Environment
SAFETY
Nothing reveals the failure of our members of congress more than allowing the NRA to use a minority of gun owners, as few as 25% of our population,
to hold the rest of us hostage to the violence which is robbing
our schools and neighborhoods of simple safety.
Americans are conflicted about the meaning of the second Amendment to the constitution. “A well-regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
It is becoming clear that Americans who want to own guns are a minority – 25- 30%. It is hard to be completely accurate because there is no national gun registry. But if 75-70% of Americans do not own guns, why is it so hard to deal with the role guns play in the violence that plagues the cities of our country?Everytown has provided us with interesting research on Gun violence in America.
This graphic gives an interesting perspective of what is happening because of guns in the United States.
Please take the time to click on the link above and explore this site. They are providing wonderful tools that help people learn and think about the issue of gun violence.
This site summarizes the reasons the American majority expect effective governance regarding guns:• Every day 100 people are killed in America.
• Every day 100 people are wounded with gun fire.
• More people kill themselves with guns than are killed by others with guns.
• Access to a gun increases the risk of death by suicide by three times.
• Gun suicides are concentrated in states with high rates of gun ownership.
• Gun homicides are concentrated in cities—half of all gun homicides took place in just 127 cities, which represented nearly a quarter of the U.S. population.
• Within these cities, gun homicides are most prevalent in racially segregated neighborhoods with high rates of poverty
• Black males are 15 times more likely than white males to be shot and injured in assaults involving guns.
• Firearms are the second leading cause of death for American children and teens and the first leading cause of death for Black children and teens.
• Nearly one million women alive today have been shot or shot at by an intimate partner.
• Approximately 4.5 million American women alive today have been threatened with a gun by an intimate partner.
• Black women are twice as likely to be fatally shot by an intimate partner compared to white women
• Approximately 44 percent of American adults report knowing someone who has been shot
• Nearly 25 percent report that they or someone in their family have been threatened or intimidated by someone using a gun.
• Approximately three million American children witness gun violence every year.
All of this creates a climate of fear that is exploited to increase gun sales in our country. The U.S. gun homicide rate is 25 times that of other high-income countries.
Few Americans want to prevent their neighbors from owning a gun, but they are concerned that guns should be registered. Military style weapons should not be in the hands of people with mental illness or a history of gun violence.
Placing guns out of reach of people who use them to kill and wound others is not enough. Mass shootings are often carried out by loners. Changes in behavior often occur before the onset of violence. Community and mental health resources are necessary to prevent this kind of violence. It continues to be true one issue bumps into another.
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