The American Gun Violence

The American Gun Violence

In this essay we are going to deal with the american gun violence. It is related to the notion of Places and Forms of Power. Here the power means the influence of a person or a group of person over other persons. We are going to see that power can be cultural, economical and political. Therefore we may wonder if the 2nd amendment which allows the citizens to bear weapons shouldn’t be abolished.
First of all, we are going to study the origins of this phenomenon which explains the present situation. Then we are going to talk about the numerous consequences such as the development of lobbies, of massive killings and of association against guns. Finally we are going to study the two political sides who are facing the pros and the cons.                              

If the USA face the problem of guns ubiquity, this is due to the origins of the country. Indeed in 1789, the 2nd amendment of the American Constitution quoted « A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed ». At that time weapons were used to survive, to protect belongings and families from a hostile environment. As mentioned in a text we studied in class « The American myth » society has evolved since 1789 but Americans still have an archaic mentality, which explains their commitment to protect themselves with weapons. Culturally, the American dream is an image of a country in which freedom is important, success is possible for everyone by dint of a hard work and a society «  in front of modernity ». However, reality is not as beautiful as it seems. More than half of Americans believe in the right to own guns, even if number of people supporting arms has declined.

Researchers have showed how the US compared to other countries has a high violent death rate. They used 2010 mortality date from the World Health Organization to examine 23 countries. They calculated the death rates per 100,00 population and broke down the findings by age and sex. They found out that homicide rates were 7 times higher in the US than in other high-income countries. Most of this difference seemed to be attributable to gun-related homicides. The US had a rate of homicide by gun that was 25 times higher than other countries. If we just looked at the rates for those between 15 and 24 years old the rates in the US were 49 times higher than other countries. Unintentional firearm deaths were also more than 6 times higher in the US compared to the other countries. 82% of all people, 90% of women , 91% of kids up to age 14 years and 92% of kids 15-24 were killed by guns in the United States.  

During the study period, 1860 homicides occurred and 24% of them took place in the home of a victim. Just over half of the homicides were in the context of a romantic triangle or an argument in the house. Another 5%  were murder-suicides. But 8% of homicides occurred as part of a drug deal and 22% as part of another felony like a rape, burglary, or robbery. But here is the fact, 77%  of victims were killed by a relative, or someone known to them. Strangers, intruders accounted for less than 4% of the cases. After controlling for other things like whether a household contained an illicit drug user, a person with prior arrests, someone who had previously had a fight in the home. This study proved that keeping a gun at home was strongly and independently associated with an increased risk of homicide. And almost all the risks stemmed from homicide by family members or intimate acquaintances.

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