California Gun-Control Bill is Completely Pointless

"My hard-on for gun-control is this long." -DF

Always looking to capitalize on the latest tragedy for political support, Democratic senators from the state of California—Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer have proposed the “Pause for Safety Act”.  According to this article, the bill would allow people to take out “temporary gun prevention orders” on those they suspect are unstable or potentially threatening. Under this bill, courts can issue orders allowing for the seizure of firearms by those who are deemed dangerous. With the Elliot Rodgers case and several other recent spree-shootings still fresh in everyone’s minds, it is no wonder the gun-control crowd has yet again seen fit to exploit the victims of these tragedies as a means to push their own agenda.

At first glance, it might seem like this bill does not infringe on the freedom of a law-abiding citizen’s right to bear arms, but in practice it may not be as innocuous as it appears. First of all, had this law been in effect already, how many spree shootings would it really have stopped? If the bill requires someone to file a temporary gun prevention order against someone they believe to be a threat, then I fail to see how this would have stopped any of the recent spree shooters. It takes a certain kind of disturbed lunatic to open fire on a crowd of innocent people. Those who are bent on doing harm to others are not likely to obey gun laws in the first place. In fact, the majority of firearms involved in murders in the United States were purchased illegally. This bill effectively does nothing to eliminate the thousands of illegal firearms already in North America, which aren’t going away regardless of how many laws are passed. It is naïve to think that homicidal lunatics are going to relinquish their firearms just because Dianne Feinstein said so. Mentally unstable criminals are not thwarted by temporary prevention orders.

You might be saying, “Well, maybe this bill won’t actually prevent any crimes, but it still sounds like a good idea, right? I mean, who wants to let potentially dangerous people own guns?” The problem with this line of reasoning is that it is not always easy to determine whether someone is a potential threat. Whenever one of these spree killers goes out and shoots twenty people, we always look for red flags in their behaviour that would have allowed us to prevent the violence beforehand. Sometimes it is quite obvious that somebody is a threat, as in the case of Elliot Rodgers, but oftentimes you can't tell that someone is violent until they've acted out.  How then, is a court supposed to draw the line between someone who is a legitimate threat or just a well-meaning eccentric? To me it seems as though there is no accurate criteria by which we can label somebody as a potential threat. Without any reliable criteria in that respect, how are the courts in a position to issue warrants allowing for the seizure of people’s property? If this bill becomes law, then I predict that there will be many gun-owners who will unjustly be labelled as “potentially dangerous” and have their weapons seized by the government.  Maybe the guy who lives on your block doesn’t like you face and decides he’s going to file a gun prevention order on you because he feels “threatened”. Or maybe a manipulative wife files a prevention order against her husband on a whim because she got mad at him for some reason. If you have a decent imagination, you can probably think of scenarios when a law like this could be abused.

This is a classic example of a group of misinformed politicians fishing for votes by the proposition of well-meaning, albeit completely useless legislation. It’s all about making things sound good on paper.  Those who support this bill have not made an effort to look past their knee-jerk reactionary instincts to gun violence to consider the ineffectiveness of controlling firearms.  Taking guns away from anyone will not prevent violence, it will only encourage it.