I do have questions about gun control, however. The biggest question is this: will it work?<\/p>\n
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The evidence, so far, is underwhelming.<\/p>\n
Here in Canada, we\u2019ve had gun control for a good long while<\/a>. Some highlights:<\/p>\n In spite of a history of gun control, we have also had a history of mass shootings at schools in Canada<\/a> as well:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n Now then\u2026 we have had varying degrees of gun control through all this period, yet you can see that we still have had shootings at schools. Does gun control work<\/em>?<\/p>\n Another example: Norway<\/p>\n I ask again, Does gun control work<\/em>?<\/p>\n I don\u2019t ask these questions as an advocate of unregulated gun sales. I don\u2019t have a\u00a0 huge problem with government regulations of gun ownership and sales. Canada\u2019s recent experiment with the long gun registry doesn\u2019t offend me so much on principles of liberty as on principles of practicality and the total incompetence and high costs with which it was administered.<\/p>\n What is the solution to mass murders\/shootings? Is there a solution?<\/p>\n It is possible that government policies could be enacted to aid in preventing future tragedies. It doesn\u2019t appear that more gun control will be likely to be among those policies that actually work.<\/p>\n And, as\u00a0John Fund pointed out<\/a>: \u201cIn reality, gun control in a country that already has 200 million privately owned firearms is likely to do little to keep weapons out of the hands of criminals.\u201d I don\u2019t know how many guns exist in Canada, but we probably have a pile of them here, too. Gun control seems to be like the proverb of closing the barn door after the horse has already escaped.<\/p>\n What might work?<\/p>\n Some are advocating arming teachers, or at least having some armed individuals at public schools as a security precaution. This might limit the damage a shooter could cause, but I am sure there would be a hullabaloo as soon as one of these individuals accidentally shot an unarmed person who \u201clooked like a threat\u201d.<\/p>\n Others are advocating tougher mandatory institutionalization of unstable individuals. This might work \u2013 but a lot of people who would never cause such a crime might spend their lives in institutions. Is that what we want?<\/p>\n There are no easy answers to this question.<\/p>\n As a consequence, I think that we should be very careful about rushing forward some emotionally laden \u2018solution\u2019, especially if it resembles the solutions of the past. They obviously haven\u2019t worked and it is very unlikely that they will work in the future. Perhaps it is time for something else?<\/p>\n And truly there is no political solution for these problems. The best we can hope for politically is to restrain and limit the number of such incidents and the amount of harm inflicted in such incidents.<\/p>\n For a real solution, we need wholesale spiritual<\/em> change. That, however, will require the coming of the Prince of Peace. Would that it were today.<\/p>\n Update:<\/strong> <\/span>Another important article to read is “Guns, Mental Illness and Newtown<\/a>” by David Kopel, writing in the Wall Street Journal. He suggests three possible causes for an increase in mass killings in recent decades: 1) media exposure and the copy-cat syndrome, 2) the deinstitutionalization of the violently mentally ill, 3) the false security of so-called ‘gun-free’ zones (wishful thinking at best). His article deserves a sober look.<\/p>\n\n
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