After learning that it’s children who are the leading experts on gun violence just yesterday, we have another terrible thing to share. It’s how easy it is nowadays to get a deadly weapon in America. You just need a 3D-printer. Yes, you would ask why anyone would do that. Well, we can tell you that in recent years more than 100,000 Americans have downloaded plans to print 3D weapons. What’s even more terrifying is that—as of June 2018—Small Arms Survey’s report estimates that American civilians own  393 million guns, almost half of the worldwide total.

Quite understandably, while taking the history of gun possession in the US, it’s clear why Stop Handgun Violence (SHV) and creative agency Arnold have decided to also launch a new public awareness campaign that aims to drive home the dangers of 3D-printed firearms. And what’s the best way to show the dangers of homemade guns? Use 3D-printed models.

The short film reveals the horror and fear on student’s faces to remind everyone of the now-all-to-common experiences of school shootings in the North American country. It comprises of still 3D images of students carrying backpacks and books as they enter their high school. An image that would not normally bring any fears, well apart from upcoming tests. Yet, when you have children telling school staff on how to behave during school shootings, the events turn a dark path very quickly. The haunting video shows teenagers trying to barricade a door and then climbing through broken windows, which usually becomes the only mean of escape from an active shooter. One that ends with cuts and broken bones.

After these horrifying scenes of a mass shooting at a nondescript high school, which could just represent any school in the US, the black-and-white nightmare concludes with a rallying cry for Americans to contact their congresspeople to drive forward national legislative action.

“We are in desperate need for more public support to push lawmakers to ban 3D printed guns,” John Rosenthal, Founder and Chair of Stop Handgun Violence, explains the dire situation. “These firearms pose a huge risk to public safety and we need our elected officials to take swift action to stem the flow of these dangerous and completely unregulated weapons. As 3D printing technology becomes cheaper and better, the dangers will exponentially climb. 3D guns are catastrophes waiting to happen and we must amp up the narrative legislative action before that happens. We are cautiously optimistic that our effort will bring a bill that bans 3D guns to Congress,” he adds pleadingly.

To push for a necessary change—and to get guns out of the reach of would-be school assassins that were responsible for endangering more than 228,000 students with gun violence at school since the Columbine High School massacre—the Boston-based agency Arnold, production and design studio LOBO, and directors Mateus de Paula Santos and Aron Matschulat Aguiar created the poignant video alongside SHV, the non-profit organization that has been the lead advocate in Massachusetts, the state with “the lowest gun death rate and the most effective gun violence prevention laws in the continental United States”. Although real progress has been made in the Commonwealth through educating and activating concerned citizens, community groups and legislators, violence in schools remains a real threat. The eerie PSA illustrates the unique and preventable dangers of printing 3D guns.

While, thankfully, no real incidents from 3D guns have yet materialized, SHV aims to be more proactive than reactive and it’s because of “the fact that 3D printed guns are becoming more accessible and untraceable is terrifying. This simply can’t become the new normal,” explains Arnold Chief Creative Officer Icaro Doria.

She then furthers her worries because: “While 3D printers were billed as tech for good, the sad reality is that they are proving that they can also be a deadly path toward imminent danger. With 3D printers in homes, offices, and even at some local public libraries, ill-intentioned people have high-tech tools to make deadly weapons at their disposal without detection by law enforcement.”

And we can only confirm that this is what 3D printed guns look like. They’re easy to make and almost impossible to stop. More than 100,000 Americans have downloaded plans to print 3D weapons. That’s why it’s so important to ban the downloading and use of these dangerous digital plans. Learn more about how you can help ban 3D printed guns now at Ban3DPrintedGuns.com.

If you visit the website, you will get the option to share the call for banning the possibility of printing deadly weapons, as well as putting more pressure on Congress by telling your representative to ban 3D-printed guns. And that’s not the end. The site ends with a simple counter. With a number of Americans killed by guns since the massacre at Sandy Hook – currently at 234,713! And it’s rising…

Moreover, if you wish to help the non-profit organization Stop Handgun Violence—which committed to the prevention of gun violence through education, public awareness, effective law enforcement and common-sense gun laws—you can go to www.stophandgunviolence.org and find out more. We can tell you that the organization does not seek to restrict Constitutional rights, but rather advocate only for common sense legislation that will help save lives.

Credits:

Client: Stop Handgun Violence

Agency: Arnold

Production and design studio: LOBO

Directors: Mateus de Paula Santos, Aron Matschulat Aguiar