One argument used by some gun rights zealots against any type restrictions on civilian purchase and ownership of the military-style assault weapons used in so many of these mass slaughters is that handguns cause more fatalities in the United States than AR15s. So, the implication goes, those assault weapons aren’t as much of a threat as the pistols people have in their homes or on their persons.
With respect to fans of conservative radio talk show star Rush Limbaugh, who echoed the ridiculous comparison on this week’s “Fox News Sunday” program, such a comparison is ridiculous.
A handgun is a weapon that can be held, aimed and fired with one hand. Of course they are deadly, and some of the modern semi-automatics can be rapidly fired with high capacity magazines containing 30 rounds or more.
Handguns indeed have been used in some of the mass shootings of the past decade including the ones at Tuscon, Ariz., in 2011, and the one in the Aurora, Col., movie theater in 2012. The movie shooter used multiple weapons, including a Glock pistol.
The majority of civilian owned pistols are revolvers, generally holding six rounds, and semi-automatics with magazines that can hold from 10 to 30 rounds. A criminal or an insane person can do a lot of damage with any of these, especially, the semi-automatics, and they do so everyday somewhere in the USA.
But consider this when comparing handgun statistics to those of military-type assault rifles that can be converted to fully automatic with a bump stock as was done by the shooter at a concert in Las Vegas last year, killing 58 people and injuring 851: Handgun deaths — and there are too many — include accidental shootings, suicides, domestic disputes, manslaughter, murder and in some cases justifiable homicide by law- abiding citizens protecting themselves.
This isn’t to say that an AR15 can’t be used for protection. But there are already enough hunting rifles, shotguns and pistols in America for that. Military-style assault weapons are designed to kill a lot of people, and that’s what’s happening all too often in America these days. Their sales to civilians should be outlawed, as once was the case.
That wouldn’t get rid of all of them, but it might help. Something isn’t working now as demonstrated once again by that school shooting in Florida last week..
