Over the past few weeks, gun violence has been a hot topic of discussion on campus and on social media. As I talked to more people, and read various articles online each with a different viewpoint on this issue, I began to form my own opinion.

When asked the question “Why do you need a gun?” people’s answer is often that they need it for protection. But, the real question is “Who are they protecting themselves from?”. Most often the answer is other people with guns. When people purchase a gun, they agree to an underlying agreement that they won’t be afraid to use it, in a time of need, to take another human being’s life.

While I was wondering what could cause gun abuse, I realized that as when our society moved on to a digital world, it exposed people to gun violence in the form of video games, television and movies. With more than half of all American children growing up playing video games, they are witnesses to environments of destruction, where the sole method of survival is killing others. Video games allow players to reset and start over, giving them multiple “lives”, making our population insensitive to issues such as death at a very young age

There are countries that have strict gun laws, and so deaths related to gun violence in those countries are less than 10 each year. Whereas, here in the U.S. we have lost 17 children in just one shooting. It is sad to see almost no amends being made despite the requests after the tragedy.