Why do so many Americans believe that to properly protect
ourselves today, we need guns?
Won't be me
Who spoils your fun,
Go ahead,
And tote that gun.
Who spoils your fun,
Go ahead,
And tote that gun.
Following that
dark opening-night screening of the latest Batman movie in
Aurora, Colorado, it's time to contemplate yet again why America's troubled
young men kill so many more people than their counterparts in the rest of the
world's more affluent nations.
Most wealthy
countries don't care much for handguns. They have better things to do. And in
Europe, fading tribal memories dating back to the lawless Middle Ages have, at
last, largely receded.
Americans are different.
Our most hazardous epoch is more recent. Popular Western movies and TV dramas
refresh robust memories of the great frontier. While that heritage is fading,
it still grips many of us.
After all, our
voluntary and involuntary immigrant ancestors were bold and strong. They
survived death-defying trans-oceanic trips, some of them as cargo.
Perhaps our
frontier complex can explain why so many Americans believe that to properly
protect ourselves today, we need guns.
I don't get it.
Reality has changed. If there's a Native-American menace today, it's casinos.
Duels are out. Slavery ended 150 years ago.
But guns have
sunk truly pernicious roots into our culture. In the first half of 2011,
nearly 700 Americans perished in murder-suicides. About 90
percent involved a firearm. Overall, we
bump ourselves off at the rate of 30,000 per year using
bullets.
A total of 110,000 of us are killed or wounded. Plenty of those wounded are in bad shape too, with
gunshot victims accounting for 15
percent of all spinal cord injuries.
The requirement
for a background check reflects the desire by most governments to tamp down
today's flood of guns and epidemic of shootings.
The National
Rifle Association (NRA), which is generously financed by the gun industry,
strenuously opposes this civilized public safety policy. That dark duo has many
supporters.
Take Alaska for
example. Sixty percent of Alaskan households own guns, and 20 out
of every 100,000 Alaskans die annually from
gunshots. In Hawaii, by contrast, only 10 percent of families own guns. And bullets kill just three out of every 100,000
Hawaiians each year.
Yet the dark duo
still argues that the solution to too many gun deaths is to make sure that even
more Americans obtain these deadly weapons. It has persuaded the U.S. House of
Representatives to force states with restrictive handgun laws to honor
concealed-weapons permits from Wild West states when their residents come to
visit. Sort of like drivers licenses.
One state that
won't care is Florida. In 2010, the Sunshine State prohibited local governments from imposing any of their own restrictions at all
on gun-toting, invalidating a host of existing municipal ordinances.
As usual, ironies
abound, especially since Tampa has banned water pistols from
the streets outside the upcoming Republican National Convention. Thus you will
be able to pack real heat out there, but not your super soaker.
Fortunately, the
Secret Service is in charge inside the venue. Especially after the Aurora
massacre, the GOP faithful will be lucky to get in armed with nail clippers.
They'll have to conduct their mayhem out front.
OtherWords columnist William A. Collins is a former state
representative and a former mayor of Norwalk, Connecticut. otherwords.org