Deckard already debunked your argument with this. Bans were banned effectively before 1997. Also, you don't mention any data points or sources....so it's also suspect. I really don't understand how you can attribute the U.S.'s 5x murder rate over Great Britain is explanable by cultural differences in the populations and not the fact that we have many many many more guns per person. To me it's clear. Banning guns would save lives.
Yeah, well that's because they are trained soldiers - not exactly just average citizens. There aren't many example of complete bans on guns outside of Europe - the worlds lowest incidence of violent crimes with firearms. You'd think that's be enough. Guess not.
You misunderstood me, Ottomaton. I was genuinely curious about the topic, because I remember the gun ban as causing a ruckus in Britain, and it made news in the States, unlike the fox hunting ban (which made scarcely a blip on the radar here, but a huge ruckus in Britain... one still going on), and didn't make the comment because I'm for banning handguns. I'm not. I was against the concealed handgun law, but not against handgun ownership. As you no doubt are aware, being a liberal doesn't mean you have to be against gun ownership, and recreational gun use, despite GOP propaganda. I have a funny story about my Dad and a burgler, but I'll contain myself. Keep D&D Civil.
It would be interesting to see a 'side-by-side' comparison of the 'murder rate' in G-8 nations. I always hear about the U.S. having an alarmingly higher rate of violent crimes compared to other 'First World' nations, but have never seen any 'hard numbers' to support it.
I'm sorry. I don't mean to stereotype or pigeon hole you. For what it is worth, I am acquainted with a London policeman who believes the increase is due to the accession of some of the former Warsaw Pact states to the EU. Some of these states tend to have a significant organized crime & corruption problem, and being in the EU allows people and goods from these countries to enter the UK with a much lower degree of security. But again it is only a theory and I don't believe the statistics in other European Union countries show the same increase.
Found this interesting link... Murders (per capita) by country http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_mur_percap-crime-murders-per-capita#rest The 'top 25' is dominated by eastern European nations/former USSR republics, including Russia (I would guess mostly due to organized crime). Pretty much dominated by developing nations, with the exception of the U.S. at #24. Interestingly enough, when you factor in all other 'violent crimes' (i.e. rape, burglary, etc.), things look a bit different, according to this old article referring to a study conducted by the International Crime Victims Survey: http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/guncontrol_20010302.html
That's OK. My wife disagrees with me about the topic. I imagine the EU is having all sorts of difficulties sorting out the relatively free movement of people and it's impact on the cultures of the member nations. Personally, I'm rooting for the different cultures retaining what makes them special and unique for purely selfish reasons, on my part. I enjoy the diversity of the European nations, their peoples and their cultures. It's always been a trip to me to see the ethnic and cultural differences as I travel there. Losing that would be a bummer, IMO. I also love the nudity all over the place... in museums, in public squares, fountains, on public beaches. What happened to that teacher would astonish any European I've ever met! Keep D&D Civil.
It has happened in Israel. In fact it was what brought about suicide bombings. The preferred method of attack used to be gunman shooting up a cafe or street corner. Once they found out that the Israelis were a well armed populace, there was a tactical shift to a method that couldn't be stopped by a gun. So, there could be an argument that having guns in schools would lead to school bombings, but to suggest that someone with a gun would not have a better chance to stop a gunman on a rampage than someone that is unarmed is asinine.
gun control or not. if someone is sick and twisted enough to go through with something like this - then gonna get hold of a gun/other weapon to do the job no matter what.
Look, we don't live in a war zone yet...most of these people who are committing these crimes are just buying them very easily. Let's take away their ability to get guns and then they can't commit these kinds of crimes. It's so simple it's mind boggling. I really don't want the USA to become like Israel.
The first problem is that you can't take away their ability to get guns. Look at automatic weapons: they are pretty much completely banned, yet a bunch of them are in the hands of gang bangers. People that are okay with murdering children are not going to balk at aquring weapons illegally. I also provided you with an example where the lack of guns did not prevent just this sort of crime, so that even if your pie in the sky notion of getting rid of all of the guns came true, the crimes would still happen. There also doesn't need to be a warzone for weapons to be successfully used for self defense. The Clinton Justice Department said that firearms were used 1.5 million times annually in self-defense. That is 1.5 million crimes prevented by guns. Kennesaw, Georgia mandates that every head of household maintain a firearm and ammunition, but it has not turned that town into a warzone where people are shooting each other for parking spaces like the anti-gun nuts fear. In fact, I believe they have a lower crime rate than other area towns. Criminals are afraid of guns. In the US the vast majority of break-ins occur when people are not at home. In countries that ban guns, as many as half of all break-ins occur with people at home, because the criminals know they won't get shot. The bottom line is, if you make having guns a crime, only criminals will have guns.
Nice creativity with facts...especially the 1.5 million times in self-defense. I chuckled at the absurdity of it. here's the reality: http://www.bradycampaign.org/facts/issues/?page=home 154 justifiable homicides. Not 1.5 million uses in self-defense. Maybe you are getting your decimal points confused? Maybe the reason intruders don't invade homes when people are in there is because they might call the cops? Ya think that's the real reason? Hmmmmmm.....
You can't take away existing guns, but you can prevent them from getting more guns. There are other, more effective, and safer ways to protect ones home from burgulary or home invasions. I don't care about hunting rifles, but we're a gun crazy culture - and we have a firearm homecide rate closer to a banana republic then a first world nation. And we also have more guns then people in the U.S. What other culture is like that? Again - a banana republic. The more guns you have in society - the more homicides there will be. Guns are meant for killing people. Work to prevent guns from getting into people's hands, and less homicides will be commited.
It is the conservative estimate from the 1994 National Survey of Private Ownership of Firearms (NSPOF), a more liberal estimate was over 4 million defensive gun uses. The National Crime Victimization Survey came up with an estimate of 108,000 defensive gun uses per year. All three surveys are quoted in this paper written by a couple of gun control advocates, along with their quibbles about why the higher estimates can't be right and the lower estimates can't be wrong (quibbles that largely break down to - we don't believe that there were that many uses of firearms in self defense, so the smaller number must be right). You breakdown in logic is that you do not have to shoot and kill someone to use your gun in defense of your person or property. Hell, you don't even have to fire your weapon. If you rack a round in your shotgun when a theif is trying to jimmy the lock on your window and the guy runs away, then you have just used a gun to protect your person or property. That doesn't address the point at all. In countries where firearms are banned, home invasions when people are home are much more common than in countries where guns are allowed. If the reason was fear of the police bing called, the presence or absence of guns should not be a factor.
OK, here's my funny story about my Dad and a burgler. (well, it was funny when he told it, anyway) Dad had moved into a ground level apartment, by himself, and was sleeping in his bed. There was a window above the bed that looked straight into a covered parking lot, with a big American sedan parked in the spot beneath the window. Dad wakes up and hears someone breaking into the window, literally above his head. He kept a pistol in a bedside table, so he reaches into the drawer, quietly, takes it out, and raises up to face whoever is trying to get in. The burgler is suddenly staring at the barrel about a foot away, with my father staring down the sights. The guy's eyes bug out, he leaps back, scrambles up the hood of the car, over the roof, down the trunk, and out into the night. Dad said it'd been a long time since he'd seen anyone move that fast! The fellow had a weapon stuck behind his belt at the back, and my father spotted it as he was hauling ass. Thank goodness, the fool forgot he had it, in his haste. After that, Dad started keeping it loaded. Yes, it was an unloaded pistol. I told him he could easily afford a better place. He liked living in the old neighborhood, except that the old neighborhood had gone seriously downhill. Kept living there, too. Sure, incidents like that are rare, and sometimes people get shot by accident. I don't think people should keep firearms unless they know how to use them, and respect them. In my father's case, he was very familiar with firearms, hunting as a kid, being a guard on mail planes and wearing a pistol in a shoulder holster, out of the old airport that became Houston's Hobby. It was the best job he could get, although he graduated at the top of his high school class. The Depression had a way of doing things like that to people. He enlisted at the beginning of WWII and ended up shooting the Japanese, in a freak incident that was a nasty little fight between a B-25 he was hitching a ride on (that had no bombs), and a big sub that evidently couldn't submerge. That's another story I've told here before, so I'll spare everyone. Keep D&D Civil.
What makes no sense is that in countries where guns are banned - there's less crime. Less killing, shootings, and such. You keep claiming that other countries have more home invasions - but I haven't seen any facts or sources. So I don't buy your argument. What I do know is that the U.S. has more guns then people, and has the highest murder rate and firearm killing rate of any "first" world nation on earth. Explanation?
Canada has tons of guns (literally and figuratively) and a miniscule murder rate. Same goes for Switzerland. Israel has more guns than you can throw a rock at, er shake a stick at, and their domestic crime rate is pretty low IIRC (they mostly have problems with being attacked by foreign terrorists). If having guns was the problem, why would the US be the only first world country that had a lot of guns to have a lot of violence? Could it be that there is some other factor in the US that leads to violence instead of/in addition to guns? To see the "effectiveness" of a gun ban, maybe you should look at Australia. They in effect banned guns in 1996. Their violent crime rates went up following the ban. From 1995 (the last pre-ban year) to 2001 (allowing for the effects of the ban to be felt) their homicide rate dropped 11%, but their assault rate increased by 39%, their rape rate increased by 19%, and their robbery rate increased by 70%. Could this poosibly be because the criminals had no need to fear their victims being armed? Outside of homicides, Australia has much worse per capita violent crime rates than the US now. Is it worth it to prevent 40 homicides if it causes 3,600 rapes? Banning guns to solve our problems with murders is a childish and simplistic solution to a complex problem, like trying banning airplanes to solve our problems with terrorism. You have to address the actors not the tools. As for other countries having more home invasions, I said no such thing. I said that in countries that have banned guns, a greater percentage of home invasions occur when the people are at home. I don't feel like tracking down where I read that, but you are welcome to look if you don't believe me, or continue not believing me for all I care.
Sorry for derailing this thread into a gun control thread and this is an issue that I can agree with aspects of both sides on. Just some food for thought though. With easy access to guns yes people can defend themselves better but criminals or those thinking of committing crimes can get them easier too. I think how much a society can stand having an armed populace depends on how much faith in the humanity and government of that society. For instance one can say that in a society like Switzerland where there is a very strong civic commitment the Swiss feel that their soceity is stable enough that having everyone armed is fine while in Singapore where guns are strictly banned their is enough faith in the government to guarentee security. My own view of gun control is that this is an issue best left for each state to decide what level of gun control they should based upon their own cultures rather than trying to have a federal standard.
I like that view. Let the states decide within the framework of the Constitution. The example of Switzerland and Singapore is a good one. I'm a big fan of the Swiss form of government, and remember being there in the '60's and '70's. Just an amazing country of well educated, bilingual people, and the first time you're standing in a train station, or sitting at a sidewalk cafe and a Swiss strides up with an assault rifle over their shoulder and gets on the train with you, or sits and gets a cup of coffee can be startling. Hitler left them alone in part because they knew it would be a nightmare to attempt a takeover. They have jet fighters in caves that can taxi out and take off from a freeway. Just a real trip. Singapore? A highly advanced country with a low crime rate, and a very high level of eduacation as well. Similar to Switzerland in that respect. I don't respect their form of government, but they are doing well as a country. Interesting contrast there, Sishir. Keep D&D Civil.
I would suggest that murder rates have to do with having a population of extremely poor people relative to the general population with little chance of improving their lot in life. In the US it would be inner-city African Americans. In some of the Eastern European countries and Russia it is more peasant farmers and people who haven’t adapted well to the post Communist world. One thing that Switzerland has in common with some of the other European countries like Sweden is that it has strong social programs; there aren’t any ‘forgotten people’. If you want to believe that ownership of guns plays a part in the murder rate, that's your prerogative of course. I would hope, however, that you would at least give some thought to what I am suggesting as a cause.
