Another school shooting, another call for more gun control laws. This time, in the state with more gun control laws than any other.
It won’t — can’t — work.
The only way to end “gun violence” is to forcibly confiscate and destroy every single firearm in the country. Not just privately owned weapons; everything. Then eliminate every possible precursor to so much as a zip gun, including plumbing supplies, building construction materials, fertilizer, sugar, soda cans.
Then you’d have to end literacy, lest some clever fellow read an old book, and get some badthink ideas.
You’ll also have to close the borders and end international trade to prevent gun smuggling.
The fact is, you can’t end “gun violence” by regulating guns. Even if you waved a magic wand and made guns impossible, those inclined towards aggressive violence will continue their ways using other implements, or just fists and feet. Humans managed plenty of violence for millennia before firearms were invented less than a thousand years ago.
You have to solve all violence. And since some feral humans seem inclined towards violence just for the heck of it, we’ll never completely succeed until humans evolve into angels.
But we could minimize it by directing our attention to the motivations of violent people, and countering those; gang turf wars, mental health issues, revenge killings. Taking Jacksonville, Florida’s near-daily shootings as an example, we could stop a large amount of violence if we could teach idiots that shooting someone because he “dissed” you is a bad idea. Or that robbery and burglary are inappropriate ways to get money for school supplies.
Instead, time, money, and legislative effort goes to more victim-disarming gun control laws, “buybacks,” and “gun violence” research. Not root causes.
The only national gun control law that addresses the cause — the offender — is the Gun Control Act‘s creation of the class of prohibited persons who may not possess firearms. It doesn’t do much about them, but it created the class.
The Brady Act‘s background checks pretend to keep guns out of the hands of criminals, but it’s very well established that criminals don’t buy their guns from licensed dealers anyway. FFL NICS checks are designed to ignore real “crime gun” acquisition channels.
Criminals already have millions of stolen firearms which “require” no background checks. (Enhanced firearms sentencing could be regarded as gun control laws targeting criminals, but they generally enhanced punishment based on mere possession — or even “constructive possession” — rather than criminal use of the firearm.)
Every other law targets the law-abiding. Think of it as professional courtesy, providing safe workplaces for violent criminals.