Letter: Packing guns could help end outbreaks of violence

Letter: Packing guns could help end outbreaks of violence
Date: May 9, 2007 8:39 AM
PUBLICATION: The Windsor Star
DATE: 2007.05.09
EDITION: Final
SECTION: Editorial/Opinion
PAGE: A9
BYLINE: Jeff Gardiner
SOURCE: Windsor Star
WORD COUNT: 226

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Packing guns could help end outbreaks of violence

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I am responding to Brent Milcz's letter of May 5. He points out that the
Virginia Tech shooting, and others like it, are the work of people with
tremendous social problems that have gone unchecked.

A recent report printed in the Harvard Journal of Law by Simon Fraser
University's Gary Mauser shows just that. Murder, suicide and violent
crime are directly related to the state of the society in each country.
The paper also points out that private gun ownership does not contribute
to society's ills.

Suggesting that allowing people to exercise their right to self-defence
will cause more problems is an opinion not backed up by facts. In the
U.S., every state that has enacted a law to allow citizens to carry a
concealed handgun for self-defence has seen a noticeable drop in all
rates of crime.

There have also been at least five reported cases where armed students
or teachers have stopped gunmen at schools while there has never been a
case where a mass shooting was made worse due to an armed bystander.

What we have seen from the example from our neighbours to the south is
that empowering potential victims by allowing them to have tools for
self-defence saves lives.

Self-defence is the most basic of all human rights, and the ability to
exercise that right should not be dependent on whether or not your
neighbour approves.

Jeff Gardiner
Wellesley, Ont.




The Second Amendment IS Homeland Security !