Notion Anglais "Gun control"

- Today, I am here because I will introduce to my topic about the notion places and forms of power and in particular in regards to gun control in the USA. We can wonder what power is? Power is the ability to control others, events or resources; the ability to make things happen despite obstacles, opposition. At all times, power has been in the hands of politicians or military chiefs. But power also implies counter-power, that is to say opposition and resistance.

In order to illustrate this notion, I will try to answer the question: How has the integration of guns in the US culture evolved?

Firstly, we will talk about history of the USA, precisely about setting up the firearm in the 19th century, after, we will see the consequences of firearm today and then we will see if solutions were taken in order to stop the use of weapons. To illustrate my statement, I have chosen four documents, a humorous video taken from YouTube, a magazine article, a magazine cover and a campaign poster.

Development:

- So firstly, I am going to deal with a brief history of the USA. For that, the first document I have chosen is a video taken from YouTube. It deals with the global history of America. We can see in the video that people have always been scared of someone, so to defend themselves they have used guns through the years. First it started when pilgrims arrived in the New World (1620) and used their guns against Native Americans. It continued with the witch hunt, then they kill the British to became free. The Second amendment was passed and the carrying of guns was authorized but it didn’t stop there. Years later Samuel Colt made firearms popular (1836), after there was a civil war, the formation of the KKK and the NRA. All this shows very clearly through a video that the history of the USA is closely linked to the use of guns. Indeed, Americans got their independence thanks to guns, conquered the West thanks to guns, and kept their nation thanks to guns. They have always relied on their guns to protect themselves. Through this video, the author deliver us a very satirical criticism of American Society. Moreover, we can see that the integration of guns in the US done very quickly with Samuel Colt who made firearms popular in the 19th century. Maybe people who have guns thinks that they have a big power in their hands but guns are not considerate like power.

⎝ So, we saw that the integration of guns started very quickly in the US but what is the situation of firearm today in America? Are they prohibited? Have they led to massacres? We will see it now.

- So now, I am going to talk to you about weapons in our current society. Were there any improvements? Not really… This document can prove it. It’s an article extract from the magazine “The New-York Times” published by a journalist maybe the day after the shooting. We can learn that in April 20th 1990, two students: Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed ten students and two teachers at Columbine High School, with their guns. Moreover, we can also talk about the cover of another magazine “Time”. It’s very emotional because on this cover we can see all the victims of the shooting. But in the center, we can see the 2 killers. The title of the revue “The Monsters Next Door’ wants also tempt readers ‘attention. It means that everyone should be wary because everyone can have a gun with him.

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