Serbia suffered two school shootings just days apart. That’s the kind of thing we’re routinely told only happens in the United States.
In response, the government there did what many other governments do in the wake of such awful tragedies. They over-reacted.
From a nation with a fair number of guns, often owned by those who endured horrific warfare. Now, they’re being subjected to countless indignities, even if many are willing to endure them.
For NBC News, that’s apparently a good thing.
The Serbian government’s recent crackdown on guns led many of the country’s citizens to hand in their weapons. That should set an example for American gun policy, NBC News correspondent Richard Engel suggested Monday.
“All existing gun permits are under review,” Engel reported on NBC’s Today. “All sales of new guns of any type are banned for two years. Gun owners must submit to in-person psychological and background checks. And owning an illegal gun is punishable by up to 15 years in prison.”
…
NBC did not delve into whether the new gun restrictions would have helped to avert Serbia’s mass shootings. The country already has strict gun laws, banning citizens from owning guns unless they are over 18, pass repeated background checks, and have no criminal record. Citizens must also be able to prove they need the weapons for hunting, sport, or—in limited cases—self-defense, according to Serbia’s 2015 gun law.
The first shooter, a 13-year-old boy, is below Serbia’s age of criminal responsibility, NBC reported, while the second shooter, an adult man, used an automatic weapon, according to USA Today. Serbia already bans automatic weapons in nearly all cases, according to the 2015 law.
So, much like what we see here, the gun laws already in effect don’t actually prevent the shooting, but politicians eager to “do something” pass new rules–probably gun control measures they already wanted and just couldn’t manage to get passed–so that it looks like they’re addressing the problem.
In that regard, Serbian politicians are no different from many of our own.
Yet the troubling part here is how NBC News didn’t even look at these laws critically, nor interview anyone who might have offered a different perspective, one a tad more critical about how effective these laws will be in preventing another such tragedy.
Many in the United States will do what NBC News apparently did. They’ll see what Serbia did and think they had the correct response.
What’s more, years down the road, they’ll claim that the lack of mass shootings since then is proof that the laws worked, all while ignoring the fact that they weren’t exactly common before these two incidents. They won’t be common afterward, either. Not in a nation that size.
But there’s a reason NBC didn’t want a deeper look at what Serbia did. They don’t want people to know how little these new rules will do.
Especially when you look at the rules themselves.
“All existing gun permits are under review,” Engel reported on NBC’s Today. “All sales of new guns of any type are banned for two years. Gun owners must submit to in-person psychological and background checks. And owning an illegal gun is punishable by up to 15 years in prison.”
Criminals rarely figure they’ll feel the penalties for their actions, especially mass shooters, so that’s not going to do much.
The rest treat law-abiding citizens like criminals. These are people who already own their guns lawfully, but now they’re having to go through and be treated like they’re fresh out of prison and looking to buy a firearm.
It’s ridiculous, especially in light of what we know about the killers in both shootings.
Then again, it’s NBC News. What do you expect?
