In spite of the recent shootings in Tucson we keep hearing that there can be no change in American policy toward citizens’ access to guns or ammunition. That any change in policy is off the table. Here’s a crazy question: Why? Lets briefly assess the gun landscape here in the U.S. People who live in safe parts of the country own the vast majority of guns. We’re talking about suburbs and rural areas. Places where there are very few murders. And even though Tucson boasts a low gun murder rate it seems everybody is packing. Hell, even surgeons at the hospital in Tucson say they have guns. In a nation of 310 million people, 500 people are killed each year during home invasions. What’s more, a third of those people are killed with a gun that the criminal found in the house. Or the criminal seized it from the homeowner and killed him or her with it. In the wake of Columbine High School, the Amish school in Pennsylvania, Virginia Tech, Tucson and a bunch of other avoidable catastrophes, surely the time is right to discuss aggressive policy reform. If nothing else, gun law reform may help gun owners realize that the fictional horror movie that plays on loop inside their heads will likely never occur. There was a time when people questioned Martin Luther King, Jr. for advocating a federal anti-lynching law. They argued that you couldn’t force citizens to love each other. MLK responded, “That's true. You can't legalize us getting along with each other. But if we pass an anti-lynching law it will probably help.” And it did. Policy and public perception go hand in hand. Change gun laws and you change the perception that keeping a small arsenal inside a suburban home is a good idea. Back in my neck of the woods (Australia) on April 28th 1996, Martin Bryant was arrested following a 16-hour siege at a Tasmanian guesthouse in which he killed 35 people. On May 10th 1996, Australia enacted one of the world's toughest sets of rules on gun ownership. All pump-action and semi-automatic weapons were banned under the new law, and other gun ownership legislation was tightened. Needless to say, Australia hasn't seen another Bryant-style rampage since. Defenders of the Second Amendment will maintain that America doesn’t need laws like these when evidently it does. But perhaps the more pressing question is: Why is this country so gun-obsessed in the first place?
