They point to a correlation between gun ownership and crimes, and they believe that if laws were stricter or guns were taken away then crime would decrease. This argument, however, couldn’t be further from the truth. Banning guns or making more gun laws would just infuriate the general public. A 2009 Gallup Opinion Poll showed that an all time low of 44% of people believe that there need to be newer, stricter laws applying to gun control (Gallup.com). This number in 1990 was 78%, so as time goes on people are leaning more and more away from stricter gun laws.
Much of the argument over stop and frisk lies in numbers.” For instance, the NYPD says its policy has led to a falling murder rate and more gun seizures, with homicides down 21 percent this year and the number of illicit guns seized up 31 percent from last year”(Huffington post). If this tactic results in this much of a drop in homicides and an increase of thirty one percent in illicit guns seized, why not use it. This tactic obviously helps keep the streets a little safer. Most if not all cities that imply stop and frisk experience a dramatic drop in crime rate. “The reality is that crime has gone way down in New York City and that stop and frisk has certainly contributed to it.
The majority of the people voting for the age limit to drop to 18 are the people who are under 18 or who are 18. They feel that 18 year-olds are prepared to make responsible decisions about drinking (Amethyst Initiative). The Amethyst Initiative believes that lowering the drinking age will only make situations worse for society. But the fact is, these people are not thinking about the consequences and are only looking at the pleasure. “More than 1,700 college students in the U.S. are killed each year—about 4.65 a day—as a result of alcohol-related injuries” (The Marin Institute).
“Traffic deaths from drunken driving have fallen steadily, with those involving teenagers 16 to 19 declining by 39.1 percent from 1982 to 1990, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)”. (Clark, 1992). Even though drinking and driving is a crime thousands of teens continue to get behind the wheel and kill thousands of innocent people in alcohol related crashes every year. There are drunken accidents because teens don’t take drinking and driving seriously. Teens just want to feel the pleasure and they want to feel good but don’t think about the other people or even there selves that they can kill on the road.
Push for P-plates until 25 Forcing young drivers to remain on probationary licenses until the age of 25 would cut Victoria's road toll, says the state's top traffic police officer. Under the move, young adults would have to drive with a zero blood alcohol level for an extra three years, or for the first seven years of solo driving. Assistant Commissioner Robert Hill, who wants the community to consider making the change, said 40 per cent of people aged 20 to 25 who were killed or injured on Victorian roads every year were victims of drink-driving. Mr. Hill said medical research showed that the brain did not develop fully until the mid-to-late 20s, particularly the part that controlled decision-making. ''What I'm advocating is a community
Even more shocking, daily use has hit a 30-year high amongst high school seniors (Marijuana Use). However, alcohol use has reached historic lows in recent years (Marijuana Use). This could be because "the proportion of 8th and 10th graders who say they could get alcohol "fairly easily" or "very easily" had been declining since 1996 and continued to drop in all three grades in 2011"(Marijuana Use). Even though alcohol is legal, it is harder to obtain because it is a substance which is controlled and regulated by the federal government. Marijuana is not regulated for recreational use, and therefore cannot be
Decrease in Juvenile Crime In 2001, according to the FBI, juveniles accounted for 17% of all arrests and 15% of all violent crime arrests (Snyder, 2003). In the late 1980s, juvenile violent crime arrest had a substantial growth then peaked in 1994. However, between 1994 and 2001, the juvenile arrest rate for Violent Crime Index fell 44% and as a result, the juvenile Violent Crime Index arrest rate was the lowest since 1983 (Snyder, 2003). Furthermore, in 2001, the rate of juvenile arrests for Violent Crime Index offenses that included forcible rape, robbery, aggravated assault and murder declined for the seventh consecutive year. The juvenile arrest rate for each of these offenses has been declining steadily since the mid-1990s; for murder, the rate fell 70% and manslaughter arrest rate fell 40% from its 1993 peak through 2001.
Violent crimes in the county have been steadily decreasing from 2,447 in 2005 to 2,072 in 2009. Homicides decreased by almost 50% in the same time. The 2012 homicide rate was 15 down from 18 in 2011. Most of the murders in the county happen in East Palo Alto, a city with a long history of crime and poverty. Burglary and robbery crimes have also been steadily decreasing.
civilians use guns to defend themselves and others from crime at least 989,883 times per year, for that year there were an estimated 11.6 million offenses. That means that 8.5% of the offenses in the year 2000 were thwarted due to civilian intervention with a firearm. In John R. Lott’s More Guns, Less Crime Lott states that there are 60% fewer multiple-victim shootings and 78% less victims per attack in states that do not have a concealed weapon ban. There are many different statistics that have been compiled to show that gun ownership reduces crime, and just as many that support the opposing view, it is not a matter of whether or not citizens own a gun, it’s a matter of the intent in which they have when it comes to using the gun. While most people would by a gun for conventional purposes such as self-defense, hunting, or target shooting, it is inevitable that there will be people who buy a gun in order to use it for robbery, murder, rape, or a number of other heinous crimes, but depriving those who would use their firearm without malicious intent of their second amendment right does not rectify this horrible fact.
Stop the Gun Violence Something must be done to reduce the gun violence in America. In 2011, there were 8583 people killed by guns in the United States (Rogers). Most of these incidents get little to no media coverage. Every so often there is a Columbine, Virginia Tech or Sandy Hook tragedy that gets the nation's attention for a few weeks but after that it fades away in most people's minds. Unfortunately these catastrophes are becoming more and more frequent.