Did you know 100 times more people in America are murdered by knives or sharp objects than “assault rifles”?
Did you know you’re 15 times more likely to be shot with a handgun than any rifle at all?
Did you know that for every “assault rifle” used to murder, there are between 300,000 to a million that were not?
Even if you didn’t know any of these facts, you almost certainly knew one thing: “Assault weapons” like the AR-15 look scary and are used in mass shootings. Therefore, many if not most Americans believe they should be taken out of the hands of as many as 10 million law abiding citizens’ hands to prevent a very small amount from having access to them.
But here’s the problem with that. The likelihood of someone willfully turning in their “assault weapons” if they’re capable of committing heinous acts like the three recent mass shootings are nil. These aren’t the type of people who will be easily disarmed. If they don’t have them today, they’ll figure out how to get them tomorrow. That’s how criminals operate.
The folks over at FEE took a closer look at “assault weapons” like the AR-15 earlier this year. Their conclusion:
Mass shootings involving rifles like the AR-15 can produce dozens of victims at one time, and combined with extensive media coverage of these events, many people have been led to believe that such rifles pose a significant threat to public safety.
However, such shootings are extremely rare, and a look at the FBI data informs us that homicide with these types of rifles represents an extremely small fraction of overall homicide violence. Banning or confiscating such firearms from the civilian population would likely produce little to no reduction in violent crime rates in America.
Lest we forget, the San Bernardino shooters bypassed the state’s assault weapons ban to acquire their illegal firearms. Future mass shooters will do the same whether there’s a national assault weapons ban or not. Again, that’s how criminals operate.
Attempts to ban firearms like the AR-15 are emotionally driven, as the facts do not back up the fear. For a nation that is supposed to be so evolved, relying on feelings to make decisions about our rights seems quite disingenuous.
Image via Townhall.
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