What do you think about the fire-arm laws that we have in America? Do you believe that guns should be so easily bought by the general public? Do you think they should be a little more easy to come by? Or, perhaps, banned alltogether? Why?
I ask because, after the Virginia incident, I have been asked these same questions by at least ten different people, always starting with the question, "Have you heard about what happened in your country?"
In Spain, fire-arms are banned amonsgt the general public unless you pursue a special liscence, which is very hard to come by. Spaniards cannot understand why we would allow guns so freely in the States. In Spain, they never have this sort of traumatic shooting, and even their own terrorist group has killed no more than thirty people in one car-bombing or attack. For them, this is obvious proof that the availability of guns causes an increase in deaths. So why do we allow guns? (and this is not a rhetorical question, either.)
You should see all the blogs about this. With Virginia Tech many have discussed the right to bear arms (with various levels of name-calling and ugliness, I might add) - but mostly the discussions revolve around mental health issues - treatment etc.
ReplyDeleteThe right to bear arms - 2nd amendment - consistently interpretted legally as an individual's right to own guns - because we love our democracy, but we fear our government may centralize too much power, and we need to put that power literally in the palm of every citizen. Also, if we criminalize gun ownership, then only criminals will have guns. You get the idea.
I think that if people want to own guns, they should have to take tests and trainings, with exceptions for special circumstances.
Mom
If you say to a Spaniard, "I can own a gun because it says so in the constitution," they will not be impressed. If you explain that it is to protect us from our own government, they will look at you blankly. They feel safe beneath their government without the protection of arms (even though they know their government is corrut). But then, their government and constitution aren´t as valued by them as ours are by us. After all, theirs has only existed some 30 odd years, and not particularly well in the opinion of many. But amost anthing is better than Franco.
ReplyDeleteI have been pondering this for a few days . . . You have given me food for thought. I have not yet come to a conclusion, so I will have to get back to you on this one . . .
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