On Wednesday, December 2, 2015, shooters opened fire at a holiday party, killing 14 people and injuring 21 others in San Bernardino, California. After the tragedy, one of all too many in the recent months and the second in the past week, the debate about gun control was in full swing.
People on both sides refuse to budge and both sides have valid arguments. It can be a lot to keep up with, so to make things a bit easier, here's a list of reliable articles for, against, and about gun control and gun violence.
Gun control is a complicated issue and there is no one right answer. With an abundance of views out, there is no shortage of reading
"End the Gun Epidemic in America," the Editorial Board, New York Times
You might have heard of this one. It's the first opinion piece to run on the New York Times' front page since 1920. It's a short, direct article that calls for stricter gun control laws and specifically calls out both politicians for not taking actions to prevent mass shootings and voters for allowing these same politicians to keep their jobs despite their shortcomings. Needless to say, it got a big reaction and it's a good place to start looking at the big players in the gun control debate.
Key Quote: "It is a past time to stop talking about halting the spread of firearms, and instead to reduce their number drastically—eliminating some large categories of weapons and ammunition. It is not necessary to debate the peculiar wording of the Second Amendment. No right is unlimited and immune from reasonable regulation."
"San Bernardino shooting: 11 essential facts about guns and mass shootings in America," Max Ehrenfreund, Washington Post
Written just hours after the shooting in California, this article answers some basic questions about gun violence in the U.S. and the history of mass shootings with graphics and answers that are simple and clear.
Key Quote: "There are some perhaps surprising findings—gun ownership in the United States is declining overall, for instance. But while mass killings have occurred with increasing frequency in recent years, support for gun rights is still resolute in America."
"Gun violence in America, in 17 maps and charts," German Lopez, Vox
This is another good starting place for basic facts about gun violence in the U.S. and how it compares to other countries. The visuals are clear and easy to follow. One drawback is that, although it compares gun ownership and gun-related violence between the U.S. and other countries, it doesn't compare overall homicide rates. It is only logical that in an area where there are more guns, there will be more gun violence, just like in an area where there is more water, there will be more drownings.
A comparison between general homicide rates in countries paints a clearer picture. If countries with strict gun laws still have high homicide rates because people are just using other weapons then the pro-gun control stance loses a bit of ground. One interesting point that this article does make is about gun-related suicide and how the immediacy of suicides by gun leads to a higher rate of fatal suicide attempts.
Key Quote: "Jill Harkavy-Friedman, vice president of research for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, previously explained that this is why reducing access to guns can be so important to preventing suicides: just stalling an attempt or making it less likely to result in death makes a huge difference."
"U.S. gun violence: the story in charts and graphs," Mallory Simon and Ray Sanchez, CNN
This is another article that presents gun violence in visual terms. This one looks specifically at facts about shooting attacks such as: where they happen, what types of guns are used, and how active shooter incidents often end.
Key Quote: "Civilians in the United States own about 270 million guns, according to a 2007 report by the Switzerland-based Small Arms Survey. That's slightly more than the population of Indonesia, the world's fourth-most-populated country."
"We’ve had a massive decline in gun violence in the United States. Here’s why," Max Ehrenfreund, Washington Post
This article presents statistics that show that, despite the increase in mass shootings, gun violence overall is declining. Two in three homicides are still committed with guns, but violent crime on the whole in America is going down. The article also lists five possible reasons that experts have theorized are behind this.
Key Quote: "This decline in gun violence is part of an overall decline in violent crime. According to the FBI's data, the national rate of violent crime has decreased 49 percent since its apex in 1991. Even as a certain type of mass shooting is apparently becoming more frequent, America has become a much less violent place."
"Here’s What Actually Reduces Gun Violence," Peter Aldhous, BuzzFeed News
After looking at some background, we're starting to get into the many—many—ideas about solutions. BuzzFeed News spoke with a variety of researchers on gun violence to see what actually works. No matter how you feel about gun rights, the 2nd amendment does exist and, for that reason, the U.S. solution to gun violence is not going to look like the solutions in the U.K., Scandinavia, or other countries where guns are almost nonexistent among citizens.
This article delves into what can make a dent in the U.S. by looking at states that have already implemented certain laws and ascertaining which ones have an impact in gun-related deaths.
Key Quote: "In 2012, the deadliest year for mass shootings in three decades, according to data compiled by Mother Jones, 72 people died in incidents including the Newtown massacre and the movie theater shooting in Aurora, Colorado. Every one of those deaths was a personal tragedy, but in the context of some 30,000 annual fatalities from gunshots across the nation, they just drops in a vast ocean of suffering."
"Oregon provides beacon of hope for gun reform momentum," Matthew Teague, The Guardian
Oregon passed stricter gun control laws by implementing background checks, but it was spurred not by the recent community college shooting, but by the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in 2012. This article looks at how the change in gun rights happens.
Key Quote: "'If you ask people about 'gun control,' they might say they don’t like it. But if you ask people about specifics, like assault rifles or background checks, they’re overwhelmingly for it. People want change,' [Penny Okamoto, executive director of a group called Ceasefire Oregon] said. 'So we put the vote in their hands."
Mourners gather in Roseburg, Oregon after the shooting at an Oregon community college on Oct. 1, 2015. Photograph: Josh Edelson/AFP/Getty Images, via The Guardian
"California has the nation’s strictest gun laws. Here are the other strictest and loosest states," Amber Phillips, Washington Post
This article gives a quick summary of the states that lead in gun control and gun rights, with brief overviews of the requirements and restrictions that each state has. They are sure to point out that correlation does not prove causation and that any alleged link between gun laws and gun violence cannot be taken at face value.
Key Quote: "'Some studies and analyses seem bear out that stricter gun laws mean fewer deaths,' fact-checker Glenn Kessler wrote, 'but the results are inconclusive and subjective: There's even a debate about which gun laws to count, and pro-gun groups say it's tough to prove a cause and effect between stricter gun laws and lower gun violence.'"
"Amid California's strict gun laws, a massacre," Emanuella Grinberg, CNN
While many argue for stricter gun control laws, many others point out that these don't always work. Case in point is California, which is one of the states with the strictest gun control laws. Despite its laws and regulations, California still suffered a tragedy in San Bernardino. This article gives a summary of the gun control measures that President Obama is calling for, which California has, and then looks briefly at both sides of the debate.
Key Quote: "After this week's shooting, Obama said it was time to make it harder for dangerous people to obtain weapons. His comments prompted the National Rifle Association to accuse him of exploiting the tragedy to promote his 'gun control agenda.'"
"No, Mr. President, the NRA is not to blame," Chris Cox, USA TODAY
Chris Cox, executive director of the National Rifle Association's Institute for Legislative Action, writes an opinion piece arguing against President Obama's call for stricter gun laws. He points out the fact that California's strict gun laws did not stop the recent tragedy and also states that President Obama is taking advantage of mass shootings by pushing gun control laws rather than stopping to console the American people. All writers, of course, have a certain amount of bias, but this article especially has a license to take a very specific stance as it is an NRA representative writing an opinion piece. While it represents pro-gun rights, it's important to keep in mind the position of the writer like with any article.
Key Quote: "In California, President Obama had what he wanted—the strictest gun control in the country—and it did not prevent this evil act. The plain truth is that the president cannot keep us safe. And his policies would leave us defenseless. That's why our Second Amendment right to defend ourselves must be protected. It’s not just a constitutionally guaranteed freedom. It’s a natural, God-given, human right."
"How Mark Zuckerberg could prevent gun violence," Sreedhar Potarazu, CNN
This opinion article takes a different stance after questioning Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg's announcement that he would give away 99 percent of their profits to charity. Sreedhar Potarazu calls for the wealthiest U.S. citizens to fund research to help prevent gun violence.
In particular, he suggests that what the U.S. needs is an infrastructure to allow information about people purchasing guns to be more easily accessible to determine who should be eligible to buy guns and who shouldn't, since guns alone are not the problem. While he has some interesting points, his ultimate solution of more funding seems to be lacking in concrete evidence.
Key Quote: "We're not unaccustomed to using personal data to make threat assessments. Companies look at our driving records to determine how much we should pay for car insurance. Banks assess our credit records to determine whether to give us a mortgage.
Privacy is important, but we routinely surrender a bit of it willingly every day. Yet when it comes to gun violence—literally a matter of life or death—we're inexplicably more interested in protecting our privacy than we are of protecting our lives."
"Gun violence is an epidemic. It is time for a public health response," Georges Benjamin, "The Guardian"
In another unique perspective, this article argues that gun violence is a public health issue and should be treated as such. American Public Health Association official Georges Benjamin cites the response toward Ebola and automobile accidents: in both, the APHA took a clinical approach to the problem to figure out the root of it and then solve it.
Key Quote: "We’re not debating the constitutionality of guns. What we want to do is work to make people safer with firearms, the firearms themselves safer, and our society safer with firearms in the environment."
"Why the U.S. Lacks Gun Violence Research," Lauren Walker, "Newsweek"
In the previous article, Benjamin mentions how research on gun violence was banned. This article digs deeper into this to look at the reason why and the effects of this.
Key Quote: "To avoid further defunding, the CDC has tread lightly with its gun-related research, [Alice Chen, executive director of Doctors for America] says. This has resulted in a lack of comprehensive data on who is barred from owning a gun, why and how guns are procured, what drives people to commit gun violence and how the weapon makes its way into different hands, including children’s."
"From Colorado To California, The Gun Control Debate Has Become Personal," Kirk Siegler, "NPR"
This article turns to a more personal approach rather than looking for solutions. Kirk Siegler specifically talks to citizens in Colorado Springs, where a mass shooting took place at a Planned Parenthood just a week before the San Bernardino shooting. Individual citizens, no matter their stances on gun control, in general, expressed a wish for the situation to change.
Key Quote: "Yet, over the past week, interviews with a random cross section of folks in conservative Colorado Springs revealed that people are simply exasperated. 'Most of these people that are committing these crimes seem to have some kind of mental illness and it just seems too easy for these people to go in, grab guns and go berserk,' says Scott Solberg, who lives a few minutes away from the Planned Parenthood clinic."
"A survivor’s life," Eli Saslow, Washington Post
Once again taking a very personal view, this follows part of the journey of 16-year-old Cheyeanne Fitzgerald, a victim of the Oregon shooting, helped by her mother, Bonnie Schaan. It's a heart-wrenching look at how, even when the country moves on past a shooting, the victims are still struggling to make it through each day.
Key Quote: "[Cheyeanne] had dropped out of high school midway through her sophomore year, scored well on her GED and then enrolled in community college—the first in her family to go. On the second day of class, she had decided she wanted to become a nurse. On the third day, she had said maybe neonatal. On the fourth day, she had shown up early for Writing 115 and came home utterly dependent."
Energetic dance performance under the spotlight.
Taylor Swift in a purple coat, captivating the crowd on stage.
Taylor Swift shines on stage in a sparkling outfit and boots.
Taylor Swift and Phoebe Bridgers sharing a joyful duet on stage.
