ONE of the headlines yesterday notes that Negros has zero indiscriminate firing incident on New Year’s Day. This shows that gun owners in this side of the country are responsible and careful.
However, this is not the same in other parts of our country, and because there are recorded casualties caused by stray bullets during Christmas and New Year, calls for no-gun policy are usually revived around this time of the year.
I personally condemn the act of indiscriminate firing from any gun owner for whatever reason. Such behaviour shows irresponsibility in its highest degree. The horrible deaths recorded due to indiscriminate firing strongly suggest that guns should really have to have no room in our society. This way crimes related to guns may probably be minimized if not eliminated.
Yet while such premise may sound ideally logical, the implications of no-gun policy don’t quite work in the society we live in. Let us face it, we are in a world where bad elements exist. And whether there be gun bans or not, these bad elements will always have their way of securing weapons for their evil activities. I have personally encountered near death experiences due to these people, and I can attest that the only thing that can stop a bad man with a gun is a good man with a gun.
Come to think of it, what kills are not just guns or the stray bullet per se, otherwise there would have been as many deaths as there are as many guns and as many bullets in our society. What really kills are the idiotic gun owners who obviously have no sense of responsibility whatsoever to have considered a deadly weapon as a toy for New Year.
The more fundamental issue therefore is how the government regulates gun ownership. Are licences issued indiscriminately or are they only granted to those who are equipped to handle them? Obviously guns are not for everyone. But for those who need them, they have to meet the requisites of responsible gun ownership.
As to the issue of having too many guns in private hands, this should be an indicator that people do not feel safe. And instead of stripping people off of their fundamental right to protect themselves and their loved ones, our government should toil more on making our community safer to live. They can start by improving police response time on crime calls. Come to think of it, almost always they arrive at any crime scene when it’s already that -‘a crime scene,’ and not when it can still be prevented or at least subdued.
In fairness to some units of the law enforcement department, there have been innovations that some police chiefs have employed which made their area quite secure. Kudos to such leadership!
As to the victims of indiscriminate firing during the New Year, my heart bleeds with their grieving families. Nobody deserves such senseless death. It’s precisely that that our government should do better in securing the safety of our young and vulnerable population, and until that is served we should not be deprived of our fundamental right to protect ourselves and our loved ones.