While citizens and advocates of gun control are responding to Friday’s horrific school shooting in Connecticut by calling on Congress to enact sensible gun regulations, some gun advocacy groups are blaming supporters of the tighter restrictions for the tragedy.

Larry Pratt, executive director of Gun Owners of America, issued a statement this evening attributing the massacre to gun regulations, arguing that had weapons been permitted on school grounds, the murders could have been avoided:

“Gun control supporters have the blood of little children on their hands. Federal and state laws combined to insure that no teacher, no administrator, no adult had a gun at the Newtown school where the children were murdered. This tragedy underscores the urgency of getting rid of gun bans in school zones. The only thing accomplished by gun free zones is to insure that mass murderers can slay more before they are finally confronted by someone with a gun.”

The National Riffle Association (NRA), most well-known gun advocacy group, has yet to issue a statement about today’s events.

Preliminary reports indicate that the gunman, 20-year-old Adam Lanza, was “heavily armed” with “multiple weapons when he entered the school.” He was also reported to be wearing camouflage and a bullet proof vest. At least three guns were used — two pistols and, according to the BBC and AP, a .223-caliber assault rifle.

America seems to be in for another debate over gun regulation after the slaughter at Sandy Hook Elementary School left 27 (mostly children) dead. So it’s worth reviewing five made against regulating gun ownership in the United States:

MYTH #1: More guns don’t lead to more murders. A survey by researchers at the Harvard University School of Public Health found strong statistical support for the idea that, even if you control for poverty levels, more people die from gun homicides in areas with higher rates of gun ownership. And despite what gun advocates say, countries like Israel and Switzerland don’t disprove the point.

MYTH #2: The Second Amendment prohibits strict gun control. While the Supreme Court ruled in D.C. v. Heller that bans on handgun ownership were unconstitutional, the ruling gives the state and federal governments a great deal of latitude to regulate that gun ownership as they choose. As the U.S. Second Court of Appeals put it in a recent ruling upholding a New York regulation, “The state’s ability to regulate firearms and, for that matter, conduct, is qualitatively different in public than in the home. Heller reinforces this view. In striking D.C.’s handgun ban, the Court stressed that banning usable handguns in the home is a ‘policy choice[]‘ that is ‘off the table,’ but that a variety of other regulatory options remain available, including categorical bans on firearm possession in certain public locations.”

MYTH #3: State-level gun controls haven’t worked. Scholars Richard Florida and Charlotta Mellander recently studied state-to-state variation in gun homicide levels. They found that “[f]irearm deaths are significantly lower in states with stricter gun control legislation.” This is backed up by research on local gun control efforts and cross-border gun violence.

MYTH #4: We only need better enforcement of the laws we have, not new laws. In fact, Congress has passed several laws that cripple the ability for current gun regulations to be enforced the way that they’re supposed to. According to researchers at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, a series of federal laws referred to as the Tiahrt amendments “limit public access to crime gun trace data, prohibit the use of gun trace data in hearings, pertaining to licensure of gun dealers and litigation against gun dealers, and restrict ATF’s authority to require gun dealers to conduct a physical inventory of their firearms.” Other federal laws “limited the ATF compliance inspections” and grant “broad protections from lawsuits against firearm manufacturers and retail sellers.”

MYTH #5: Sensible gun regulation is prohibitively unpopular. Not necessarily. As the New Republic’s Amy Sullivan reported after the series of mass shootings this summer, a majority of Americans would prefer both to enforce existing law more strictly and pass new regulations on guns when given the option to choose both rather than either/or. Specific gun regulations are also often more popular than the abstract idea.

More than 150 individuals held a vigil in front of the White House this afternoon to grieve for today’s tragic school shooting in Connecticut and encourage President Obama to take real, meaningful action on gun control.

Strangers exchanged hugs and prayed for the victims and their families in the shadow of the White House approximately an hour after President Obama addressed the shooting, fighting back tears in an afternoon statement. Many attendees held signs saying “Enough is enough” and “Today is the day”.

Photos from the event:

Andy Pelosi, a father of two elementary school girls who lives near Newtown, Connecticut, spoke passionately about the tragedy. “No children, no teachers, no staff should have to worry about going to a school in the United States of America and be gunned down,” said Pelosi. “No parent should have to worry when they put their children on a school bus in the morning, like I do and like many of you do, and worry about is my child coming home at the end of the day.”

Watch his remarks:

In his remarks to the nation about the Connecticut school shooting tragedy, President Obama said Friday, “we’re going to have to come together and take meaningful action to prevent more tragedies like this, regardless of the politics.” While he did not get specific, some lawmakers were more blunt, arguing that meaningful gun control legislation is needed to reduce the unfathomable number of such mass shootings the nation has endured since Columbine. Rep. Carolyn McCarthy (D-NY), whose husband was killed and son was injured in a the 1993 Long Island Rail Road shootings said she has given the White House notice that “the gloves are off” and will do everything possible to push for gun control — even if it means embarrassing the president.

Among the others speaking out:

1. Rep. Jerrold Nadler (D-NY): “If now is not the time to have a serious discussion about gun control and the epidemic of gun violence plaguing our society, I don’t know when is. How many more Columbines and Newtowns must we live through? I am challenging President Obama, the Congress, and the American public to act on our outrage and, finally, do something about this.”

2. Rep. Nita Lowey (D-NY): “We cannot tolerate mass shootings as a mere inconvenience or a normal part of our everyday lives. Easy availability of the deadliest weapons to the most dangerous people has cost countless lives and caused immeasurable suffering, never more so than today. Our expressions of sympathy must be matched with concrete actions to stop gun violence.”

3. Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA): “As a nation, we are again confronted with an act of terrifying mass gun violence. While the coming days should be reserved for grieving, as a legislative body, and as a people, we must consider what can be done to improve our laws to prevent the continuation of this horrific trend.”

4. Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA): “Tragedy in CT school. Unspeakable carnage. Every parent’s nightmare. Pray for the families. Congress must act now.”

5. Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ): “Americans are sick and tired of these attacks on our children and neighbors and they are sick and tired of nothing being done in Washington to stop the bloodshed. If we do not take action to address gun violence, shooting tragedies like this will continue. As President Obama said, we must act now ‘regardless of the politics.’”

6. Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA): “This touches us all so deeply, and it is long past time that we enacted sensible gun laws and school safety legislation.”

Mark Kelly, husband of former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) — herself a shooting survivor — and Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D-NY) joined in these calls aggressive action on gun control legislation.

Boston Mayor Thomas Menino (D) and New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg (I), co-chairs of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, also demanded immediate action. Among their proposals are requiring background checks for all gun purchases and increased enforcement of existing gun laws. Others have also proposed re-regulating military-style assault rifles.

And, conservative columnist David Frum noted, “A permissive gun regime is not the only reason that the United States suffers so many atrocities like the one in Connecticut. An inadequate mental health system is surely at least as important a part of the answer.”