By Ben Mitchell
For the Kent Reporter
I would like to address a very controversial nationwide issue – gun control.
I don’t believe that gun control is the correct course of action to stop all of the publicized murder cases that we all see spread across the front page of newspapers and on evening newscasts.
The real problems are the breakdown of families, the violence in games and movies, and the huge coverage of the news media.
The main reason that I see is the breakdown of the family structure. Kids in the world today don’t have the connection that they used to within families. This is a combination of several family-related issues.
Today divorce is a huge part of society, which makes it a lot harder to belong to something. They have to split their lives between parents, instead of having a single solid connection with both of them.
They also don’t have the same bonding time together because they don’t go out to do fun activities together like people used to. Many of the favorite childhood memories of my parents and grandparents were when they were participating in fun activities together. Many of my memories are also when I was taking part in family outings like bowling, mini golf, our annual trip to grandma’s house in Utah, or going to Florida to visit our cousins. These were fun because of the ties that they created within our family. We were able to get to know each other much better and establish a memory and ties that we can look back on together.
The second reason is the illusion that such conduct is acceptable because of all the violence and crime that they see in movies and video games. There would be much less gun violence if people weren’t exposed to it all the time. The more accustomed people are to something happening around them, the more likely they are to do it themselves. Video games and movies also help to break down families by shortening the amount of time that people want to spend together. They’d much rather harm people on video games like Halo or Call of Duty than interact with family members.
The third and final reason is the media. When people feel disconnected, unloved or depressed, and don’t feel like they can talk to anyone who will understand what they’re feeling, they want to “end it all.” They want to be remembered by all of humanity – to “go out with a bang”.
The reality is that guns are not the problem. There are plenty of other ways for someone to kill people: knives, hammers, explosives are a few of them. There were more than five times as many murders with knives than with rifles in 2011. People who want to make a mark will make it.
To conclude, the government can’t monitor every gun in the nation and they shouldn’t. We have the right to bear arms as stated in the Second Amendment, and the government shouldn’t try to control the possession of guns.
Fifty years ago everyone had a gun, but there weren’t mass shootings then. What is the difference between then and now? The government should be lobbying for the protection of families and the importance of them, not trying to get rid of guns.
Ben Mitchell, 15, lives in Kent and attends Kentlake High School. He is a Boy Scout and is involved in school programs like band and sports.
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