Written by On May 24, 2022, an 18-year-old armed with two AR-15 assault rifles barricaded himself in an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas and killed 21 people, including 19 children. This event marked the 27th school shooting in the United States in 2022, and the year is barely half over.
America’s Gun Problem
To say America has a gun problem is an understatement. All of what we are experiencing is due to a misinterpretation of twenty seven words written almost two and a half centuries ago.
Gun fanatics and the National Rifle Association regard the Second Amendment as sacrosanct because it is the one piece of code that gives them authority to own guns. However, their interpretation of the amendment is distorted to fit their own ideals.
The Second Amendment states, in full, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” This law made sense when it was written in 1776 when the country barely had a functioning military and not the $750 billion behemoth it is today.
The use of militia and minutemen in the Revolutionary War was vital. Everyday people like farmers and blacksmiths were a necessity to fight off the English, because America’s military consisted of merely 48,000 men at any one time. The need for more armed men was necessary to protect the majority of the Atlantic seaboard from an attack.
So looking at the Second Amendment, it clearly makes reference to “a well regulated militia” in conjunction with the right to bear arms. Our problem now is that the disparate citizens who froth at the mouth over the idea of guns is not “a well regulated militia.” It’s a bunch of Rambo fanboys cosplaying as soldiers.
How to Fix It
What’s the solution? Other countries who have suffered from devastating attacks have managed to curtail the issue, so why can’t we? It’s clear that bans on assault weapons and other handguns work, but America isn’t willing to do that and would rather see their children slaughtered all to “protect” a Constitutional right that they only pay attention to half of it.
If the country doesn’t want to ban guns, I say owning a gun is volunteering to serve in the military. There, the person who buys the gun will get proper training in how to use the gun. This is where the idea of “well regulated” falls into play.
Doing this won’t deprive citizens of their supposed right to own a firearm and will also alleviate the U.S. military’s need to enlist recruits out of high school. This would also allow the government to cut the military budget significantly since each one of these gun-owners would now be part of a localized militia. Need soldiers to fight in a war? Just activate the 702 out of Cary, North Carolina.
Clearly, this will never happen, but just as clearly, our country is in dire straits when it comes to the safety of its citizens. Our politicians are too entrenched with organizations who profit from the manufacture and sale of guns in order to do anything, and much of the population is too enamored with the idea of being the next John McClane to call for change. It’s not until these tragedies hit close to home will anyone show any empathy for the lives that have been lost. It’s time for these people to get their heads out of their asses and realize that doing something is far more effective than doing nothing.
