What the Colorado Mass Shooting is Doing for Gun Control

Recently, in Boulder, Colorado, a mass shooting occurred, killing 10 people, including a police officer. The shooter entered a local grocery store and open-fired. Although motive has yet to be revealed, the assailant has been identified as Ahmad Al Aliwi Alissa— a 21-year-old, Syrian-American male. CNN news reported that Alissa has been charged with 10 first-degree murder charges and is awaiting trial. 

This incident is one of the firsts since the Covid-19 pandemic; almost no time has been wasted for the tragedies to begin again. The world has barely opened back up, and these heinous acts have returned, like nothing has happened; almost as if our world wasn’t turned upside down and millions of people haven’t already died. However, these events have left  more than tragedy and mourning in their wake, as gun control has made its way back to the forefront of the conversation. After the mass shooting in Boulder, CBS News had an exclusive interview with Vice President, Kamala Harris, to hear her thoughts on the events. In the interview, she said, “This is not about getting rid of the Second Amendment. It’s simply about saying we need reasonable gun safety laws.” The House has acted on the 2 bills written for gun control; now, it is in the hands of the Senate, and Harris has made efforts to encourage the Senate to act quickly. She stated, “All of us [are] pleading to the reason, pleading to the hearts and minds of the people of the United States Senate, to say ‘enough is enough with the partisanship’.”

Eighteen innocent people died in the span of week at the hands of men who were unfit to own weapons. People argue that “guns don’t kill people; people kill people,” but if you give a gun to a killer or someone who is mentally unstable, you might as well have pulled the trigger. The lack of gun control in America is enabling the killings, on average, of 38,000 people per year. This is roughly 100 people per day. If there were restrictions on guns, this statistic would decrease dramatically. Although gun control won’t fix the world and end murder, it will significantly improve and millions of lives would be saved.