Glock Schlock

You might think the ease with which a 23 year old mentally ill student purchased a Glock handgun, which he then used to murder over 30 victims, would give critics of gun control some pause.  You would be wrong.  The gun nuts are unanimous — Virginia’s ridiculously lenient gun laws had nothing to do with Monday’s massacre.

Let’s run down their usual arguments, and why they’re wrong.

“Guns don’t kill people, people kill people.”  We’ve all heard this ad nauseam.  It’s not an argument, it’s a sound bite.  It’s used as a substitute for intelligent conversation.  The quick response is that people kill people with guns.  Make it more difficult for people to get their hands on the wrong kinds of guns, and make it more difficult for the wrong kind of people to get their hands on any guns, and they will kill fewer people with them.  That’s a no-brainer.

“Outlaw guns, and only outlaws will have guns.”  Another sound bite.  Gun control is not about outlawing guns, it’s about restricting the types of guns and regulating the process of gun ownership.

“Gun control won’t work, because criminals will always be able to get their hands on guns.”  Ok, well, since when do we pass laws based on whether we expect criminals to obey them?  By this logic we should not pass laws against murder, because people are going to kill anyway.  But gun control is not only about keeping guns out of the hands of criminals.  It’s also about preventing mentally ill college students from getting guns.  In any case, reducing the number of bad guns will certainly reduce the number of guns in the hands of criminals.  The vast majority of illegal handguns in New York are brought in from easy to obtain states such as Virginia, Florida and Georgia.  That’s where the criminals get them.  Even criminals need a source for their illegal guns.

And my favorite:  “We need more guns, not fewer guns.”  There are actually those who argue that if all the students at Virginia Tech were packing pistols Monday’s tragedy would not have happened.  Maybe that’s true, but who wants to live in a world where your children have to go to school armed?  More guns will simply equal more violence.  I would rather aim for a society in which nobody has a handgun, versus one in which everybody does.

Guns are made to kill.  If you have no business killing, you shouldn’t have a gun.  That’s how I see it.  I would allow guns for hunting and I think it’s reasonable to allow a person to keep a gun in his home.  We should regulate gun ownership like we do automobiles — they should be registered, and owners should be required to carry insurance for any harm caused by their guns.