School Shootings and Gun Control
School Shootings and Gun Control -
The tragic mass killings at that Connecticut school will undoubtedly spur renewed calls for gun control. According to one criminologist, that would be a welcome but somewhat ironic development, since mass school shootings seldom provide compelling evidence in favor of more restrictions on weapons.
The scholarly journal American Behavioral Scientist devoted two issues in 2009 to the 10th anniversary of the Columbine High School mass killings and what, if anything, we have learned from them. Gary Kleck, professor of criminology and criminal justice at Florida State University, contributed an essay in which he called mass school shootings “the worst possible case for gun control.”
Here’s his reasoning:
The following are important attributes of the “typical” school mass shooting, if one can speak of a typical scenario for such infrequent events. First, the crimes are premeditated. The killers plan the murders, and how they will carry them out, for days or weeks in advance, and sometimes even longer. This means they possess a persistent ongoing desire to acquire the tools of murder, not a transient short-term desire. Gun control measures that merely delay gun acquisition, such as waiting periods, are therefore irrelevant, as are those that merely place minor obstacles in a gun buyer’s way.
Second, the guns used in the shootings typically either already belonged to the shooters prior to their formulation of an intent to carry out a mass murder or were acquired by theft. Only the shooters at Columbine used guns obtained at gun shows, and even this was purely incidental—the killers could have legally acquired the same guns at gun stores. Restrictions on gun shows are therefore irrelevant, both to Columbine and other mass school shootings.
Furthermore, locking devices are irrelevant to blocking access to a shooter’s own gun, that is, one to which he has authorized access, and are relevant to the prevention of theft by would-be mass killers only to the extent that they can defeat the efforts of these strongly motivated thieves.