Gun owners rights need to be protected in Canada

Canada is the best country in the world and a country that prides itself on being inclusive and the fact that it treats everyone the same. But this is not the treatment 3.3 million - 4 million people receive. The reason for these people getting treated the way they do is not because they are murderers or drug dealers it is because they own firearms. They are treated as second class citizens because of this and victims of so called gun control. Just recently the RCMP turned all Ruger 10/22 magazines capable of ten plus rounds prohibited. This magazine was made for the ruger 10/22 rifle. Arguably the most common rifle in Canada. The magazine was made prohibited overnight because of a new handgun that the magazine has the possibility to fit in.This is a problem because handguns are only allowed ten rounds. Now you need to realize that this magazine was made before the handgun and was made to fit the ruger 10/22 rifle not the other way around. It was a magazine that is owned by many Canadians for a number of years without any incident. And now Canadians that own these are made into criminals for possessing them and can face up to 10 years in prison. This is just one of many story of gun owners receiving unfair treatment.

This is a topic that I am passionate about and very familiar with. Many of my friends and family are gun owners. One of my favorite hobbies is goose/duck hunting which includes the use of firearms. I am very familiar with firearms and the laws around them because I myself am impacted by them. I have my hunter safety card but I am also in the middle of studying for my PAL right now which stands for Possession And Acquisition Licence. This license will allow me to do things like buy firearms, ammunition and hunt alone. I will be writing the test this Saturday in Charlottetown but will not receive my actual license until I am eighteen. Since I know so many people that are gun owners. Even some that are restricted gun owners which that basically means there is different laws and regulations for those guns. Mostly handguns and rifles with a short barrel length. I have listened to these people complain about some of the restrictions and rules that they have to follow that really should not be in place. I have been to multiple gun ranges/ gun shops here on the island and out west and had the opportunity to talk to different gun owners. So when I speak about this topic I do have the background knowledge.

What I am going to focus on today is gun control and while its intentions are good it is not the solution to some of the problems we face. Gun control is the thought that by putting different laws and regulations on guns themselves that this will somehow magically make the public safer. Which is the main goal of gun control supposedly.

The problem is gun control just does not work and punishes law abiding citizens. It does absolutely nothing to improve public safety like it claims.

The main part of gun control is putting restrictions in place or outright wanting to ban certain guns. This is a problem because when you put restrictions on certain guns all your doing is making the lives of gun owners harder while doing nothing to stop criminals. Which is a common myth that these restrictions will stop criminals. They will not criminals do not listen to laws or restrictions in the first place. That is why they are criminals.

In canada gun crime is relatively low when compared to other types of crimes. It is not really a problem like some make it out to be. Things like car accident are more of a problem. In fact statistics Canada put out a study that stated firearm-related violent crime accounted for only two percent of all victims of violent crime. Most often than not there was no weapon. Items like a knife were more common. So Canada does not have a gun problem. Most cases that do involve gun violence the guns were obtained illegally or used in gangs. So no restriction or law would of prevented these types of incidents.

Gun control often leads to an infringement on people's rights and freedoms. In some cases gun control has gone too far. For example when Alberta was devastated by extreme flooding residence of the high river community had to leave their homes but when they came back to their homes there guns were illegally taken by the RCMP. The RCMP had gone into private residents and took citizens guns without search warrants while the residents weren't there. There property and houses damaged just to get legal guns. This was not the first time gun owners were singled out and there rights striped from them and wont be the last if this gun control agenda continues.

If we really wanted to improve public safety we would focus on putting more money towards mental health. If we stopped wasting money on gun control and programs like the long gun registry which was meant to register every single gun in Canada and ended up costing the Federal Government two billion dollars largely in part because of the computer system needed to store the information. Then was scrapped because it was a waste of money. Two billion dollars and no increase in public safety. This registry like so many other types of gun control never saved one life while putting it towards mental health would because incidents that involve people getting killed by guns can be linked back to a mental illness. If we could help these people we would be getting to the root of the problem instead of worrying about a single object.

While I do understand why some might question my opposition to gun control and why I feel we need guns in the first place. These people need to realize that guns are not these crazy killing machines they are used for hobbies like hunting and target shooting.

In my solution of putting more money into mental health which is usually the cause of any gun violence tackles the issue head on unlike gun control. In my solution people won't be stripped of their property like what happened in High River. My solution will also save taxpayers money by not spending it on useless laws. And it will actually improve public safety not just give the illusion of more safty like gun control does.

The next step we as citizens can take is to show support to pro gun organizations like the NFA (Canada's National Firearms Association) and also when we eventually get to vote. Vote for someone that will protect gun owners and their rights and bring some common sense to gun control.