In his letter to the editor in the Jan. 10 Morning Star, Mr. Alexander states that a viable solution to stopping terrorists from killing innocent people would be a law requiring every adult citizen to take a course in firearm safety and be required to carry a firearm in order to be ready to protect the weak and innocent from harm should the need arise.
As U.S. government statistics show, their rate of gun ownership currently is 112.6 guns per 100 people, so we can look at some gun usage statistics from our neighbours to the south to get an idea how this solution might work in actual practice.
In the past 10 years, there have been 71 deaths by extremist attack (including domestic extremists) on U.S. soil. During those same 10 years, other gun deaths in the U.S. totalled 301,797. More than half of the gun deaths were caused by suicide.
In Canada, the current rate of gun ownership is 31.2 per 100 people and during the past 10 years there have been four deaths attributed to terrorist attack and 13,000 other gun deaths. Again, more than half of the deaths caused by suicide.
Looking at the statistics on gun deaths and causes (eg: homicide, suicide, accidental, undetermined, and terrorism) in Wikipedia, in nearly every country of the world the suicide by firearm rate is double or more of the homicide rate and the more guns per capita, the more deaths by gun per capita.
Are we willing to increase gun deaths in Canada from our now about 1,300 a year to 4,100 a year to save less than one person from a terrorist death every two years? Is there any indication that the right person would be at the right place at the right time to take the terrorist out?
In order to protect ourselves and our fellow citizens, we need to determine what the threats to our safety actually are and prioritize them. We then need to look for solutions and examine them carefully to make sure the cure is not worse than the disease.
April Sheehan
Vernon