Our government cannot respond to the climbing death toll and irreversible loss engineered by mass shootings by honoring victims and failing to act. This is not a time for passivity, but one that demands action. In December of 2012, twenty children and six adults were killed in Newtown Connecticut at the Sandy Hook Elementary School. Twelve people were then killed in the Aurora shooting, fourteen in the San Bernardino attack, forty-nine in an Orlando nightclub, and this October fifty-eight were slaughtered at a Las Vegas western and folk music festival. Since Sandy Hook, there have been more than 239 school shootings nationwide. I am determined to see the achievement of compromise in legislation that will better the safety of American schools, a bipartisan goal. The security of schools and lives of people should be valued and not inhibited by party divisions. We do not need to infringe on people’s Second Amendment Right, but can and should halt the sales of military weapons, which are not intended or designed for civilian use. Raising the age requirement to purchase guns to twenty-one will set a national standard of safety improvement, as in Florida it was illegal for Nicholas Cruz to have a handgun but legal for him to possess a semi-automatic weapon. Addressing a person’s agency to obtain a weapon who struggles with mental health and building an academic culture in which students connect with advisers about well-being can prevent massacres that ingrain destruction in families.
Gun ownership is a part of the lifestyle of some people, but a weapon that was crafted for military use has no purpose in a civilian household. Not only is it inappropriate but, it is also unnecessary and disadvantageous in hunting. And when an individual such as Nicholas Cruz cannot legally have a glass of wine, he or she should not be able to own a weapon designed for military combat. If a person is not considered of the age to meet the social and mental responsibility of consuming alcohol, he or she is not qualified in maturity or knowledge to hold a semi-automatic assault weapon. People question the need for an established age limit, but countless states have already set the age requirement at 21. It is urgent and critical that our country recognize a national standard. Federal law permitted Nicholas Cruz to buy the AR-15 a year prior to the shooting, a gun with magazine capacity that allowed him to spray bullets. The AR-15 can fire thirty rounds with an effective firing rate of forty-five rounds per minute. Yet, according to a radiologist in Florida who treated Parkland victims and spoke to Heather Sher of the Atlantic, it is the bullet’s velocity coming from the semi-automatic weapon that causes it to decimate and not defend. An AR-15 bullet travels three times faster than the .9mm bullet of a handgun. If a bullet from a handgun does not hit a body part that is imperative in function such as the heart, then the victim can often be saved and will not bleed to death before transportation. The immense energy the AR-15 releases is lethal, and victims who are shot have almost no chance of survival. The Second Amendment communicates the right of defense, imparting a person’s right to own a handgun as a mechanism of protection. The Second Amendment does not articulate that a person sustains the right to carry an instrument that ensures death and employ slaughter.
Teachers at Marblehead High School stated that the proposal of arming colleagues with limited training was egregious and unrealistic. Even a teacher who was experienced in handgun operation would be no opposing match for a shooter that had a semi-automatic weapon. If 10-40 percent of teachers had concealed weapons of war, our high school would no longer be an environment for by education but would be one dominated by an undercurrent of constant fear and tension. The teachers expressed the need for a greater presence and involvement of police within schools in addition to creating a environment addresses students’ psychological and emotional well-being. If students suffering from mental health issues are alienated or ignored, connecting with them and getting them help could prevent the metamorphosis of pain to annihilation.