Gun Control
It was a sunny Sunday afternoon in Sydney way back on 28 th April 1996. I was making my way to the local gym as, in those days, I was a regular gym junkie. Just before I left my home, I heard on the radio that a gunman had been on a killing spree in Tasmania. At that stage only a small number of people had lost their lives. When I got to the gym, the number of deaths had risen to 23. I mentioned this to my gym instructor. His response was that it was the gunman’s form “of self-expression”. The instructor was reading the Celestine Prophecy at the time, which probably explained his comments. I personally preferred the term “madman”. The gunman was named Martin Bryant and the final death toll was 35. The whole of Australia was in shock. How could anyone kill 35 innocent people? There was an outpouring of disbelief and anger. How could we stop this from happening again? The Prime Minister at the time was the right wing conservative John Howard. He had been in the ro