Gun control has been a controversial topic, and has become much more popular over the last few years due to public eye criminal cases, such as the Zimmerman case and several other police encounters. I have mixed feelings about gun control and do not stand on one side or the other of the fence. I do believe that citizens have the right to bear arms, but at the same time I think these rights need to be highly and consistently controlled by having some sort of system in place.

            In 1998 Massachusetts passed what was known as the toughest gun laws in the country, which banned semi automatic weapons as well as prevented anyone convicted of a violent crime from owning one. “There were nearly 1.5 million active gun licenses in Massachusetts in 1998," the AP reported. “In June [2002], that number was down to just 200,000.” (Boston Globe, 2013) Even though this did away with much of the clutter in the state the crimes involving guns actually went up. This was because the surrounding states had no change in their laws, and people could simply go out of the state, purchase a gun and comeback. Even though it was a great law in my opinion, it did nothing except make someone have to drive an extra hour to purchase a gun. But this sort of system is what I would like to see implemented, where gun licensing is controlled throughout the country.

The flip side of that coin would be what the NRA is pushing for, where everyone may be armed in their daily life on a daily basis. In my eyes this would be a nightmare. People would too often take the law into their own hands, and act as if they were police officers in my opinion. Cases such as Zimmerman would be a weekly occurrence. I have no problem with family households having a gun for protection from intruders and such, but at the same time, I do not believe neighborhood watch members should be riding around with guns. I think there is a fine line between the two. The NRA argues that everyone having a gun would decline the mass shooting which take place but “mass shootings aren’t the problem. The number of public mass shootings of the type that occurred at Sandy Hook Elementary School accounted for a very small fraction of all firearm-related deaths,” says the report. “Since 1983 there have been 78 events in which four or more individuals were killed by a single perpetrator in one day in the United States, resulting in 547 victims and 476 injured persons.” Compare that with the 335,000 gun deaths between 2000 and 2010 alone” (Saletan, n.d.). I simply think that more regulations need to be put on gun control in states across the nation, rather than just Massachusetts.

Jacoby, Jeff. "Opinion." BostonGlobe.com. (2013) N.p. Web.  July 21, 2015.

Saletan, William. "From Our Inbox." The Miami Herald. N.p., n.d. Web. July 21, 2015.