BACKBENCHER
Rod P. Kapunan
12/22/2012
On December 14, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut, Adam Lanza started indiscriminately shooting 28 people, including his own mother. This is the latest massacre that took place in the US. Twenty of those killed were below 11 years old. The incident serves to highlight anew the danger posed by unrestrained freedom, in this particular instance amplified by the usual invocation by the Americans of the Second Amendment of the Constitution giving them the "right to bear arms."
Despite the numerous incidence of senseless killings carried out by psychotic individuals, Americans, to this day, continue to debate on whether or not to strictly limit gun control.
The Gun Control Act of 1968 has done little to restrict the sale of guns. On the contrary, it loosened the sale and acquisition of automatic firearms or assault rifles. This, despite the fact that the US now ranks as among the highest in the incidence of senseless killings, claiming 11 out of the 20 worst mass shootings over the last half century, according to Newsweek. The debate is not on how many more lives would be snuffed out by bullets fired by roaming homicidal maniacs, but on their fear that restricting them would violate their Constitutional right. Some even interpret that as an infringement of their right to property.
As posted by Think Progress Justice, a US-based nongovernmental organization which has for its advocacy gun control, it states, that people killed in the US by the use of guns is 19.5 times higher than similar high-income countries in the world. In the last 30 years since 1982, America has mourned at least 61 mass murders.
Citing a few:
1. September 27, 2012, Andrew Engeldinger shot to death 5 at Accent Signage Systems in Minneapolis. Engeldinger ultimately killed himself;
2. August 5, 2012 US Army veteran Wade Michaela Page killed 6 Sikh temple members at gurdwara in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. Page killed himself later;
3. July 20, 2012, during the midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, James Holmes killed 12 wounded 58;
4. April 2, 2012, One L. Goh killed 7 at Oikos University, a Korean Christian college in Oakland, CA.;
5. October 14, 2011, Scott Evans Dekraai killed eight in Seal Beach, CA.; 10) September 6, 2011, Eduardo Sencion shot 12 people in a restaurant in Carson City. 5 died, including 3 National Guard members;
6. August 3, 2010, Omar S. Thornton gunned down Hartford Beer Distributor in Manchester, CT. 9 were killed, including Thornton;
7. November 5, 2009, Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan at the Fort Hood army base in Texas killed 13;
8. April 3, 2009. Jiverly Wong opened fire at an immigration center in Binghamton, New York before committing suicide. He killed 13;
9. March 29, 2009, eight died in a shooting at the Pinelake Health and Rehab nursing home in Carthage, NC.;
10. February 14, 2008. Steven Kazmierczak opened fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University, killing 6 including himself;
11. December 5, 2007, Robert Hawkins, shot up a department store in the Westroads Mall in Omaha, NE. Hawkins killed 9 before killing himself;
12. April 16, 2007. Virginia Tech became the deadliest school shooting in US history when Seung-Hui Choi, gunned down 32;
13. October 2, 2006, an Amish schoolhouse in Lancaster, PA was gunned down by Charles Carl Roberts. 5 young girls died, while Roberts committed suicide afterward;
14. March 21, 2005 Jeffrey Weise killed his grandfather and his grandfather's girlfriend before opening fire on Red Lake Senior High School, killing 9 on campus. Weise killed himself;
15. March 12, 2005 church member Terry Michael Ratzmann killed himself after executing the pastor, the pastor's 16-year-old son, and 7 others;
16. July 29, 1999, Mark Orrin Barton murdered his wife and 2 children with a hammer before shooting up 2 Atlanta Day Trading firms. He killed 12 including his family before killing himself;
17. April 20, 1999, teenagers Eric Harris and Dylan Kiebold shot up Columbine High School in Littleton, Co. They killed 13 and later killed themselves.
Despite such horrors, the National Rifle Association of the US that was headed for a long time by famous American actor Charlton Heston has been consistent in opposing gun control laws. They have succeeded in placing at a higher pedestal the right to bear arms than the value of life itself. Maybe it was on this assumption why the US Supreme Court has consistently upheld their stand.
Many Americans would seldom give it a second thought that their appreciation of freedom is only as good as when they continue to live, nor would care to think that freedom is worthless when those who are supposed to enjoy it are no longer around. Such is the belief that now prevails because anti-gun controls lobbyists have instilled the idea that disarming the citizens is tantamount to depriving them of their defense and protection without them ever thinking that behind that right is the billions of dollars raked in by gun manufacturers.
They have even forgotten that what their founding fathers had in mind was the right of the citizens to defend themselves against their colonial oppressors, the British redcoats. The right to bear arms was for the purpose of safeguarding their individual liberty and the independence of the breakaway colonies. Certainly, they would not have conceded to the idea of using guns that would result in the senseless bloodletting of their own people. More so today that the US has become so powerful. It is no longer a case where they would fear losing their independence, but the hubris of wanting to impose their will on other states by the naked use of arms and violence.
(rpkapunan@gmail.com)
Despite the numerous incidence of senseless killings carried out by psychotic individuals, Americans, to this day, continue to debate on whether or not to strictly limit gun control.
The Gun Control Act of 1968 has done little to restrict the sale of guns. On the contrary, it loosened the sale and acquisition of automatic firearms or assault rifles. This, despite the fact that the US now ranks as among the highest in the incidence of senseless killings, claiming 11 out of the 20 worst mass shootings over the last half century, according to Newsweek. The debate is not on how many more lives would be snuffed out by bullets fired by roaming homicidal maniacs, but on their fear that restricting them would violate their Constitutional right. Some even interpret that as an infringement of their right to property.
As posted by Think Progress Justice, a US-based nongovernmental organization which has for its advocacy gun control, it states, that people killed in the US by the use of guns is 19.5 times higher than similar high-income countries in the world. In the last 30 years since 1982, America has mourned at least 61 mass murders.
Citing a few:
1. September 27, 2012, Andrew Engeldinger shot to death 5 at Accent Signage Systems in Minneapolis. Engeldinger ultimately killed himself;
2. August 5, 2012 US Army veteran Wade Michaela Page killed 6 Sikh temple members at gurdwara in Oak Creek, Wisconsin. Page killed himself later;
3. July 20, 2012, during the midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, James Holmes killed 12 wounded 58;
4. April 2, 2012, One L. Goh killed 7 at Oikos University, a Korean Christian college in Oakland, CA.;
5. October 14, 2011, Scott Evans Dekraai killed eight in Seal Beach, CA.; 10) September 6, 2011, Eduardo Sencion shot 12 people in a restaurant in Carson City. 5 died, including 3 National Guard members;
6. August 3, 2010, Omar S. Thornton gunned down Hartford Beer Distributor in Manchester, CT. 9 were killed, including Thornton;
7. November 5, 2009, Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan at the Fort Hood army base in Texas killed 13;
8. April 3, 2009. Jiverly Wong opened fire at an immigration center in Binghamton, New York before committing suicide. He killed 13;
9. March 29, 2009, eight died in a shooting at the Pinelake Health and Rehab nursing home in Carthage, NC.;
10. February 14, 2008. Steven Kazmierczak opened fire in a lecture hall at Northern Illinois University, killing 6 including himself;
11. December 5, 2007, Robert Hawkins, shot up a department store in the Westroads Mall in Omaha, NE. Hawkins killed 9 before killing himself;
12. April 16, 2007. Virginia Tech became the deadliest school shooting in US history when Seung-Hui Choi, gunned down 32;
13. October 2, 2006, an Amish schoolhouse in Lancaster, PA was gunned down by Charles Carl Roberts. 5 young girls died, while Roberts committed suicide afterward;
14. March 21, 2005 Jeffrey Weise killed his grandfather and his grandfather's girlfriend before opening fire on Red Lake Senior High School, killing 9 on campus. Weise killed himself;
15. March 12, 2005 church member Terry Michael Ratzmann killed himself after executing the pastor, the pastor's 16-year-old son, and 7 others;
16. July 29, 1999, Mark Orrin Barton murdered his wife and 2 children with a hammer before shooting up 2 Atlanta Day Trading firms. He killed 12 including his family before killing himself;
17. April 20, 1999, teenagers Eric Harris and Dylan Kiebold shot up Columbine High School in Littleton, Co. They killed 13 and later killed themselves.
Despite such horrors, the National Rifle Association of the US that was headed for a long time by famous American actor Charlton Heston has been consistent in opposing gun control laws. They have succeeded in placing at a higher pedestal the right to bear arms than the value of life itself. Maybe it was on this assumption why the US Supreme Court has consistently upheld their stand.
Many Americans would seldom give it a second thought that their appreciation of freedom is only as good as when they continue to live, nor would care to think that freedom is worthless when those who are supposed to enjoy it are no longer around. Such is the belief that now prevails because anti-gun controls lobbyists have instilled the idea that disarming the citizens is tantamount to depriving them of their defense and protection without them ever thinking that behind that right is the billions of dollars raked in by gun manufacturers.
They have even forgotten that what their founding fathers had in mind was the right of the citizens to defend themselves against their colonial oppressors, the British redcoats. The right to bear arms was for the purpose of safeguarding their individual liberty and the independence of the breakaway colonies. Certainly, they would not have conceded to the idea of using guns that would result in the senseless bloodletting of their own people. More so today that the US has become so powerful. It is no longer a case where they would fear losing their independence, but the hubris of wanting to impose their will on other states by the naked use of arms and violence.
(rpkapunan@gmail.com)
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