Gun Violence Prevention

Preventing Gun Violence: What causes Gun Violence?

Gun violence is a problem that is being dealt with throughout many places, and my group is researching how to prevent gun violence since it is a problem that many locations are facing and it is becoming a nation-wide epidemic. Gun violence is most common in places with easy access to guns and we need to learn how to put a stop to gun violence. To limit gun violence we need to ask, what causes gun violence? Learning what causes it will help find how to prevent the beginning of the next shooting. Gun violence is very common, and this is because there are many problems being caused by the people who get their hands on the weapon. Some problems would be considered easy gun access, vendors selling guns to mentally unstable people, an unbelievably violent culture, and economic problems that will later cause people to think that gun violence might be a good solution.

Gun violence is clearly not possible without the gun, which is the weapon in use. You need to actually have access to a gun which are undeniably easy to achieve due to the fact they are easily attainable. If we were to limit the access to guns, then gun violence would surely decrease. According to the book, “Reducing Gun Violence in America” by Daniel W. Webster and Jon. S. Vernick, it is stated that, “Fifteen states extend firearms sales regulations to sales by private, and unlicensed sellers” (Webster and Vernick 111). This not only proves that it is easy to get a gun, but since it is only fifteen states, there is also a variety in gun laws within the United States ranging from state to state. This is also confirmed within the book when they mention “states vary greatly in the nature of their gun sale laws.” (Webster and Vernick 111). The variety of gun laws throughout the U.S. makes it easy for someone to get their hands on a gun because some places are less strict with their laws. This is the beginning of the problem because if it wasn’t so easy to obtain the weapon, there would not be as much violence as there is now.

Easily obtainable guns is especially bad when there are vendors selling to people who are mentally unstable. Even though people who are mentally ill or mentally unstable are usually harmless to others, there is a small percentage of mentally unstable people who are willing to do violent things if they have a severe illness. They are not the root cause of gun violence but they do make up a small percentage of gun violence that can be easily preventable if they had just went through mental health checks before buying a gun. To prevent these kinds of attacks it has been suggested for locals to take non-violent action to help stop these things from happening. This is shown when Jon Vernick and Ted Alcom mentioned, “they need to petition a court and temporarily remove firearms from an individual who presents a danger to himself or to others during times of crisis, regardless of whether that person has been diagnosed with a mental illness” (Vernick, Background Checks for All Gun Buyers and Gun Violence Restraining Orders: State Efforts to Keep Guns from High-risk Persons). Getting a mental check-up before getting a gun should be a very important part of the process to prevent the possible harm to oneself or to others.

The gun owners being affected by the culture they live in is a large part of it as well. Many students deal with “a culture of honor to be significantly associated with two indices of school violence: the percentage of high school students who reported having brought a weapon to school during the past month, and the prevalence of actual school shootings over a 20-year period.” (Florida). This shows people in the U.S. grow up with violence put up in their mind. This helps explain why violence is so common. It is common because it impacts places like public schools and is drilled into a young student’s brain. They learn that violence is okay because of a social acceptance of the idea of protecting your honor. People don’t want to be seen as less than another person so they will fight for dominance in any way needed. It is even stated in “The Christian Century”, that “popular culture breeds violence” (Stopping Gun Violence). Which is another example of how toxic society can affect someone, especially if it later causes violence to be common.

Another reason gun violence is so common is because of the economy. The economy is what affects our daily lives and can help us for better or worse. It has a large effect on people , therefore it will have a large effect on gun violence. This is later confirmed in the magazine, “Analysis: The Geography of Gun Violence” where it states, “On the economic front, gun violence was higher in states with lower average incomes. Similarly, gun violence was less likely in states with more college graduates and stronger knowledge-based economies. Gun violence was also higher in states that tend to vote Republican.” (Florida). This is proof that money also has a large part in this. Money controls most things in society such as status, for example. Most places with plenty of money are more likely to be nicer than places where the poor live because they can afford better living conditions which might bother people because they believe they will not be able to afford things the rich can. This is important because this will get many people riled up due to feeling as if it is unfair and unjust, out of jealousy. These feelings will build up and become anger, which will then be the cause of a new shooting. It is another problem we are facing today, and to solve that problem we help build a better economy.

In conclusion, gun violence is a epidemic than can be stopped if you were to stop the root cause of why people would want to use the violence in the first place.Things we need to fix to prevent future gun violence is easy gun access since we need to make it more strict, vendors selling guns to mentally unstable people to prevent them harming themselves and others. We also need to stop the violent culture we have to stop letting the youth believe violence is acceptable and we need to fix the economic problems so people don’t have urges to attack places out of spite. Doing this is not only stopping the root causes of gun violence, it will lower gun violence dramatically because it will be much more difficult for people to gain access to the weapon, therefore gun violence is preventable.

Works Cited

1. Dolbee, Kimberly. 'What Is the Primary Cause of Gun Violence in America?' Guns & Ammo, vol. 55, no. 4, Apr. 2011, p. 12. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A251379936/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=aba3716b. Accessed 30 Jan. 2019.
2. Florida, Richard. 'Analysis: The Geography of Gun Violence.' National journal.com, 20 July 2012. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A297051667/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=05133d10. Accessed 1 Feb. 2019.
3. Isenstein, Libby. 'The States with the Most Gun Laws See the Fewest Gun-Related Deaths.' National Journal.com, 28 Aug. 2015. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A426946356/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=5120095b. Accessed 1 Feb. 2019.
4. Judy, Karen. 'Preventing Gun Violence: We Must Act.' Clinical Psychiatry News, vol. 35, no. 7, July 2007, p. 9. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A167255927/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=d6b7635e. Accessed 7 Feb. 2019.
5. Pollack, Harold. 'What We Can Do about Gun Violence.' The American Prospect, vol. 27, no. 1, Winter 2016, p. 104. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A447176636/GPS?u=texshare_tgps&sid=GPS&xid=e5bd8ac5. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.
6. Sanders, Katie. ''AMERICANS ARE 20 TIMES as LIKELY to DIE from GUN VIOLENCE as CITIZENS of OTHER CIVILIZED COUNTRIES,' SAYS AUTHOR LISA BLOOM.' Tampa Bay Times (St. Petersburg, FL), 17 Jan. 2014. Opposing Viewpoints in Context, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A356027545/GPS?u=texshare_tgps&sid=GPS&xid=b6096b01. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.
7. 'Stopping Gun Violence.' The Christian Century, vol. 130, no. 1, 9 Jan. 2013, p. 7. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A317202174/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=9ae2263a. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.
8. Vernick, Jon S., et al. 'Background Checks for All Gun Buyers and Gun Violence Restraining Orders: State Efforts to Keep Guns from High-risk Persons.' Journal of Law, Medicine & Ethics, vol. 45, no. 1, Spring 2017, p. S98+. General OneFile, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A494499150/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=33ee4414. Accessed 6 Feb. 2019.
9. Wapner, Jessica. 'How Gun Violence Literally Infects Communities; A new study provides the first evidence that gun violence spreads exactly like a blood-borne pathogen.' Newsweek, 17 Nov. 2017. Gale Virtual Reference Library, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A480566352/GPS?u=lausdnet&sid=GPS&xid=e76b1f63. Accessed 23 Jan. 2019.
10. Webster, Daniel W., and Jon S. Vernick, editors. Reducing Gun Violence in America.

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