by Angus Macdonald

Created on: January 23, 2007   Last Updated: April 19, 2007

As a British person, I think gun ownership is possibly the most ridiculous part of American life. Why would anyone want to own something which was designed for the sole purpose of killing people? If you shoot for sport or hunt, then owning a gun is necessary. This I can understand. If you think that owning a gun for self defense is a sensible way to protect your family then you are sorely mistaken.

I live in country with many problems. We have high levels of violence, institutionalized racism, problems with alcoholism and drugs, thefts, etc. Essentially we have the same problems over here that exist in the US. With one major exception - we don't have a problem with gun crime. The reason? Quite simply because we don't have guns. We do have the odd shooting as illegal guns are still on the streets but the total number of gun deaths in the UK is below 200 a year. In the US the total number of gun deaths every year is over 10,000. To me that shows one simple thing - that having lots of guns owned privately doesn't make a country safer, it makes it far more dangerous. I understand it is actually quite common in the States for a homeowner to be killed by a burglar who has stolen the very guns bought to protect the home. Is there anything more sadly ironic?

I live in a country which has a nearly identical culture to that of the US. Yet in our country we feel safe enough in our own homes to not want lethal weapons lying around. Indeed, we recognize the fact that having lethal weapons lying around can only lead to people getting killed.

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