Australia Doubles Down on Gun Control After Mass Shooting
For decades, Australians have watched in disbelief as America endured mass shooting after mass shooting. Each horrific episode touched off a familiar cycle of horror in the United States, an outpouring of grief, followed by calls for tougher gun laws that would inevitably dissolve to the status quo.
Most Australians felt certain that things at home were different. After all, three decades ago, it took just 12 days after a massacre in which a gunman killed 35 people in Port Arthur, Tasmania, for the country to adopt sweeping gun ownership restrictions. For two decades after the carnage, there wasn’t a single mass shooting in Australia.
The shooting, which left at least 15 dead and scores wounded, has forced a hard look at gun control in Australia — how the number of licensed firearms had steadily risen over the years, how some of the pledged changes were never fully implemented, how the country had gotten complacent in three decades largely free of this particular brand of indiscriminate terror.
Governments are suppose to be designed to be responsive to the wishes of the majority. To solve problems the majority want solved.
AI Overview
Yes, recent polls consistently show that a
majority of Americans favor stricter gun control laws in general. For example, polls conducted in late 2024 and 2025 found that 56% to 60% of U.S. adults want gun laws to be stricter.
It has been an epic failure of governance that the US continues to essentially do nothing about the annual, mass slaughter of Americans.
