When I went to Paris I read this article from Le Monde perhaps the best French newspaper. I can't seem to find a copy online but here is a similar article from Le Figaro
http://www.lefigaro.fr/elections-americaines-2008/2008/11/10/01017-20081110ARTFIG00279-la-victoire-d-obama-dope-les-ventes-d-armes-personnelles-.php
Last week a kind colleague showed me an article about a tv show examining the gun use of Americans.
If you read and watch mainstream media you might think every American has a gun. No one I know owns a gun so it seemed to be a complete distortion of the reality I know. After having watched Romeo+Juliet (1996) by Luhrmann we discussed gun violence in America. We are studying the following article in class next week.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/sep/29/gun-violence-death-us
I would like those of you living in America to read the article and post your opinion. Am I the one who has a distorted view of America? Are guns really as prevalent as these articles make them seem?
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Madame, you are not crazy. I dont know anyone who owns, or carries around a gun. Then again, i dont live in texas. There are different gun laws all over the us. but i dont think that any law would stop a psychopath who wants to go on a killing spree. I guess there are just more crazy people in america. But there are more people living in america overall than in a lot of places. If you looked at the ratios, its probably the same. I think another reason this happens is because america tries to control its citizens. There are more drunk teenager in america because of the drinking age, and there are more killings because we arent allowed to carry guns. This is a very touchy subject in america, but overall, i take offence to these ubjective views of america, and how people think we all are crazy people who like to kill each other. i personally would not enjoy killing anyone by the way
ReplyDeleteI agree with Allison; there are a lot of pretty werid people living in the United States! But, there are werid people living in other countries but murder counts is extremely high comparing the United States to other countries. I wonder why! I have never heard or saw anybody besides a security personal such as polices with a handheld rolver...Or is it just me, that I do not live in a certain neighborhood or town that has a higher percentage or shootings. But, being an American, I take that article defensively, like Allison said, we do not go around with a smile and say "I want to shoot somebody today!" - unless we're a serial killer wannabe. (:
ReplyDeleteI think in America, it's easy to find a gun because it's authorized by the law ; and the article seems to say that murders can occur everywher to everybody. I just want to emphasize that this problem exist too in countries where the sale of guns is prohibed. If you read the headline of the newspaper France Antilles of the last week (newspaper from Martinique), you'll see a case of crime of passion. And it something that happens, maybe less than in America, but here we are in a little island, so I think it's more frightening. It shows a problem : here we can find and buy guns, despite it is prohibed ; so undeniably, it exists arms dealing in Martinique. And maybe it's a problem more difficult to resolve ; because in America, you can change the law, but here in MArtinique, we are at the centre of many kind of trafic, so it's harder for us to change it.
ReplyDeleteI think this article can have a well effect on people's mind because it spurs them to march against arms in usa and stop this passive reactive of being shocked everytime they hear about a crime. The journalist wants to make people understand they have a real power to stop this bloodbath. However, i would say that if you are not americans like me and you read such an article with alarming statistics ( 65 Millions americans own a total of 283 millions arms...) you begin to feed prejudices against american society and you begin to think " i won't never go in this country , i could be killed in anytime by a mentally -deranged person who owns an arm!" so, it was nice to have the point of view of a native like madame Owens to know the reality of the facts.
ReplyDeleteI just write to comment on Oceane's point. Indeed I totally agree with her because I think everyone just think the United States are the most dangerous country of the world because of its probably guns traffic "allowed" by the law. But I can't believe that everyone carries a gun in America. I just think it is just too emphasized just because it happens in America to show that it is true that there is this gun traffic. But a few time ago we heard that these same cases of violence with guns happened in some countries that we couldn't even think of. So I think each country has its problems with guns and even the slowest. I'll take the case of Martinique because I live here and even here there is this gun traffic. But the truth is that here it is hidden,just to show that France doesn't have the same problems as America. But there are these cases of people carrying guns and killings people at a party or for jalousy in a mall. So ok go on thinking that America is the most touched by this phenomenon but I think we're still hiding each other the truth. The matter is that we need to stop pointing America as THE city of gun madness and just take care of our own problems of guns because there are.
ReplyDeleteElodie...Sorry for the mistakes!!