Now, before anyone starts going after me about this (yes, I'm talking to all of you hunting freaks), please listen before you comment.

Within just this weekend, there have been two mass shootings. One in El Paso, Texas at a Walmart. One in Dayton, Ohio. Both had about ten or more death and more injured. Two shootings in 24 hours. 20 plus people dead. Both in places that should be considered okay. All of the dead are innocent.

Both the shooters are now terrorists for the country. Yes, I said terrorists. No, I didn't say white nationalists because while yes that's what they are, I am not afraid to say that these shooters are terrorists.

"But Maddie, their mental health--" I don't give two shits they took an AK-47 (a fucking semi assault weapon that should only be used in war) into a public place and shot up places that should be considered safe.

This came one week after the shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in California.

If you think that none of these mass shootings hit close to home, well I'm here to tell you you're wrong. I'm from Ohio. Dayton is only a couple of hours away from my hometown, and I have some friends from high school even some close friends from high school that go to the University of Dayton. To think what if they were in the area at the time of the Dayton shooting, I could've lost some friends to heinous gun violence...

The idea of mass shootings in the United States has been pretty much happening almost my entire life. I was barely one year old when the shooting at Columbine High School in 1999 happened. I'm turning 21 this week and there have been recorded 250 mass shooting in the United States. The 250th one being recorded in Dayton. I've seen the news reports about Sandy Hook and the Aurora theater when I was in middle school, the Pulse Nightclub shooting my senior year of high school, Parkland and Las Vegas my freshman year of college, and these recent shootings the summer before my junior year of college. All of them used a semi-automatic rifle.

According to an article in The New York Times titled "How to Buy a Gun in 16 Countries." It lists all of the requirements in different countries that it takes to be registered to use a gun. For the United States, they just need to pass a background check and they can then buy a gun. It also says that there are some Americans that buy guns without a background check.

This is why we need extensive background checks. Actually, scratch that because we need to ban the sale of semi-automatic weapons. I don't care what the Republicans say, it is not due to video games it's your laws that are making this becoming a reality. If semi-automatic weapons were banned, then we wouldn't have over 200 mass shootings in the United States.

Okay, end rant.