Matthew McConaughey Has Delivered An Impassioned Speech For Gun Control
These regulations are not a step back, they're a step forward for a civil society and the second amendment."
Last week, a teenage gunman opened fire with a semi-automatic rifle at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas.
The shooter, eighteen-year-old Salvador Rolando Ramos, killed nineteen schoolchildren and two teachers in a rampage that lasted over an hour before he was fatally shot by police officers.
The murders in Uvalde were the most deadly school shooting in America since the Sandy Hook massacre, in a year that has already seen twenty-six similar shootings at American schools.
In the fallout of the shooting, American actor and Uvalde local, Matthew McConaughey has given an impassioned speech arguing for gun control at a White House press briefing. McConaughey, who has previously been outspoken about his gun ownership, says he quickly travelled to his hometown in the days following the school shooting where has was confronted with scenes of shock and anger.
“The common thread, independent of the anger and the confusion and the sadness, it was the same. How can these families continue to honour these deaths by keeping the dreams of these children and teachers alive? Again, how can the loss of these lives matter?” McConaughey says in the viral video.
McConaughey was visibly affected as he recounted the victims of the school shooting, including passionate ten-year-old environmentalist Maite Rodriguez whose body tragically could only be identified after her death by the shoes she was wearing.
Wow, this McConaughey speech pic.twitter.com/0CeFFdAhlw
— Acyn (@Acyn) June 7, 2022
“We need responsible gun ownership, we need background checks, we need to raise the minimum age to purchase an AR-15 rifle to twenty-one. We need a waiting period for those rifles, we need red flag laws and consequences for those who abuse them. These are reasonable, practicable, tactical regulations to our nation’s state’s communities and homes,” McConaughey confirmed in the video.
“These regulations are not a step back, they’re a step forward for a civil society and the second amendment.”
“Look Is this a cure-all? Hell no, but people are hurting. Families are, parents are. As divided as our country is, this gun responsibility issue is one we agree on more than we don’t. This should be a non-partisan issue.”
You can watch the full video below.
Photo Credit: @BillyCalzad