently, a reasonable blame should be on the gun control laws in United States. Some people argue that the United States should have gun control, but others are against it.
Some people in the U.S are calling for gun control. According to a student in Virginia tech, "You can't control guns with more guns for chrissake[sic]" (qtd in Frei par. 15). They complain about the gun control laws saying that it is easy in the U.S to bear arms. For instance, when a man wants to buy a gun, "He needs only two forms of ID" (Reich par. 1). This ease of buying guns increases the number of people who commit crimes. Therefore, the government should create a database for people who have mental problems or have entered psychiatric hospitals so that the firearms shops can use it to identify those people. Matt Frei, a reporter for BBC news states in his article, Washington diary: Virginia shootings, that if there had been a background check in Virginia, firearms shops would not have sold two guns to Cho Seung-Hui, who killed the 32 students at Virginia Tech:
If the state of Virginia had been obliged to conduct a thorough background check and seek references before granting Cho the right to bear arms, they might have discovered what his teacher Lucinda Roy knew from his writings: that he was a deeply disturbed individual who fantasised [sic] in his creative writing exercises about shooting people in the face - first one eye, then the other. (Frei par. 16)
On the other hand, there are people who do not want gun control. Some of them have been trained to hunt and use guns since childhood. Consequently, it is hard for them to stop practicing their favorite activity, especially, when it comes to states like Vermont where people do like hunting. According to Matt Frei, "His liberal home state of Vermont hates fast-food as much as it likes hunting" (Frei par. 20). Also these people want to bear arms for self-defense. For example, "If Professor Liviu Librescu, the 76-year-old Holocaust survivor who died wedging himself against the door to stop the gunman from killing his students, had had a weapon, perhaps he would he [sic] alive today" (par.14).
To sum up, the United States should have gun control. In many tragedies that the U.S has witnessed, the gun was an important element. In addition, if there were no guns for sale in market, people who have mental problems or criminals would not even think about killing people.
Works cited
"American Idiocracy." The Economist 24 March 2007: 40.
Frei, Matt "Washington diary: Virginia shootings." BBC News on the Web 18 April 2007. 23 Apr. 2007 <http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/Americas
/6566763.stm>.
Reich, Robert "U.S. needs a prescription for gun control." Market Place 18 Apr. 2007. . 23 Apr. 2007<http://marketplace.publicradio.org/shows/2007/04/18/PM200704184.html?refid
=0>.
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