In my post yesterday I didn't mention gun control as one of the means to stop violence, for one simple reason: I want to write a whole blog entry about that topic.
My posision on this issue is clear: we must restrict people's access to guns more.
This decision has not come easy for me. My gut feeling tells me it's not the weapon, but the man behind the weapon that is dangerous. Furthermore, grownup people should take responsibility for their own actions. However, I've come to realize that "grownups" is just a technical term for someone past the age of judicial maturity. In reality many people are irresponsible and can't make logical decisions. So we have to protect ourselves from their possible actions towards us. We even have to protect them from themselves.
Many years ago, my best friend shot his brains out with a revolver. He was a member of a pistol club, but didn't attend meetings there. The police knew about that. Another member of the same club was a local policeman. The police also knew that my friend wasn't entirely stable. So they were thinking about taking the magnum revolver away from him. While they were thinking about this, he killed himself.
Why didn't the police act before?
Why haven't we learned anything from this incident, and many more like it?
As I lay down a rose on my friend's grave, I can't stop thinking that he would've lived today if he didn't have access to a gun. I'm sure of that. Maybe 68 people at Utøya would've lived today too, if last week's terrorist couldn't get his hands on a gun.
Let's face it: very few people need to own a gun at home. So let us purge the society for civil guns. Let us make new laws that restrict the new licences for guns to those who really need it, and prove they can handle it. That'll reduce the gun count to a fraction of what it is today. As it should be. The police should carry arms, not civilians.
