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Over the past years the debate about second amendment rights has become a fierce one. With every mass shooting many push to ban guns, or at least “assault” rifles. Now the US has a Democratic presidential candidate that supports such actions. This means the debate has once again reared its ugly head. So, should we ban guns, or at least “assault” rifles? No! That is ridiculous and the facts only oppose it. 

The argument in favor of getting rid of guns is commonly linked with mass and school shootings. Those in favor of such actions point to some shocking statistics, but these so-called “facts” are disingenuous. One commonly pointed to statistic is the number of mass shootings. For example it is said that there were 417 mass shootings in the US in 2019. The statistic uses anytime three or more people were wounded in an incident. In about half of the numbers referred to no one died. Many more of them are the results of shootouts between two groups, so gang activity. This is backed up by the fact that only 31 of those 417 were mass murders. Another statistic that is pointed to is that there were 255 school shootings in a single year in the US. This is also generally wrong. This number is anytime a gun is discharged on school property, accidently or not. For example someone shot himself in the parking lot of an abandoned school at night and that was counted as a school shooting. Most of the shootings referred to are accidents and others are suicides. The best statistic is that on average 10 people are killed in school shootings each year. That is 10 out of millions and millions of children that go to school. 

Another argument is reducing gun crime. The number commonly referred to for this is that 30,000 people are killed by gun “violence” each year. This is misleading. Violence indicates one person attacking another. In truth the 30,000 statistic includes suicide and accidental deaths. The actual statistic is around 10,000 gun homicides a year. There are also 300,000 gun crimes a year. All of these numbers, inflated or not, are offset by another statistic. Multiple studies, including two separate studies done by the CDC, have concluded that guns are used defensively around 3,000,000 times a year. Guns are used in self defense way more often than for crime and murder. 

Gun control advocates point to examples where gun control laws “worked”. The two big ones are England and Australia. Both of these are inadequate examples. In England gun crime skyrocketed after the gun ban and took 10 years to return to normal levels. Australia’s crime was decreasing at an identical rate prior to the gun buy back. There is not evidence that it had any effect. In fact there are more guns in Australia now that there were before the buy back. 

Many will say that they just want to ban “assault” rifles. These “assault” rifles are considered to be dangerous by gun control advocates. There is no reason to ban these weapons. All rifles in the US are used to kill about 400 times a year. That is less than the amount of people killed by hands and feet, which are used to kill about 600 times a year. It is also said that “assault” rifles are not needed for hunting. This is incorrect. In fact the AR-15 is one of the most popular hunting rifles. 

All of these things are irrelevant. They ignore the reason that the founding fathers gave us the second amendment. This reason being to fight tyranny. All of the worst governments banned guns before committing atrocities. Nazi Germany took guns from “undesirables”, Stalinist Russia, and Communist China also banned guns. Venezuela also banned private gun ownership under the guise of trying to lower gun crime. They then committed atrocities. The people also started to kill cops to steal their guns. Taking away guns takes away the ability of the people to fight tyranny should it arise. 

Some regulation is needed, but banning guns or even banning “assault” rifles is wrong. It infringes upon the freedoms of everyone in the US. The people of the US need to have the right to defend themselves, from criminals or a tyrannical government should it arise. There is no reason to start banning guns and all the reasons given are misleading or wrongs. There are, however, very good reasons to let people have guns.