Term Papers on Handguns - Vital Weapons Or Deadly Killers

Term Paper Title	Handguns - Vital Weapons Or Deadly Killers
# of Words	4773
# of Pages (250 words per page double spaced)	19.09

Handguns - vital weapons or deadly killers

Firearms;  Vital Tools for Self Defense
or
Deadly Killers?

Introduction

     There are presently in excess of 200 million guns in the United States, according to
the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms  Each year this number grows by 4 to 5
million. There are 60 to 65 million legal owners of one or more guns.1  There is a firearm
on the premises of more than half the households in America.  Most of them keep guns for
protection.  The others keep them for hunting, target shooting, collecting, and similar
pursuits.
     In recent years nearly 35,000 people have been killed annually by guns in the
United States.  These deaths include 15,000 murders, 18,000 suicides, and 1,500
accidents.2  It is because of these statistics that many would like to ban guns altogether.
But is that really in your best interest?  Would it really benefit this country, or reduce the
number of murders in this country?   Consider the evidence  in this article and you will see
that guns should not be outlawed and that less gun control in necessary to preserve what
the founders of this country believed in.

Guns are Beneficial

     Guns can help prevent crime.  This is a view held by many opponents to gun
control.  The criminals themselves agree. As part of  a three - year study by the U. S.
Department of Justice, criminals in prisons across the nation were interviewed.  Sixty
percent feared being shot by an armed citizen more than being shot by the police.  fifty -
three percent did not commit  a specific crime because they were afraid the victim was
armed.   Fifty - seven percent of them were scared off by an armed victim who either
brandished a gun or actually fired it.3  This alone shows that crime would drop if more
citizens owned, carried and knew how to use guns.
     One  such case involved eleven - year old Jason Green of Houston, Texas.  Home
alone one night, he heard noises in the house.  Arming himself with his father's shotgun he
investigated and caught a burglar in the act.  Just then his mother pulled up outside in the
family car.  Fearing the burglar might harm his mother Jason fired.  His mother reacted by
bursting into the house and firing her revolver.  Hit by bullets from both guns the burglar
died.
     Jason's mother, like Jason, was defending her house against an intruder.  There are
about 645,000 defensive uses of handguns each year, according to Gary Kleck, a
professor at Florida State University.  He bases his figure on several surveys on handgun
use, including one done for an organization that favors banning all guns.  Kleck also
concluded that hand guns used in self - defense, or some other legally justified cause kill
1,500 to 2,800 criminals every year.  If other types of firearms besides handguns are
included, then over 1,000,000 law - abiding citizens use guns for self - defense annually.
     Guns also provide vulnerable women with some form of protection against rape
and other violent crime.  Recently, Orlando, Florida saw an increase in the number of
rapes over a twelve - month period from 12.8 per 100,000 to 35.9 per100,000.  Women in
Orlando were afraid to  go out alone, even in the daytime.  Citizens of Orlando demanded
that something be done.
     Something was done.  the Orlando Police Department set up a program to train
women to use handguns.  Over three thousand women armed themselves and took
training courses.  As a result, Orlando's rape figure dropped to 4.1 per 100,000 - a 90
percent  drop from the previous high.  Similar programs in Detroit and Highland Park,
Michigan, and Montgomery, Alabama saw impressive reductions in crimes against women,
including both rape and robbery.
     One woman victim decided on her own that she had enough.  A fifty - one year old
woman of Los Angeles, California, twice raped by the same man,  purchased a handgun
and took lesions to learn how to use it.  When the man return a third time she shot and
killed him.
     These are just a handful of ...

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