At the end of the summer of 2000, a naked man broke into a Merced, California, home and used a pitchfork to stab to death 9-year old Ashley Carpenter and her 7-year-old brother, John. Three other sisters barely escaped, with two "bleeding from dozens of puncture wounds." Little Ashley bravely slowed down the killer as she held on to his leg while screaming, "Stop." Her actions saved her three sisters" lives. .
This incident could have been stopped even before it began. While the attacker was breaking into the house, 14 year old Jessica, who was baby-sitting her younger siblings, desperately attempted to get their father's gun. But as a good law-abiding citizen, the father had locked the gun away in compliance with California law.
Gun control should be reduced in the interest of public safety. To prove this we will look at how Gun bans have failed at reducing crime throughout the world. Then we will look at how the media through propaganda distorts the public view on guns. And then we will finally look at the only piece of legislation that has proved to reduce crime significantly.
Many people believe that the fewer registered guns in people's hands would result in a lower crime rate. But quite the opposite happens, the laws of Europe and Australia are a perfect example of how strict regulations and gun bans effects the crime rate.
In 1996 the U.K. banned private handgun ownership. Prior to that, over 54,000 Britons owned such weapons. The ban is so tight that even shooters training for the Olympics were forced to travel to other countries in order to practice. You would think that after a total ban on handguns they would have seen a dramatic drop in the crime rate. But since 1996 gun related crimes soared an astounding 40%. While the ministry had been claiming that crime was low and under control, the crime rate was at its highest point in 100 years. Dave Rodgers, vice chairman of London's Metropolitan Police Federation said, "The ban made little difference to the number of guns in the hands of criminals, and the underground supply of guns was not affected at all.
