P.S.A (-ish) Crime is not never going to happen to you

[ZedNova]

The main reason i'm living in America is because i can go out and Pop a couple rounds off at the range. It's fun. ( But expensive)

Fearing guns is silly, most of the people who say we should get rid of them have never needed to use one. The bad guys will still have guns even if we ban them.

Now, what i do think needs to be changed is how someone comes to own gun. That alone could help everything out without taking them from everyone.

An example i could use is my 18 year old friend, his grandpa passed away from Alzheimer's and had a few nice Rifles in his house. His family went to his place to pack up stuff and sell it, while the guns went across the state line (Iowa to Nebraska) and ended up in the hands of my friend without a background check or a license.

[Canopus]

Exactly Airbornem4. owning guns has to be regulated like driving a car. You pay to get a license (and actually learn to handle a weapon) and your guns get registered. Ofcourse you can still get them illegally then but it would make it harder. A sytem like this has proven itself already in many Countries.

[OdinYggd]

Exactly Airbornem4. owning guns has to be regulated like driving a car. You pay to get a license (and actually learn to handle a weapon) and your guns get registered. Ofcourse you can still get them illegally then but it would make it harder. A sytem like this has proven itself already in many Countries.

Some parts of the US this is already the case. New York State does not allow you to transport firearms across the state line without filing a permit for it, and any and all firearm purchases are recorded by firearm serial number in a central database tracking who the current registered owner is. They also perform background checks and have a mandatory waiting period for gun purchases. Certain types of firearm such as handguns actually do require a license to legally own, and have very strict requirements for obtaining that license.

Sadly this does nothing about people storing their guns in an insecure manner that allows unauthorized access and leads to crime and accidents. There is no good way to enforce proper gun storage requirements without being overly intrusive into the household, and enough guns still make it illegally across the state line that controlling it is considered relatively ineffective.

Where I live in Upstate NY, guns are very much a fact of life. I personally have fired upon wild animals that were unacceptably close to my house and livestock, and the farmers especially in this area absolutely have to have that capability or not only would they lose livestock- but their own lives would be in danger. Though I don't claim to be a gun expert or any kind of gun fanatic, I can definitely handle and maintain a firearm safely and probably am at least an average shot with it- when I pull the trigger at all. Safety first when handling one, always assume it is loaded and do not pull the trigger unless you are confident that your shot will strike the intended target and will not strike anything else that could be damaged by it.

However the topic here seems like it was originally that of crime prevention, and we have gotten onto the topic of gun control specifically. Because of the relatively sensitive nature of gun control and the fact that we are off-topic, I'll be locking this now.