Part 1

Isaac Jordan
11/6/16

Personal Connections

Gun control is becoming a larger topic of discussion and if we need to reform it leave it
how it is. I got most of my views on gun control from being around firearms my whole life. We
have an old .22 that has been passed down through generations in our family, it use to be my
great, great grandpa's rifle. My dad and grandpa taught me to shoot when I was around 7 years
old with that old 22. I was always told by my grandpa and dad its not a gun problem its a
people problem. I now shoot shotgun competitively, as well as hunt. The way I was raised
around firearms they dont make me feel uncomfortable, I know what they are capable of and
how to use them safely.
I feel that some people dont really know what gun control is. It isnt always the extreme
of people wanting to take away our gun rights but rather to restrict them more so they are harder
for the wrong people to get. I feel that doing a more extensive background check would be okay
with me as well as most gun buyers/owners but trying to limit the magazine capacity, or ban
certain types of guns is not. It was written in the 2nd amendment that we have the right to bear
arms. This isnt so we can go to competitions. shoot at the range or even to go hunting. This was
put into the Constitution because when this country was founded we gave a certain amount of
power to our government and we wanted to regulate the power that they have so they dont try to
take the power from the people. We have right as well as an obligation to over through our
government if we feel that they are trying to take the power from the people.
My dad and I have had conversations about gun control and how some wouldnt be bad
however trying to take them would probably lead to a civil war. One of the things we talked
about was Hitler and how when he was coming to power that was one of his strategies to
rounding up the Jews. Before he started rounding the people up he took the guns away from the
people in Germany so they couldnt fight him back when he started rounding up the Jews. I
found this scary because if our government is trying to take our guns then what might they plan
to do next? What could they possibly want to do if they know we would try to fight them over it?
Some people think that we should make guns illegal and take them away from everyone
will get them off the streets and the wrong kind of people cant find them anymore. Trying to say
that making guns illegal will take them off the streets is stupid idea. That is like saying that by
making meth illegal will take it off the streets, it just doesnt work that way. People will still find
a way to get them, and those kind of people that get them are going to be the wrong kind of
people.

Most of the people that I have met that are for extreme gun control havent actually held
or shot a real gun before. They find them scary. Now to me the only time that I would find a
gun scary is if someone has a gun pointed at me and I dont have anything to defend myself. I
have talked to people at this school that havent ever even touched a real gun before. After the
Orlando shooting happened, a reporter by the name of Gersh Kuntzman shot a firearm for the
first time to see what it was like. He found an ex-cop that would take him to a shooting range and
try shooting for the first time. He wanted to try an AR-15 after he had shot the gun he claimed
the he bruised his shoulder, that the noise was deafening (with ear protection) and that he got a
slight case of PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder). I own and shoot an AR, so I know the
capabilities of them. There is no way in hell he bruised his shoulder, even if he was holding the
gun and shooting it wrong. ARs are also not deafening even without ear protection. He also
had a lot of people get really mad at him for saying that he got PTSD from shooting. He then
replied with another article that said he used the word wrong and shouldnt of used it.
Gun control to me is not the way to stop crime. In my opinion it will make it worse. Even
if the police had guns we still need them because they cant always be there in time. Its like fire
fighters: they can put out fires, but people still have fire extinguishers to put the fire out. Because
if you wait for the fire department to get there to put out a stove fire it could burn down your
house. Same with shootings. You could save a lot of lives if you shoot the bad guy before he can
kill them. In the end I feel if you want to do more gun control then do a more thorough
background check, not take or restrict our guns.

Part 2
Isaac Jordan
11/8/16

More

Gun Control Will be Harmfull

By creating more gun laws we will not be any safer. Guns control is becoming a bigger
and bigger issue in the US. People want to feel safe. They want to accomplish this by tightening
gun laws or even taking away guns from the people. Doing this isnt going to make people safe.
It would actually be less safe with more gun laws. By taking guns away you are only doing it to
the law abiding citizens not the criminals that commit the crimes.
An argument that a lot of people use is the 2nd amendment. In the 2nd amendment it was
written "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." This says that the people should have the
right to own firearms and it shouldnt be infringed upon. The people during the time of this were
scared of being taken over by another country. They thought that if all of their citizens owned
weapons then they wouldnt be invaded by other countries. By owning firearms if we got taken
over we could over through them as a malita.
People are always going to be violent and find way to hurt each other, so why not defend
yourself. A LA Times writer did an article on the cons of gun control. In the article it was written
Even before most of the details about the Orlando shooting were released, John Lott, a pro-gun
commentator, already was proclaiming the dangers of so called gun-free zones. Lott argued
that the police only arrived on the scene after the attack occurred. He also claimed, Since at
least 1950, only slightly over 1% of mass public shootings have occurred where general citizens
have been able to defend themselves. He concluded: It is hard to ignore how these mass public
shooters consciously pick targets where they know victims wont be able to defend themselves.
This shows that people who cant defend themselves will be targeted. Most people should
remember back in 2012 there was a shooting in Denver, CO at a movie theater. Fox News did
research and found that According to mapquest.com and movies.com, there were seven movie
theaters showing The Dark Knight Rises on July 20th within 20 minutes of the killers
apartment at 1690 Paris St, Aurora, Colorado. At 4 miles and an 8-minute car ride, the
Cinemarks Century Theater wasn't the closest. Another theater was only 1.2 miles (3 minutes)
away. He targeted the people that couldnt defend themselves, the innocent and helpless.
If people want to feel safer around guns they need to enforce gun laws more not take
them away. Mike Rowe from the TV show Dirty Jobs during an interview about gun control he
said When your foundation is shaky, you dont keep building on top of it, you knock it down

and start over. If people are killing each other you take a step back and find where the problem
is that is enforcing laws. He also says Currently, thousands of people deemed mentally
incompetent by the courts are NOT registered in our National Check System. Thats insane, if
youll pardon the irony, in part because its so easily correctable. Likewise, The ATF says that
most states report less than 80% of their felony convictions to the national system. As a result,
nearly 7 million convicted felons are not currently registered. Is it any surprise that nearly every
mass killer in recent memory passed a background check? He says we need to enforce our laws
and make it harder for criminals to get firearms.
People are afraid of guns but taking them away is not the way to stop crime. It is a right
to own guns and it is a way to protect ourselves. If we want more gun control it needs to be at the
source of the problem and that is background checks and enforcing laws. Taking guns away from
law abiding citizens will not fix the problem.

Part 3
Isaac Jordan
11/10/16

More

Gun Regulations Will Save Lives

By making more gun control laws we can make people safer and lower crime rates. Gun
control isnt always the extreme of taking guns away from the American citizens. Most people
would rather make people more gun laws and make it harder for the wrong kind of people to get
ahold of them. There are other ways that we can stop gun violence like regulating ammo so they
cant get it without the country knowing about it. We can even go to the extreme of taking guns
away from people in order to make less violence happen.
One way people have come up with to make it harder for the wrong kind of people to get
there hands on is with proposition 63. This was a law that was recently passed during this last
election. The law states Under Proposition 63, ammunition purchasers would be treated similar
to gun purchasers. Before a Californian could buy even a single bullet of any kind, he or she
would need to pay a fee of up to $50 and wait up to 30 days to obtain a four-year permit.
Instead of making more gun laws and restrictions on the guns they decided to make it harder to
buy ammo in order to lower gun violence. This would make is so the government would know
who bought ammo and how much of it they bought.
The American Medical Association is in favor of banning guns because it will lower
crime rates. In an article by them they wrote "With approximately 30,000 men, women and
children dying each year at the barrel of a gun in elementary schools, movie theaters,
workplaces, houses of worship and on live television, the United States faces a public health
crisis of gun violence... Our AMA 'recognizes that uncontrolled ownership and use of firearms,
especially handguns, is a serious threat to the public's health inasmuch as the weapons are one of
the main causes of intentional and unintentional injuries and deaths. By taking away guns,
especially pistols we can lower our crime rates and save the lives of many. The article says
approximately 30,000 people die a year at the barrel of a gun. By taking away guns we should be
able to cut that number significantly and save more human lives.
A man by the name of Phoebe Maltz Bovy who felt really strongly about gun control
wrote in an article Ban guns. All guns. Get rid of guns in homes, and on the streets, and, as
much as possible, on police. Not just because of San Bernardino, or whichever mass shooting
may pop up next, but also not not because of those. Dont sort the population into those who
might do something evil or foolish or self-destructive with a gun and those who surely will not.

He is saying that people shouldnt have guns at all. Also by trying to do background checks we
wont be able to only pick the good guys out and give them guns. We need to just take them all
away so nobody can create violence with them.

Hillary Clinton believes that we cant try to pick the good guys from the bad guys and the
risk of failure is too high. She said "We can have common sense gun reforms that keep weapons
out of the hands of criminals and the violently unstable while respecting responsible gun
owners The stakes are too high, the costs are too dear, and I am not and will not be afraid to
keep fighting for common sense reforms, and along with you, achieve those on behalf of all who
have been lost because of this senseless gun violence in this country." She wants to take the guns
away from all of the bad people but allow the good people to keep them, however she isnt sure
if it is the best way to stop gun violence.
Guns Control is a necessary tool in order to create more peace. Without more gun control
the wrong kind of people will get there hands on a gun and create needless violence; making it so
easy for everyone to get there hands on a gun is just a bad idea and is in need of getting fixed.

Part 5
Isaac Jordan
12/4/16

Reflection

After completing the project I agree that we are in need of some kind of reform in
gun laws. It currently it is too easy for criminals to get a hold of firearms. However, we
shouldnt make it harder for law-abiding citizens who use them in a safe and proper way
to purchase firearms. This is because looking into this issue more, I can see that there
is an error somewhere along the line and we need to fix it. I believe that is where
background checks and enforcing laws comes into play. There currently are hundreds
of thousands of criminals who shouldnt be allowed to have guns and yet fail to be put
into the system.
I dont think that I found anything new about my values that I didnt know from
before this project. I was raised around guns and find no reason to take them away, I
know I am independent when it comes to politics but tend to lean conservative on most
issues. By completing this project it helped me solidify what I had already believed
about gun control; I believe that we should have the right to owning firearms.
I also have learned about the other side's values and why they believe in them.
They think that we are in need of reform in the gun laws, but want to take care of the
problem by taking them away. This isnt going to stop violence but rather change up the
weapons, from handguns to knives, rifles to bats and shotguns to axes. This is going to
make people more primitive when it comes to violence.
Debating is a big part of our democracy and its use it every day to change the
perspective of people to believe what we believe. We are fortunate enough to live in a
free country and with that there comes responsibilities such as advocacy. Another way
this is used everyday is in the government, making, changing or abolishing laws that
they find are in need of change.
My political views have changed but not in a dramatic way. We have done
projects like this in the past here at animas so it kind of is a repeat for me. I know that
when arguing I need to use ethos, pathos and logos more intentionally and equally
spread the use between them. I also discovered how much rhetoric is being put out

every single day and opened my eyes to seeing more of it. And by doing that learning to
use rhetoric effectively.