Posted on 04/01/2006 9:38:14 AM PST by kiriath_jearim
The growing acceptance of guns Handguns become popular among young people
By From the Editor frankbucholtz
Guns, Guns, Guns is the name of a song by The Guess Who from the early 1970s. Unfortunately, its title seems eerily prophetic.
Our sister paper, The Leader in Surrey and North Delta, is running a series about the widespread availability and use of guns. It’s a surprising and shocking picture. Guns are easily available to young people and those involved in crime. Most come from the U.S., smuggled into Canada in trade for drugs. They are used, more and more often, in crimes — particularly gang murders.
Langley is not immune from this. While the murder rate here continues to be quite low, thankfully, more people have ready access to illegal handguns. Back in 2004, the auto theft task force released a chilling video of a meth addict who had stolen a bait car, and was driving crazily while waving a handgun.
The drive he made was from Aldergrove to Langley. In the video, he actually attempted to shoot at police, but fortunately for all concerned, the gun did not fire.
The gun problem here pales in comparison to that in the U.S. The murder of six people in Seattle last Saturday was committed by a man who used a pistol grip shotgun and a pistol. He walked into a home where he had been a guest at a party, armed with 300 rounds of ammunition. It is amazing that only seven died (he also killed himself).
This man was arrested in Montana five years earlier, on a charge of defacing a statue in the town of Whitefish with gunfire. His guns were taken away from him. However, the charges were plea-bargained down to a misdemeanour, and amazingly, he got his guns back.
These were the same guns he used in Saturday’s murders. I do not believe in our ridiculous gun registry, which has cost a fortune and does nothing to stem the flow of illegal weapons across the border. However, I do believe that the Canadian attitude to guns is a healthier one than that held by many Americans.
Guns are tools — dangerous tools that should only be used by people who are thoroughly familiar with them. Those who wish to own guns should be able to show that they are not unbalanced, and do not have criminal records. That’s what the old Firearms Acquisition Certificates did — and that system worked very well. Handgun ownership is fine. However, handguns must be registered, as they have been since the 1930s, and they must be kept in theft-proof places. They should only be used for sport shooting, or by people licenced to carry them such as police and armoured car guards.
Unfortunately, the laws we do have in place do nothing to stop young people from getting illegal handguns. Because they are a status symbol as much as anything else, they continue to be widely available.
Perhaps one solution is for parents to be well aware of what their teens are doing, where their money is coming from and who they are hanging around with.
It appears that many teens get guns because their friends have them. This is unacceptable.
Illegal guns in Canada, in the hands of people who should never have access to firearms, have taken many lives. Whether or not these people who die are involved in criminal activity is beside the point. They are someone’s loved ones — and no one deserves to die this way.
As a society, we must be vigilant about the spreading use of illegal weapons, and do our part to stop this from becoming more widespread.
It is clear that there are two causes for this increase in crime:
1. The crimialization of drugs.
2. Anti-firearm laws.
The first creates a crime out of personal self destruction. Antidrug laws have probably lead to the increase in drug potency. Crime increased to support drug addictions. The second disarms the victims of drug induced crime.
Just hunker in the bunker until the truly entitled to govern Lieberals emerge with enough scare tactics to get 'em voted back out!!!
>>Guns are tools — dangerous tools that should only be used by people who are thoroughly familiar with them.<<
I found one sentence I can agree with.
Thanks
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