Gun Control

Two policemen walk into a Krispy Kreme donut shop. Luckily, I'm having lunch there, so I can witness the cliché unfold in real life. But instead of looking for a punch line, I decide this is probably my best opportunity to get an interesting perspective on gun control in Australia. I dig up some facts and prep a few questions before I approach them, and then walk over and say hi. They are extremely friendly and interested in helping me out, and we have a great discussion—individual to individual, not representing or speaking for the NSW Police Force as a whole, of course.

The last mass shooting in Australia was over twenty years ago—a concept I think we Americans have a difficult time imagining. That's because when the Port Arthur massacre happened on April 28, 1996—what one Australian politician since has dubbed "our Sandy Hook"—the government reacted with a vengeance. Port Arthur certainly wasn't the only large-scale shooting of its kind in the late 20th century, but it was a tipping point. Thirty-six people were killed and twenty-three wounded, making it the deadliest mass shooting in Australian history. The Australian government responded with the National Firearms Agreement, which severely limited public access to automatic and semi-automatic weapons, introduced a hefty registration and licensing system, and instituted a buyback program that ultimately collected and destroyed more than 650,000 firearms.

I could (and did) research the specifics of Australia's policy on guns myself, but I asked the officers in order to get a sense for what they considered was most effective in limiting gun violence. Australia is by no means gun-free—it's ranked twentieth in the world for the number of guns per 100 persons (24.1; compare to top-ranking U.S.'s stunning 101/100). The policemen specifically cited the strict licensing system, requiring potential gun owners to have one of a list of "lawful reasons" for owning and using a firearm (and "personal protection" is not one of them). No member of the public can conceal-carry a firearm, not even private security. The officers also referred to the waiting period for purchase permits—28 days, and a new permit is required for each purchase—and the separate storage requirements that limit easy accessibility.

Without knowing the history of gun control in Australia, I think it would be easy to assume a similar gun culture to America's, with remnants of a violent, "frontier" history meshing with a vast realm of recreational and professional hunting opportunities. Yet the U.S. has hundreds of mass shootings each year, while Australia has had none since 1996. When I asked the policemen what they thought of this difference, one described it as mostly "a cultural thing," noting that most Australian gun owners shoot only for sport and store their guns not at home but at shooting ranges. There's an uncomfortable truth in this. While it's undeniable (and proven in Australia) that gun deaths—both homicides and, rarely mentioned but equally notable, suicides—decrease when firearm possession is governmentally restricted, it also seems to be that public opinions on guns and mass shootings plays a large factor. Experts attribute the effectiveness of Australia's gun policy as much to "a sea change in public attitudes about gun violence" as to the policy itself.

Meanwhile, we Americans hardly shocked anymore when we read headlines about another teenager shooting up his school or when someone opens fire in a public venue, even though the body counts keep climbing. Copycats crop up so often we've stopped calling them copycats. And while it's a chicken-and-egg question of why mass shootings happen (gun availability vs. disturbed people . . . who have access to guns), there's something about the United States, culturally, that enables these tragedies to happen and there's something about Australia, culturally, that limits them.

The officers I spoke to said they'd never had a "gun incident" in their whole careers. This was shocking to me, coming from College Park where I wake up to text alerts about an off-campus armed robbery about every other week. There have recently been more and more calls to weaken Australia's firearm restrictions, as well as concerns about increased firearm smuggling—something I didn't know about during the interview—but the policemen didn't seem concerned about this movement, considering neither of them mentioned these issues. There seems to be a confidence, maybe even an overconfidence, in the state of Australian gun laws, that may lead to complacency. I'm concerned that some Australians are starting to believe their strict gun control system is unnecessary, and not that it's simply working like it should.

HED

Works Consulted:

"Firearms-Control Legislation and Policy: Australia." Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/law/help/firearms-control/australia.php. Accessed 13 Jan 2018.

Smith-Spark, Laura. "This is what happened when Australia introduced tight gun controls." CNN, 19 Jun 2015. www.cnn.com/2015/06/19/world/us-australia-gun-control/. Accessed 13 Jan 2018.

Wahlquist, Calla. "It took one massacre: how Australia embraced gun control after Port Arthur." The Guardian, 15 Mar 2016. www.theguardian.com/world/2016/mar/15/it-took-one-massacre-how-australia-made-gun-control-happen-after-port-arthur. Accessed 13 Jan 2018.