Shawshank Redemption

Shawshank Redemption

In the movie Shawshank Redemption, Andy Deushan was a banker who had been framed for the murder of his cheating wife and her new found boyfriend. The two may have been able to protect themselves if they would have had a handgun readily available. Given that times are different now as opposed to the thirties and forties, the same situation stands. Currently in today's society many people, when at home, are not realizing the danger that threatens them everyday. Burglaries happen most often at nighttime when homeowners are resting for the night to catch them off-guard. Some go madly wrong and the robber could have a weapon, which further threatens your family's life. If you could have some form of self-defense to protect the life of your beloved family, would you take it or just leave it up to the police to slowly rescue you from this potential danger? If handguns were made totally legal, potential dangers would not be of a scare anymore, and your family could live on past any horrible confrontation. Given that a few individuals do carry unconcealed weapons around because of the rising crime rate, the majority of citizens have been taught that it is wrong. Some gun control followers believe it is not our right to carry a concealed weapon for self-defense. These people also believe it is the policemen's job to deal with these kinds of threats. But what if they can't get there in time? Wouldn't you want a weapon to defend your life and maybe even the woman who is cheating on her husband? In Nan Desuka's essay "Why Handguns Must Be Outlawed," Desuka argues that Gun Control Laws are not strict enough until handguns are made illegal. She starts right off with quoting two very famous quotes; "Guns don't kill people-criminals do," and "Guns don't kill people-people kill people." While both sound different they actually mean the same thing: all criminals are people and all people who kill are criminals. Desuka argues that: Scarcely a day goes by without a newspaper in any large city reporting that a child has found a gun, kept by the child's parents for self-protection, and has, in playing with his new-found toy, killed himself or a playmate. Or we read of a storekeeper, trying to protect himself during a robbery, who inadvertently shoots an innocent customer.

Desuka has made these cases very extreme, these do not happen on an everyday basis. No one wakes up and almost everyday reads the paper to find these horrible stories on the front page. When something happens, whether it's good or bad, it gets publicity, but only the bad news become so inflated. Lets say a child gets into its parents drawers, pulls out a handgun and in playing around, shoots itself. This would make news almost over the entire US, while if the parents would have a lock on the gun, nothing would have happened. The parents don't go to a newspaper company and tell them that their very own child almost died if it wasn't for the lock on the weapon. Good news never gets out and that's what makes handguns look so bad, no one ever gets to hear the good stories. You only hear of extreme cases where the participants had not used the gun in the correct manner. The 1997 Uniform Crime Reports from the FBI states that "In the United States during 1997, people committed about 7,927,000 violent crimes. The perpetrators used a firearm in about 691,000 of these instances." That means that only 11 percent of the crimes involved a firearm, not even a handgun. If the statistics could show it, the percentage of handguns is even less than 11 percent! According to the ILA Research and Information Division Fact Sheet, the 1995 fatal accident totals firearms at the bottom of the list under motor vehicles with 43,900 fatalities, then falls, poisonings, drowning, fires, choking and finally firearms with only 1,400. That is only 1.5 percent of all fatal accidents. America has many more problems to deal with other than the minor firearm situation.

Desuka tries to further her arguments by declaring that followers of gun control do not have a well-established slogan to pull others into their campaign. And Desuka says it right when the meant-to-be-humorous slogan "Defend you're your right to arm bears," does nothing for the "crusade." Why not use "Guns don't kill people-people kill people" as described as such a moving phrase for proponents to gun control? Could it be that maybe people don't kill people, unless they are a criminal trying to break into a home. That slogan sounds very harsh but actually is very extreme and untrue. Desuka adds very vaguely that "Criminals kill; when there are no criminals, there will be no deaths from guns." She is speaking the truth, yet what does it mean really? One also knows that sometimes people kill, and when there are no more people, there will be no more killings. And to add to Desuka's biased, sexist and yet very extreme views, she falsely declares that the killings from handguns do not come from rapists or murderers. The majority of the murders are "women killed by jealous husbands, or they are the women's lovers; or they are drinking buddies who get into a violent argument." Every murder is not only committed by males as Desuka reports. In the movie Shawshank Redemption, it's people like Desuka who put the innocent behind bars because of the extreme biased thoughts.

Desuka also makes some very good points as she credits Senator Barry Goldwater, "Hardened criminals also have guns," and will always have them even when they are to be totally banned. She continues with "The murders committed by robbers, and rapists are what give credence to Barry Goldwater's quip, 'We have a crime problem in this country, not a gun problem." We do have a crime problem here in the United States as said before and the only way to alleviate this dilemma is to enable a concealed handgun law to take safe measures. "Many parts of many cities are utterly unsafe, and even the tiniest village may harbor a murderer," Desuka states. And to protect U.S. citizens from those harboring murderers, we need handguns. From the "Citizens' Self Defense Act of 1997, Citizens frequently must use firearms to defend themselves, as evidenced by the following: A) Every year, more than 2,400,00 people in the United States use a gun to defend themselves against criminals-or more than 6,500 people a day. This means that, each year, firearms are used 60 times more often to protect the lives of honest citizens than to take lives. B) Of the 2,400,000 self-defense cases, more than 192,000 are by women defending themselves against sexual abuse. C) Of the 2,400,000