“This house believes that America should change its gun laws”.
This week’s debate was once again another fine showcase of the great debate skills within our debate club, with both sides offering valid and detailed arguments.
The Proposition, led by Oliver L and Emmerson D, began the debate by discussing the recent tragic and violent events across America causing a negative perception of American society, one unfair to many people. In addition, they suggested that universal background checks and increased age limits would help to lower gun-related crime rates in America. Whereas the Opposition, led by Adam H and Johann G, focused on the Second Amendment of the American Constitution, which gives Americans the right to bear arms. They also argued that mental health provisions need to change and that gun laws aren’t the problem. Throughout the remainder of the debate, the Proposition continued to argue that tighter restrictions should be enforced, also citing the potential safety risk caused by guns. They also discussed that expanding mental health measures is not mutually exclusive with further restrictions, as well as the specific terms of the Second Amendment. This states that citizens can raise well-regulated militia, in turn not justifying unchecked arms keeping. Finally, they chose to mention statistics, arguing that stricter gun laws do lead to lower crime rates.
The Opposition then chose to counter these ideas with the notion that guns don’t kill people, people do! They also highlighted the growth in knife crime within Britain, suggesting that violent crime is caused by many other methods other than guns. Lastly, they mentioned that many violent crimes are committed by concealed carriers who wouldn’t obey gun laws anyway.
Onto closing statements, the Proposition mentioned the direct correlation between gun owning and violent crime and the lower risk of violent crime in states with tougher gun laws. The Opposition chose to discuss that mental health is the leading reason behind violent crime and not gun usage.
In the end, this week’s debate was won by the Proposition, with star debater going to Emmerson for an excellent argument which included examples of where his ideas on changing gun laws would be effective.