Gun control is a widely debated issue and there is a large amount of people fighting both for control and against it. This makes it very difficult to decide which side has a better argument, is more convincing, and makes a clearer point, allowing more decisive action to be taken. Basically, lawmakers are trying to decide which side is right and which one is wrong. It is difficult trying to decide which one is right and which one is not by just looking at the facts, but when it comes to a more convincing argument, pro-gun control is the right side to choose. Guns should be kept out of the wrong hands. Pro-gun control seems to be the more agreeable argument because of this. People who deserve guns should be able to own them, while the ones who do not should not.

A gun in the wrong hands could cause more more damage than if it was in the right ones. Guns can be used for protection or harm, whichever the person holding it decides. Law-abiding citizens, who protect themselves and others with guns, have every right to own and carry one with them when they go somewhere they feel they will need it. Of course, they cannot bring them everywhere, but as law-abiding citizens, they would not want to. However, guns in the wrong hands can cause horrible tragedies and shootings to occur and no one can do anything about it until it is too late. There were “1,128 deaths caused by guns being used by citizens in 2013 in Philadelphia” (PPD), as reported by the Philadelphia Police Department after conducting a study on the topic. “78 of these deaths were children”(PPD), which shows that criminals and guns are a problem. If we take the guns from the criminals, the death rate from shooting will decrease by a large amount.

Children and teens often have easy access to guns when they should not..  They should not be allowed to, especially because they are not even old enough to vote. This means their parents are not responsible enough to own a gun, and the parents need to be help responsible for their child’s actions.. People need to be more responsible when handling guns. They are not toys, they are instruments for either protection or harm, and should be treated as seriously as handling blood infected with a deadly disease. Most of the children and teens do not own guns because they would not know where to get them, have enough money to buy them, or not even know why or when they would need a gun. Children and teens get their guns from their parents, or older relatives in general.This leaves parents either locking up their guns or leaving them lying around. Either way it’s dangerous, because either your child will be able to get your gun or when you need to protect yourself, you cannot get your gun. This means that guns should be given to those who would be most efficient with owning and using a gun, which would not be a family with three small children. Background checks of someone and where and who they live with would be a good place to start control. Controlling guns in families with children and teens would significantly lower accidents and murders by children and teens with guns. Children would have less access to guns, which would lower shooting mortality rates. Lower death rates mean fewer tragedies, and that is a more positive result than having more people killed with guns.

Guns are also being found where they’re not meant to be: in the hands of criminals. The National Gun Victims Action Council (NGVAG) reports that “Of 300,000 guns owned, 12,274 firearms were reported ‘missing,’ and only about 3,000 gun dealers were studied”(NGVAG). The criminals who use guns for harm and malicious purposes are able to get these guns too easily, and there are very little precautions to take the guns out of their hands. The NGVAG also reports that “Only 1.2% of gun dealers are crooked, but 60% of illegal guns come from them”(NGVAG). THis is because they are selling them “under the table,” and gun dealers just report these guns as missing while still pocketing the profit.

Fareed Zakaria, a pro-gun control advocate, addresses the idea that “Anyone should be allowed to own and use guns, it’s written in the Constitution. The opposite is actually true, since guns have been regulated since around 1820 in various states but these regulations started fading during the 1970’s”(Zakaria). People who are against gun control will argue that taking away guns is against the United States Constitution, when guns have actually been controlled in different states for the past 150 years. So if guns have been controlled for this long, why are people starting to complain now? They argue that it’s against our human rights for the government to control guns. Why is this? It’s actually pretty simple. Crime is becoming a big deal and people want something done about it. Media blows up issues that normally wouldn’t be too important otherwise, and it is clouding judgement on control. Back when gun control laws were written in the 1700’s with the Constitution, they had neither automatic guns or handguns, and they didn’t have radio or television. Now we do, and news channels and websites highlight shootings as if they were the most important subject in the world. It’s making people think that way too. They believe that if more people had guns, the crimes would have been stopped. Most crimes are not mass shootings like the media has led us to believe. This means that guns out of the hands of criminals might not stop mass shootings, but it’ll cut down on crime overall and less lives would be lost.

Anti-gun control advocates will say that crime is going up because our citizens do not have any guns to protect themselves with, because of gun control being too strict and letting criminals get guns anyway. This is not true either.  Crime rates are actually much lower now than they were 20 years ago. David K. Sutton, a journalist on the news website leftcall.com, said that “crime rates are down to a rate not seen in 50 years” (Sutton). He also states that “Murder rates are down from 24,000 to 14,000 when comparing 1990 to 2010” (Sutton). Crime is not actually going up, media is just giving more attention to crime now than it ever has before. If you turn on your TV and switch to the local news channel, chances are you will not be seeing the weather or traffic, you will be seeing headlines blazed with the words “shootings” or “dead.” Media is stirring up trouble by spreading news of gun deaths, and its one of the main causes of clouded judgement.

Controlling guns will better our society and it’s people, and keep those people safe from most harm from firearms. Criminals will still find a way around it however, so guns are definitely needed to protect other citizens. Guns should be given to those who treat them as a tool for protection and not as a toy of destruction. People who live by the laws and are mentally stable are the people who should be owning guns, not a mentally unstable criminal who will only use it for evil purposes. The main problem behind most gun murders is not the gun, but the person behind it. We should be more careful with who has a gun, but they should definitely be carried by those who are responsible enough.

Works Cited:

"Program of the 2013 Convention." PMLA 127.5, PROGRAM (2012): 1073-272. Phillypolice.com. Philadelphia Police Department, 2012. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.
Zakaria, Fareed. "The Case for Gun Control." Time. Time Inc., 20 Aug. 2012. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.
Sutton, David K. "U.S. Crime Rates 1960-2010: The Facts Might Surprise You." THE LEFT CALL. N.p., 23 Feb. 2012. Web. 24 Oct. 2014.
"Fact Sheet: Illegal Gun Trafficking Arms Criminals & Youth." Gun Victims Action Council RSS. National Gun Victims Action Council, 2013. Web. 23 Oct. 2014.