By Lance Simmens
Being born and raised in Philadelphia and witnessing riots that affected our larger cities in the early 1960s, which subsequently led to a mass exodus — largely a white flight — to the surrounding suburbs, I was introduced at an early age to the dangers of racial strife and violence.
I remember asking my father at the tender age of 10 whether or not he owned a gun and whether or not he should. His response was immediately and definitively no and when I pursued the matter he simply answered that guns are dangerous because they kill people, often times accidentally. It took several years to absorb this wisdom but as I grew older I found his response laden with a deeper meaning than mere wisecracking dismissal.
As my attraction to political involvement began to shape my future and attenuate my liberal tendencies, I found that wise admonition about firearms to have a greater impact upon my senses. Yes, they do have the ability, intended or not, of killing people. During my years I have watched and grieved at the mounting casualties that continue to haunt our society in America via gun violence. As a general principle, I do not deprive others from their affection for guns, although hunting deer or any other game certainly does not necessitate or justify the need for mass killing semi-automatic weapons designed to kill and/or maim as many individuals as quickly as you can pull the trigger. There must be limits to courting such mass destruction.
The explosion of mass shootings that have made their way into our daily lives seems to be a most senseless expression of personal freedom, and certainly no concepts about weapons of mass destruction were present when the founding fathers proffered the Second Amendment.
Data gathered by The Violence Project, a nonprofit research group that uses a narrow definition of mass shootings adopted from the Congressional Research Service, report “the latest five-year period saw more attacks than any other comparable timespan dating back to 1966 — an average of about 6.6 mass shootings per year since 2018.” An analysis by The Marshall Project, a bipartisan organization dedicated to studying criminal justice reform “shows that in the past five years, assault-style weapons have been used in half of mass shootings. Prior to 2013, they were used in one-third or fewer of all mass shootings.”
We are fortunate to live in a state that leads the nation with the strongest gun safety laws, bolstered by Gov. Gavin Newsom recently signing numerous laws such as SB2, which strengthens the state’s public carry regulations. In a press release issued by the governor’s office it touts California’s actions as “saving lives … the Golden State is ranked #1 for gun safety and last year experienced a death rate 43% lower than the national average … since the early 1900s California has cut its gun death rate in half and if other states shared California’s gun death rate, an estimated 140,000 Americans would still be alive today.”
The unfortunate blocking of the new law by a federal judge as his apparent Christmas present to the National Rifle Association defies logic. U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney of the Central District of California argues that the law would “unconstitutionally reprise concealed carry permit holders of their constitutional right to carry a handgun in public for self defense.” The governor strongly rejects such nonsense and vows to “continue pushing more gun laws, and that the federal court’s decision green lights the proliferation of guns in our hospitals, libraries, and children’s playgrounds.” My father was right: Such logic allowing wholesale allowance to carry deadly weapons in public places only invites the ease to which those dedicated to causing death and danger foment the insidious nature of mass shootings that our nation is known for.
When I hear the absurd refrain “the only thing that stops a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun,” I am sickened by the rationale that protects those and in some way encourages those to abuse these deadly weapons. If a good guy is a bad shot, he can be as dangerous as a bad guy who is a good shot. Sensible gun control certainly does not need to rely upon freedom to slaughter in order to be effective. No one is coming for your guns unless there is a danger to the community. There has to be stricter limits on laws that allow the carnage wrought by these weapons of mass destruction to flourish in the bastion of freedom. We are failing our children by not protecting them. We must, at the very least, have a sensible forum of discussion that allows us to reinstate a ban on assault weapons. We should applaud efforts by our legislature and Governor’s Office to attempt to curb wanton violence by imposing sensible restrictions upon those who wish to exercise their rights to carry weapons and applaud efforts such as SB-2.