It's always too soon to talk about gun control: Robyn Urback

It's not the time to talk about gun control in the U.S. It is too soon. We must wait a reasonable amount of time after the last mass shooting, but not too much time as to run into the next mass shooting.

They occur roughly every 24 hours, soin that sense, the moment has already passed. But then again, there never really was an appropriate moment. It was too soon, and not soon enough. Everyone with me? OK, good.

It was unfortunate to see so many people hop on their political hobby horses just a few hours after we learned about Sunday night's horrific shooting in Las Vegas, the deadliestin U.S. history. But it was not the time for political debate, as White House spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders reminded reporters Monday, calling it "premature" to discuss policy.

Rather, it was "time to unite as a country," she said;for mourning and prayers and other intangibles, which, so far, have been unsuccessful in quelling the scourge of gun violence in the U.S. But maybe if we mourn deeper and pray louder, it will start to turn around.

In any case, lawmakerscannot allow this tragedy, which was the 273rd of its kind in 275 days, to make Americanslose sight of what is important here: that is, the freedom to amass a stockpile of weapons, ammunition and modifiers that can enable a single person to woundhundreds and kill dozensin a matter of minutes.

Take that freedom away, and the U.S. suddenly devolves into Japan, or Australia, or some other quasi-socialist country where people aren't gunned down in movie theatres, high schools, on live TV, in nightclubs and in kindergarten classrooms. What would be left of Americathen? You might as well take away apple pie, Sunday afternoon football (I meanthe good kind of football, back before those whiners started kneeling during the national anthem) and the right to skin a deer on the side of the interstate. Like a man.

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Liberals forever rattle on about gun control, pushing radical ideas such as prohibiting mentally unstable people from purchasing firearms, or requiring guns to be safely stored so that toddlers stop shooting themselves and others, or banning people from carrying gunsintodaycares and airports. That is nonsense. Americans need more guns, not fewer.

Indeed, the obvious solution to amanwith an arsenal of weapons shooting down from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino is a sea of 22,000 equally armed concertgoers below, panicked and shooting wildly in the direction of the 43-storey hotel. Perhaps that would have saved some lives.Sadly, we will never know.

The important thing to remember here is that after trying very little, lawmakers are all out of ideas. Gun control has not worked in places like New York and Illinois Chicago, specifically, which long had a ban on the sale of handguns within city limits.Perhaps it's because a patchwork of state-by-state gun laws doesn't work when weapons can very easily be moved across state lines.

Perhaps it's also because any meaningful attempt at reform on a national scale is immediately thwarted by the enormously powerful gun lobby.

If legislatorsmake it harder to buy guns, people will just buy guns illegally. If theytry to staunch the spread of illegal firearms with tougher penalties for possession, a national database of firearm transactions, reinstating a federal assault weapons ban, by testing out a national buy-back program akin to that ofAustraliaor any combination thereof, well, either it won't work and the U.S. will be in the same place it is now or it will work, and the country will become one of those pathetic gun-lessnations where people keep bear spray on thedashboards of their hybrid cars. No, that will not do.

Social media videos capture chaos during Vegas mass shooting

7 years ago

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Warning: Disturbing content | Las Vegas shooting as seen through social media posts at the ground level.

Either way, people need to stop this distasteful tendency to talk policy in the wake of every mass shooting. It is offensive. Sure, the status quo isn't exactly working, but unless Americans can be absolutely guaranteed that more restrictive measures would have the desired effect, there's no point in really trying anything at all, right?

The respectful thing to do here is to mourn for the victims and their families, and then preserve everything exactly as it is, so that it mayhappen again. That's what freedom feels like, friends. Let the Swiss keep their bear spray.

This column is part ofCBC'sOpinion section.For more information about this section, please read thiseditor'sblogandourFAQ.