Should we have gun control?

Mandatory training should be required for gun ownership

Question: Should we have gun control?
Position1 of 3›: Gun ownership should be controlled
Argument‹3 of 6›: Mandatory training should be required for gun ownership

All gun owners should be effectively trained on how to be a responsible gun owner

The argument

The proposal is to attach a training requirement to gun ownership rather than to restrict what may be owned, and its appeal is that it addresses a category of harm no amount of intent-based regulation reaches. The content of the training is specific and teachable. Best practices around gun ownership include checking a firearm to see whether it is loaded, keeping one's finger off the trigger until one intends to shoot, and storing weapons safely. None of these requires judgement under pressure; they are habits, and habits are what training installs. Accidental discharges and gun-related accidents happen overwhelmingly through the failure of exactly these habits, which is why proponents expect a mandatory requirement to reduce them significantly. A person trained to treat every firearm as loaded does not need to decide to do so in the moment. The constitutional advantage is that nothing is prohibited. The Second Amendment protects the right to keep and bear arms; a training requirement leaves that right intact and conditions only the manner of its exercise, in the way licensing conditions the exercise of other rights without extinguishing them. This is what allows the measure to attract support from people who would resist restrictions on ownership itself — it asks gun owners to become better at gun ownership rather than to give it up. The comparative evidence proponents cite points the same way. Switzerland maintains a stringent firearm training programme and has, correspondingly, a far lower rate of gun deaths than the United States, despite a well-armed population. That pairing is the crux of the argument: it suggests the American rate is not a necessary consequence of widespread ownership but of widespread ownership without required competence. So the case is that training is the control which works without costing a gun owner anything they value. It reduces the deaths nobody intended, and does so while keeping the right it regulates fully in place.

Context

We need to undergo training to use a potentially dangerous power tool on a construction site. We need driving lessons before we can drive a car. Given how dangerous guns are, it only seems right that we should have training for those too.

Premises

[P1]Mandatory training in firearm handling and safe storage would significantly reduce gun-related accidents and accidental discharges. [P2] Requiring training regulates gun ownership without infringing on the Second Amendment right to bear arms. [P3] Switzerland's stringent training programme corresponds with a far lower rate of gun deaths than the US, showing the policy works. [C] Therefore, gun ownership should be controlled by requiring mandatory training.

Counter-arguments

It would violate the Second Amendment by imposing economic restrictions. Not many people can afford a $100+ training course. If the government makes these course a mandatory part of gun ownership, it would only be the middle-class and the wealthy that would purchase guns. This is against the spirit of the Second Amendment.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P3] This would amount to a violation of the Second Amendment.

Framing

- Individual rights are not unassailable. - Only certain people can be trusted with certain rights.