So Many Deaths; So Little Action

The numbers on gun deaths in the United States are appalling and should be the source of distress and alarm for everyone, and surely for every Christian who believes in the sanctity of God-created human life.   The mass shootings in an Aurora, Colorado, movie theater and now at the Wisconsin Sikh temple attract headlines and much hand-wringing.  And rightly so.  But the carnage continues day in and day out. According to the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control in the United Sates in 2009 there were11,493 homicides with a firearm and 18,735 suicides with a firearm.  This translated into an average of some 83 gun-related deaths every day!

These numbers are made more appalling by the fact that most other countries have much lower rates of gun-related deaths.  There is indeed something “special” about the United States.  For the most recent year I could find statistics, the United States had 14.4 gun-related homicides or suicides per 100,000 persons.  The comparable figure for Canada was 4.4 deaths, for Germany 1.4 deaths, for England and Wales .4 deaths, and for Japan .06 deaths. 

These are facts that cannot be denied and ought to horrify us all.  But by themselves they do not dictate—or even suggest—the public policy steps that should be taken.  They define the problem; they do not define the answer.

Banning the private ownership of all guns is one answer, but so would banning all nuclear weapons be an answer to the nuclear arms conundrum.  Banning all automobiles would be an answer to the 35 thousand automobile deaths each year.  You see my point?  Banning the private ownership of all firearms would be effective—but also impossible to achieve.  And it might not even be the wisest course even if achievable.

If this is the case, what answers should the mass shootings in Colorado and Wisconsin and the thousands of additional gun deaths each year lead the thoughtful Christian to support?  Let me suggest five modest, yet potentially helpful, steps that I believe our policy makers should take.  The first is to ban the sale of large magazines of ammunition, those of 50 or 100 rounds each.  There is no need for such large magazines for hunting, target shooting, or other legitimate uses of firearms.  A second step is to require that all guns be sold with a trigger lock that requires a key or combination to unlock.  If such devices were mandatory for every gun sold, some persons would still not make use of them, but many would.  For a time we required new cars to be equipped with seat belts even when there was no requirement that persons use them.  There being present in cars meant more persons did use them and no doubt saved thousands of lives.

A third reasonable step is to require background checks for every one purchasing a firearm, including those sold privately and at gun shows.  This step would help keep guns out of the hands of criminal elements and those who are mentally unstable.  A fourth step also deals with those purchasing firearms.  It is to require all gun purchasers to take a gun use and safety course and to present a certificate they had taken such a course from an approved source before being able to purchase a firearm.  

A final step is to require that all privately-owned firearms must be kept in some sort of a locked storage drawer or cabinet.  This would, of course, be hard to enforce, but it would serve as a statement of what society expects reasonable persons to do, and in cases of unlocked firearms being stolen or used in a suicide or in other inappropriate ways, the responsible person could be prosecuted.

However, more important—more needed—than any of these steps and others I could have mentioned, is a change in cultural values and beliefs.  Today, our society relates gun ownership and gun knowledgeableness with being manly, self-reliant, and even sexy.  An internet ad for a firearm describes it as “The rifle that brings out the West in you.”  That needs to change so that guns are seen as being dangerous and with the potential for antisocial uses.  In my life time other cultural changes have taken place.  Smoking has changed from being glamorous and sexy to being just plain stupid.  The ideal woman has morphed from being weak and dependent to being strong, accomplished, and self-reliant. 

A similar cultural change is needed in the case of guns.  One of the positive results of the sort of public policy steps I outline here would be to send signals that guns are not glamorous, but dangerous and carry with them social responsibilities.  The entertainment industry could help by portraying the harm to which guns can lead, and not as the quick solution to problems.  Our news casts and news commentators can add their voice.  Statistics on gun deaths and their causes should be the object of more scholarly studies, studies that the media then cover and highlight.  Doctors who work in trauma centers and daily observe the damage guns do need to find their voice.  Pastors need to speak out.  Right-to-life groups need to speak out against needless gun deaths as they do against deaths by abortion.  And all of us as citizens can join advocacy organizations urging action designed to curb gun violence.  And those who are gun owners can join the NRA (National Rifle Association) and urge more responsible, balanced position on its leadership.

Surely, we who are Christian citizens need to possess a genuine concern over the firearm suicides and homicides that plague our society at an intolerable level.  Possessing such a concern at a deeply-felt level is more important than any particular position we may take on public policies related to the private ownership of guns, since such a concern will defeat complacency and lead us to speak up and support steps to curb the current epidemic of gun-related deaths.  Any one committed to the sanctity of human life should do no less.