30,364 vs. 210. Obviously, 30,364 is a much greater number than 210. Sadly, the former amount represents the number of gun-related deaths, including homicides, suicides and accidental deaths, in the United States in 2005. According to a blog post from the New England Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence, 210 is an extrapolated figure that represents the number of gun-related deaths in the United Kingdom if its population was equal to the United States. In reality, there are only 42 gun-related deaths per year in the U.K., according to the blog.
Without the violence from guns, the U.K. deals with increased violence from knives. Many conservatives have voiced concerns about the “Liberal agenda” to get rid of guns, even ridiculing it, because it would only cause knife violence to increase. As renowned as Britain’s knife violence is, it is still much less than the knife violence in our own country.
The FBI’s data from 2004 shows that 1,866 people were killed from knife attacks in the United States during that year. Comparatively, knife violence in Britain at its highest rate has resulted in 322 fatal stabbings, according to an article on the Daily Mail Web site. Extrapolating the data shows if Britain had the same population as the U.S, 1,610 people would be killed because of knife violence. Even without the use of guns, Britain still manages to have less knife-related deaths per year than the U.S. Some may say this points to America’s culture being more violent than Britain’s, and eliminating guns would only cause homicides to be committed through other means. But mass killings would at least be mitigated.
It seems like we have mass killing sprees at least once per week. And in fact, one occurred this past week. Christopher Speight shot and killed eight people in Appomattox, Va. People close to him said he was an experienced gun enthusiast. He had apparently been practicing daily in his backyard over the past few months.We’ve become a nation obsessed with guns. The Second Amendment is extremely vague and was written in the wake of the Revolutionary War when colonists had to take up their own arms to fight against a tyrannical government. The Founding Fathers wanted to set up their government in the wake of the struggle against Great Britain so the people could form their own militia.
While we have the right to form our own militia under the Second Amendment, in this day and age such a militia poses no threat against our government. A few handguns, rifles and automatic weapons are nothing compared to the might of the armed forces with their nuclear and biological weapons. Therefore, there is no need for us to have guns under the reasons given by the Founding Fathers.
Those who advocate treating the U.S. Constitution as a document that should be taken literally commit the same error as those who believe the same thing about the Bible. Both the Constitution and the Bible were written by men and are, therefore, flawed. It’s important to remember the context of everything that is in them. That is why we have added and subtracted from the Constitution over the years. The Founding Fathers weren’t right on every account. I wonder if people would demand we go back to the original wording of Article 1, Section 2, Paragraph 3, of the original Constitution: the Three-Fifths Compromise, under which all African-Americans were deemed only to be 60 percent human.
If we were to eliminate guns from the equation, we could potentially cut the number of deaths in the U.S. by thousands. If we emulated the British system with regard to weapon use, we would be much better off and much safer. In order to implement such a change, we would have to confiscate all registered guns and find ways to regulate illegal ones. We would have to thoroughly search everything coming in and out of the country. It would be difficult, but it would be worth it for the future safety of our country.
Paul Murty is an English sophomore. His columns appear on Fridays.
