The United States is divided. Americans have extremely strong and differing opinions on guns. Some are calling for an outright gun ban, while others don’t want any gun control whatsoever. The country is at a standstill, a decision can’t be made. Should guns be in the public?

   Many people know that guns are used in defensive cases as well as violent ones, but the defensive cases are not often talked about. In the defensive cases people use guns to protect themselves or others from harm, but how often do these cases actually happen? A study was done by The National Academies of Sciences Engineering Medicine and then published by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) that there are between 500,000 to 3 million cases annually.

Those numbers are astonishingly high. But let’s compare that to violent crime, in 2016 it is estimated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) that 1,248,185 violent crimes were committed. So guns stop a vast number of violent crimes from happening, even if we use the lowest estimation from the defensive use study, guns are still preventing a substantial amount of the violent crimes. Knowing this fact it makes it harder to warrant a straight gun ban.

Senior Liam Ottley was questioned about guns in the public and said, people that are wanting to harm others with guns will get a one eventually, “if they can’t get them legally they’ll do whatever they can to get them illegally”.

He brings up a very interesting point. There are black markets for illegal things, and if the United States banned guns wicked people will be able to use that to get their hands on firearms. But the people that abide by the law and use guns to defend themselves wouldn’t be able to.

Senior Devin Hertz talks about his feelings regarding concealed carry permits, “I feel a bit safer knowing there are people like that, that have that stuff ready (firearms) to protect themselves or others if need be.”

Many people will have the complete opposite opinion, not knowing who around them has a gun on their hip frightens them. But they shouldn’t be afraid, these people are convicted for crimes six times less than police officers. These are the people willing to jump into a hazardous situation to help others.

There are roughly 393 Million civilian-owned guns in the United States. With the public owning that many guns it brings national security. If any country tried to invade the United States they would have to fight our military and then our citizens, which own more than a quarter of all guns in the world.

Having guns in the public makes our country safer, there’s not a doubt in my mind. If we took away the right to own guns in our country we would be making it a less protected a less safe place. We will lose our “inner wall” of protection from other countries, we will be taking away protection from the law-abiding citizen. We need guns in the public for our people’s safety.