News: Act Of Terrorism In Orlando Sparks Fresh Gun Control Furor - Is It Justified?

   As you may have heard, a gunman named Omar Mateen shot 49 people dead this past Sunday. The incident has resulted in the *deadliest mass shooting in American history. The attacker, who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State (ISIS) and praised the Boston Marathon bombers, committed this act on American soil in retaliation against the gay community, whom Omar had much contempt for. Already full of hate, seeing two men kissing was the particular event that set Omar off and compelled him to grab his AR-15 and rein terror on a gay night club called 'Pulse.'

   The details of this story are gruesome, but what is perhaps most shocking is the fact that Omar was investigated by the FBI not once--but twice. And it gets worse, this individual was able to legally obtain his weapon. The evidence is abundantly clear--we could have prevented this from happening. One might expect that a state that is already on it's toes about terrorism would have easily been able to identify this potential issue, especially considering that Omar Mateen has made plenty inflammatory remarks in the past about his family ties to Al Qaeda and talking about murdering people to his coworkers. This fundamentalist Muslim was never a true American and should not have been allowed to purchase the AR-15 legally, let alone be in our country.

   But this attack was quick to be sucked into politics, and now there has been a lot of questions raised regarding what should be done about gun control.

   There are two main camps in regards to the answer. Camp A says we need 'common sense' gun control legislation which includes banning assault weapons on a federal level and increased background checks. Camp B vehemently opposes such legislation but says that as a matter of fact, more guns in the hands of Americans would mean less gun deaths since armed citizens could quickly prevent such attacks from occurring in the future.

The AR-15 pictured here. Courtesy of the 'Bravo' company website

   Personally, I wouldn't see myself ever needing to purchase an AR-15 for any normal reasons, unless I just want one because they look cool. But even then, it's very true that guns don't necessarily do the killing, it's the deranged maniacs that get their hands on them. For this reason, I can only conclude that the most obvious solution is this: better background investigation. If you've been investigated by the FBI twice and you've been known to brag about things like "yeah bro my family and Al Qaeda are tight", then you probably shouldn't be allowed to buy a gun. And you should be thrown in prison once the proper evidence is compiled against you. Otherwise, I see no reason to punish law-abiding Americans from exercising their 2nd amendment rights, regardless of how one feels about it.

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*It has been brought to my attention that this mass shooting in Orlando was actually NOT the deadliest mass shooting in American history. The deadliest mass shooting on our soil was recorded at Wounded Knee Creek at the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota in which federal agents and members of the 7th cavalry sought to take weapons away from Sioux Indians for their own "safety." There were 297 casualties that resulted from this federally back gun confiscation attempt. Let us not belittle the recent Orlando shooting, but let us also not belittle the tragedy at Wounded Knee. However, the Orlando shooting was indeed the largest mass shooting in RECENT American history.


Sources:
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/06/13/how-the-orlando-killer-omar-mateen-got-his-guns.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/14/us/orlando-shooting.html

* http://www.eyewitnesstohistory.com/knee.htm