You are of course entitled to your opinion mate, but I sternly hold the view that the rights of a law-abiding majority should not be curtailed owing to the acts of a criminal minority. (Something relevant to both replica firearms and assault weapons.)
After the Dunblane massacre in Scotland, the British government banned the private ownership of handguns here in the United Kingdom; exactly for the reasons you advocate. (The risk outweighs their legitimate use.) The theory was that banning ownership would reduce gun crime. It hasn't. Gun crime in Britain has steadily increased since the ban (along with violent crime as a whole) and has demonstrated clearly that such legislation affects only law-abiding owners, and that criminals still have an available supply of handguns.
Needless to say, I have no doubt that if the ownership of assault weapons were banned in the United States, criminals would still have ready access to them through illegal channels. Just because something is prohibited, doesn't mean it isn't available.
As an aside, you could argue that the gun as a machine is designed to kill people, or at least another living thing; the only variables are factors such as ammunition capacity and cyclic rate. Whilst I accept that an assault rifle has greater lethality than a handgun, [b]both[/b] can kill. If one contemplates banning assault weapons because of the risk they pose in crime, it seems absurd not to apply the same restriction to [i]all[/i] firearms. Maybe in just being facetious, but people will always be killed by guns if their private ownership is legal. The only practicable options would be to either maintain the status quo, or prohibit the ownership of ALL firearms. (This of course, does not consider guns in the possession of criminals...)
In this context, a ban on only assault weapons when the vast majority of gun crime is probably committed with handguns seems a tad hypocritical.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Space Ghost [/i]
[B]Perhaps I should rephrase my argument to say that the risk assault weapons pose, in my opinion, is far greater than the legitimate purposes they serve to law abiding citizens. While I respect your lifestyle as a replica owner, the fact of the matter is assult weapons are meant to kill people, plain and simple. As far as I am concerned, they do it too easily to justify anyone owning them, outside of the military. [/B][/QUOTE]
As Morden already stated firearms were orignaly designed to kill people.
Secondly the idea that a "assualt weapon" kills too "easily" is propoganda. your standard 30-06, which is the default hunting caliber in the united states, is more leathal, and at twice the ranges then a 5.56 NATO assualt rifle. Of course, the 30-06 was the standard US military cartridge during both world wars. And to think this year is its hundredth aniversary. More people have probably been killed by that venerable cartridge then have been by 5.56 NATO out of assualt rifles.
Worse yet if you think about it, SWAT style heavy armored vests are easily capabile of defeating multiple hits from a 5.56 NATO assualt rifle. However the heaviest caliber weapon I currently own is bolt action rifle in .375 Holland and Holland. Which will either penetrate the vest, or even if the bullet is stoped the blunt force trauma transmited from the round will still most likely kill or at least severely injure the wearer.
Last but not least the actual statiscs involving assualt weapons in crime is isanely low. If police face a longarm its damn near always a shotgun. I think something like 1.4 percent of all firearms related crimes involved an assualt weapon.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Messiah [/i]
[B]As I said, it was a guess..
If youre talking about USA that is, but guns arent illegal there, are they?
If youre assuming that each person owns just one gun. ok 1/10000 might be far off the mark, but it would more likely be between 1/1000 - 1/3000. I.e. one person owns between 3 and 10 guns..
I did say illegal firearms.. :rolleyes:
the problem with that number is that antique firearms are also counted here in sweden, so even if that gun might not work, you still have to report it.
Even crossbows are counted as firearms here, so I will have to get a permit to use it in my reenactor club.. [/B][/QUOTE]
Well first, I think considering were talking illegal firearms distributed through the black market you would probably find them a bit more dispersed
then you would think, but 2 per criminal seems reasonable, so your at 1 in 600. Still a bit off from your innitial assumptions.
Additionaly firearms are not legal for EVERYONE to purchase. Felons are not allowed to buy, or posses firearms. There is a background check done at point of sale. Due to the modern computerized age, it only takes a moderate amount of time. Now Ive never had it take only 15 minutes, Typicly its about half an hour. And I noticed SpiritOne neglected to mention that fingerprints are taken at time of purchase. Either thumb or index fingers of both hands are printed.
Secondly the UN report had more distinguishing criteria then that, it did restrict itself to its definition of firearms, IE weapons utilizing a chemical propellent, however I believe the antique weapons do qualify. However weve now established that there are a certain amount of legal firearms in civilian hands in Sweden.
Yet they still dont seem to cause the level of problems you see in the United States. Whats weird is that in the developed western world the US has the second highest homicde rate, With Taiwan at the lead. Yet Taiwan has nearly no legal guns in civilian hands.
Even if you remove firearms the homicide rate in the US is double that of several european nations.
The cause of the carnage in the US isnt the presence of guns. there are guns everywhere in Israel and they rarely have "criminal" murders, the violence there is tied to a low level war thats been simmering for decades. (and a situation where even if both sides were disarmed, they WOULD be killing each other with rocks, hell look at the Infitada) The US's high murder rate is caused by various conflicting strains of its culture. Many social groups do not subscribe to the same normative values that are held in general in western europe. Violence and murder is deemed a usefull tool for problem resolution. Untill that mentality itself is changed, then the murder rate in the US wont decrease.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Tyvar [/i]
[B]Well first, I think considering were talking illegal firearms distributed through the black market you would probably find them a bit more dispersed
then you would think, but 2 per criminal seems reasonable, so your at 1 in 600. Still a bit off from your innitial assumptions.
[/b][/quote]
of the people I know who (I know) have guns, noone only has one, and two (out of three) have more than five..
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Tyvar [/i]
[B]The cause of the carnage in the US isnt the presence of guns. there are guns everywhere in Israel and they rarely have "criminal" murders, the violence there is tied to a low level war thats been simmering for decades. (and a situation where even if both sides were disarmed, they WOULD be killing each other with rocks, hell look at the Infitada) The US's high murder rate is caused by various conflicting strains of its culture. Many social groups do not subscribe to the same normative values that are held in general in western europe. Violence and murder is deemed a usefull tool for problem resolution. Untill that mentality itself is changed, then the murder rate in the US wont decrease. [/B][/QUOTE]
On the other hand, if regular joes in Israel didnt have guns, they would be a lot easier to control by the police and armed forces..
I think there would be a difference in patterns of firearms ownership between those with legal weapons and illegal. Those who have illegal weapons have different motivations for owning them.
As for Israel, do you know about the history of the infatada? of the trouble and destruction that the palestinans were able to cause to the Israelis without guns? Of the fact that its also a classic example of how if there is a will, a group will find itself weapons? Do you think that the PLO, Hamas and Hezbolla bought their guns in gunstores?
If a group has the decision to disobey the law and rebel, there is little police and military authorties can do short of violence.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Tyvar [/i]
[B]I think there would be a difference in patterns of firearms ownership between those with legal weapons and illegal. Those who have illegal weapons have different motivations for owning them.[/B][/QUOTE]
Out of the three people I know who have guns at home, one is a member of the "homeguard" and only has an AK4 at home, the other two are gun collectors, and you cant have a licence for a uzi in Sweden, so..
Hollywood to the contrary the actual number of legal Uzi's in the country is a fairly low number, and last I checked none of the legal fully automatic uzi's have ever been used in a crime, so whats your point?
Both of the people I know have more that one gun (in fact more that five each iirc) own them illegally. The person I know who [i]only[/i] has one gun owns it legally. Hence from my experience those who have illegal guns tend to have more than those with illegal guns. If you already have one illegal gun, why not have several, but if you only have legal guns, its hard to get more than 3 licenced..
hence the guessing around 1/3000 illegal gun owners.
Well, next question, have either of the illegal gun holders gone around killing people? and why do they own the guns anyways? are they criminals (outside of illegaly having guns)? Or do they just like guns?
Secondly, where are they getting their ammo? or do they have any?
Your claim is that the high ratio of homicde in the united states is either entirely dependent on, or highly dependent on the ratio of guns to people. My point is that its there may not be a strong relationship between the two.
I was attempting to point out that the ratio of guns, both illegal and legal in Sweden while dramaticly lower, is still high enough, that if there was a strong causitive relationship it would have manifested.
I think another problem is that your trying to generalize the situation in sweden via knowledge of two individuals who while strange from your point of view are essentialy law abiding, other then the fact that they are hording illegal firearms.
In order to get a more accurate view of the distribution of firearms wouldnt you have to figure out what the distribution of illegal firearms would be.
Your arguments seem to gloss over the fact that despite what many would have you believe glocks are not sold in 7/11's to kids. The US has laws on distribution of firearms, which include age restirctions, criminal background restrictions and mental health restrictions.
Id like to do a true comparison of the crime rates across the board in the US and sweden however swedish crime statistics post 1998 are impossible for me to find.
What about Switzerland? Don't they require that every adult male be a member of the reserves, and keep in his home a military issue assault rifle, capable of automatic fire? They have a low crime rate, right?
People commit crimes. Like Tyvar said, it is a cultural thing. Crime existed long before firearms, and it will exist even if they are made obsolete by newer weapons.
Here in the US, local violent crime numbers tend to go down after laws allowing concealed carry of pistols are enacted.
And didn't British and Australian violent crime rates go up dramatically after strict gun control laws were passed? I don't have numbers at the moment to back this up, but I have seen some pretty convincing statistics in the past.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Tyvar [/i]
[B]Your claim is that the high ratio of homicde in the united states is either entirely dependent on, or highly dependent on the ratio of guns to people. My point is that its there may not be a strong relationship between the two.[/B][/QUOTE]
I never said such a thing.
Yes, I know I am generalizing here.
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them, and the chance is less that someone that has a gun would go berzerk when youre around..
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them [/B][/QUOTE]
Less LAW ABIDING CITIZENS would have them. Making guns illegal does nothing to stop the already illegal gun exchange.
That is the real point of the Penn & Teller episode, and what just about everyone else is saying.
If you outlaw guns only outlaws will have guns.
Does that REALLY help lower crime? NO. Again because criminals WITH GUNS know they have no fear of having a gun pulled on them when they commit a crime. Look at Texas, I know its the asshole of America, and I know they have some problems, but we allow concealed carry around here, there arent road rage shootouts every day, there arent people shooting each other over who gets the last can of tuna in a grocery store, in fact violent crime with guns occurs less than it did before the concealed carry laws.
Guns in the RIGHT HANDS are not dangerous its the guns in the hands of CRIMINALS that are. And once again, criminals dont buy their guns legally, so gun control does nothing to prevent crime.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by SpiritOne [/i]
[B]Less LAW ABIDING CITIZENS would have them. Making guns illegal does nothing to stop the already illegal gun exchange.[/B][/QUOTE]
Of course, because the people who would have illegal guns are by default, not law abiding.
But if you think that in two given countries , one with guns being illegal, where X = percentage of population with illegal guns, and Y = percentage of population with legal guns and X + Y = Z, that Z is the same. I highly doubt it..
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Hasdrubal [/i]
[B]And didn't British and Australian violent crime rates go up dramatically after strict gun control laws were passed? I don't have numbers at the moment to back this up, but I have seen some pretty convincing statistics in the past. [/B][/QUOTE]
Quite so sir, I mentioned it in one of my previous posts. Outlawing guns does not eliminate gun crime.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted Messiah[/i]
[B]Of course, because the people who would have illegal guns are by default, not law abiding.[/B][/QUOTE]
But surely it's the application/use of an illegal item which is the real acid test of legislatory success? If guns were outlawed, I very much doubt the formerly responsible owners would immediately use them to commit crime, just because of their prohibition. (Criminals, however, have no such compunction.) Illegal gun ownership does not automatically result in violent gun crime being comitted: This factor is determined by the individual.
In essence, it's the guns that are in the hands of criminals that are the problem - Spiritone has this bang on.
Messiah, Canada is a good example of what I am talking about. A lot of people in Canada own guns for hunting, but their violent crime (meaning crimes commited with guns) is just not that high of a ratio.
Im NOT saying if everyone had guns there would be no crime, I AM saying it makes no sense to pass legislature that restricts what guns a non-criminal can have. Gun control doesnt prevent crime.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Messiah [/i]
[B]I never said such a thing.
Yes, I know I am generalizing here.
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them, and the chance is less that someone that has a gun would go berzerk when youre around..
Read my posts.. [/B][/QUOTE]
Again, dispite hollywood and stuff, crazy guys going berzerk with guns doesnt happen that often. And nor is it even a sizable portion of our homicide rate. Hell, mass murder incidents is probably something like 1 percent of our homicide rate, if that, considering their are 14,000 homicides in the US in any given year. Most of our homicides are again occuring in the context of pre existing criminality.
It seems to me the big problem is you dont understand the reality of the situation here regarding US homicides. While guys "going crazy" and killing people is sensational and it hits the news, the reason why it hits the news is its fairly rare.
In the US civilians commit justifiable homicide in defense of their persons about 260 times a year. Thats probably greater then the number that get murderd as a result of some guy snapping.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Morden279 [/i]
[B]But surely it's the application/use of an illegal item which is the real acid test of legislatory success? If guns were outlawed, I very much doubt the formerly responsible owners would immediately use them to commit crime, just because of their prohibition. (Criminals, however, have no such compunction.) Illegal gun ownership does not automatically result in violent gun crime being comitted: This factor is determined by the individual.
[/B][/QUOTE]
The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL].
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Messiah [/i]
[B]The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL]. [/B][/QUOTE]
But only in the hands of those who intend to use them in a lethal capacity. I think we've established that the overwhelming majority of gun owners do not think this way.
And considering the arguments put forth in this thread, I really think the speculative contents of that link do not count for much. Existing records both here and abroad agree that reducing the availability of guns does not result in a decline in either gun crime, or the lethality of gun crime.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Messiah [/i]
[B]The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL]. [/B][/QUOTE]
While firearms are the weapon of choice in criminal activities in the US, it doesnt necessarily imply the violence is more leathal because of guns. Again, Id refer to you to Taiwan which has a homicide rate higher then the US, yet over 90% of those homicides are not done with firearms. Hell one of the surpsing bits of information that came out about the Rwandan genoicide is that the most common cause of death in that hell was the machette.
If there is a will to commit murder, you can do it with a variety of implements and tools, that are fairly effective in killing someone. Even if you magicly removed firearms from the US altogeather, I wouldnt be suprised to see that it would result in only a negligible drop in our homicide statistics.
Most of the homicides that occur in the United States feature some form of premediation, not just guy A gets in argument with guy B and guy A whips out gun because he's angry and shoots guy B. Even murders involving an argument often have a good amount of time lapse between the first incident and the homicide. With the idea of premediation kept in mind, the perpatrator if he doesnt have firearms availible will often find some other method of attack.
Comments
After the Dunblane massacre in Scotland, the British government banned the private ownership of handguns here in the United Kingdom; exactly for the reasons you advocate. (The risk outweighs their legitimate use.) The theory was that banning ownership would reduce gun crime. It hasn't. Gun crime in Britain has steadily increased since the ban (along with violent crime as a whole) and has demonstrated clearly that such legislation affects only law-abiding owners, and that criminals still have an available supply of handguns.
Needless to say, I have no doubt that if the ownership of assault weapons were banned in the United States, criminals would still have ready access to them through illegal channels. Just because something is prohibited, doesn't mean it isn't available.
As an aside, you could argue that the gun as a machine is designed to kill people, or at least another living thing; the only variables are factors such as ammunition capacity and cyclic rate. Whilst I accept that an assault rifle has greater lethality than a handgun, [b]both[/b] can kill. If one contemplates banning assault weapons because of the risk they pose in crime, it seems absurd not to apply the same restriction to [i]all[/i] firearms. Maybe in just being facetious, but people will always be killed by guns if their private ownership is legal. The only practicable options would be to either maintain the status quo, or prohibit the ownership of ALL firearms. (This of course, does not consider guns in the possession of criminals...)
In this context, a ban on only assault weapons when the vast majority of gun crime is probably committed with handguns seems a tad hypocritical.
[B]Perhaps I should rephrase my argument to say that the risk assault weapons pose, in my opinion, is far greater than the legitimate purposes they serve to law abiding citizens. While I respect your lifestyle as a replica owner, the fact of the matter is assult weapons are meant to kill people, plain and simple. As far as I am concerned, they do it too easily to justify anyone owning them, outside of the military. [/B][/QUOTE]
As Morden already stated firearms were orignaly designed to kill people.
Secondly the idea that a "assualt weapon" kills too "easily" is propoganda. your standard 30-06, which is the default hunting caliber in the united states, is more leathal, and at twice the ranges then a 5.56 NATO assualt rifle. Of course, the 30-06 was the standard US military cartridge during both world wars. And to think this year is its hundredth aniversary. More people have probably been killed by that venerable cartridge then have been by 5.56 NATO out of assualt rifles.
Worse yet if you think about it, SWAT style heavy armored vests are easily capabile of defeating multiple hits from a 5.56 NATO assualt rifle. However the heaviest caliber weapon I currently own is bolt action rifle in .375 Holland and Holland. Which will either penetrate the vest, or even if the bullet is stoped the blunt force trauma transmited from the round will still most likely kill or at least severely injure the wearer.
Last but not least the actual statiscs involving assualt weapons in crime is isanely low. If police face a longarm its damn near always a shotgun. I think something like 1.4 percent of all firearms related crimes involved an assualt weapon.
[B]As I said, it was a guess..
If youre talking about USA that is, but guns arent illegal there, are they?
If youre assuming that each person owns just one gun. ok 1/10000 might be far off the mark, but it would more likely be between 1/1000 - 1/3000. I.e. one person owns between 3 and 10 guns..
I did say illegal firearms.. :rolleyes:
the problem with that number is that antique firearms are also counted here in sweden, so even if that gun might not work, you still have to report it.
Even crossbows are counted as firearms here, so I will have to get a permit to use it in my reenactor club.. [/B][/QUOTE]
Well first, I think considering were talking illegal firearms distributed through the black market you would probably find them a bit more dispersed
then you would think, but 2 per criminal seems reasonable, so your at 1 in 600. Still a bit off from your innitial assumptions.
Additionaly firearms are not legal for EVERYONE to purchase. Felons are not allowed to buy, or posses firearms. There is a background check done at point of sale. Due to the modern computerized age, it only takes a moderate amount of time. Now Ive never had it take only 15 minutes, Typicly its about half an hour. And I noticed SpiritOne neglected to mention that fingerprints are taken at time of purchase. Either thumb or index fingers of both hands are printed.
Secondly the UN report had more distinguishing criteria then that, it did restrict itself to its definition of firearms, IE weapons utilizing a chemical propellent, however I believe the antique weapons do qualify. However weve now established that there are a certain amount of legal firearms in civilian hands in Sweden.
Yet they still dont seem to cause the level of problems you see in the United States. Whats weird is that in the developed western world the US has the second highest homicde rate, With Taiwan at the lead. Yet Taiwan has nearly no legal guns in civilian hands.
Even if you remove firearms the homicide rate in the US is double that of several european nations.
The cause of the carnage in the US isnt the presence of guns. there are guns everywhere in Israel and they rarely have "criminal" murders, the violence there is tied to a low level war thats been simmering for decades. (and a situation where even if both sides were disarmed, they WOULD be killing each other with rocks, hell look at the Infitada) The US's high murder rate is caused by various conflicting strains of its culture. Many social groups do not subscribe to the same normative values that are held in general in western europe. Violence and murder is deemed a usefull tool for problem resolution. Untill that mentality itself is changed, then the murder rate in the US wont decrease.
[B]Well first, I think considering were talking illegal firearms distributed through the black market you would probably find them a bit more dispersed
then you would think, but 2 per criminal seems reasonable, so your at 1 in 600. Still a bit off from your innitial assumptions.
[/b][/quote]
of the people I know who (I know) have guns, noone only has one, and two (out of three) have more than five..
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted by Tyvar [/i]
[B]The cause of the carnage in the US isnt the presence of guns. there are guns everywhere in Israel and they rarely have "criminal" murders, the violence there is tied to a low level war thats been simmering for decades. (and a situation where even if both sides were disarmed, they WOULD be killing each other with rocks, hell look at the Infitada) The US's high murder rate is caused by various conflicting strains of its culture. Many social groups do not subscribe to the same normative values that are held in general in western europe. Violence and murder is deemed a usefull tool for problem resolution. Untill that mentality itself is changed, then the murder rate in the US wont decrease. [/B][/QUOTE]
On the other hand, if regular joes in Israel didnt have guns, they would be a lot easier to control by the police and armed forces..
As for Israel, do you know about the history of the infatada? of the trouble and destruction that the palestinans were able to cause to the Israelis without guns? Of the fact that its also a classic example of how if there is a will, a group will find itself weapons? Do you think that the PLO, Hamas and Hezbolla bought their guns in gunstores?
If a group has the decision to disobey the law and rebel, there is little police and military authorties can do short of violence.
[B]I think there would be a difference in patterns of firearms ownership between those with legal weapons and illegal. Those who have illegal weapons have different motivations for owning them.[/B][/QUOTE]
Out of the three people I know who have guns at home, one is a member of the "homeguard" and only has an AK4 at home, the other two are gun collectors, and you cant have a licence for a uzi in Sweden, so..
Both of the people I know have more that one gun (in fact more that five each iirc) own them illegally. The person I know who [i]only[/i] has one gun owns it legally. Hence from my experience those who have illegal guns tend to have more than those with illegal guns. If you already have one illegal gun, why not have several, but if you only have legal guns, its hard to get more than 3 licenced..
hence the guessing around 1/3000 illegal gun owners.
Understand?
and I mean that in a way that can only describe the feeling I get after laughing at that post.
Secondly, where are they getting their ammo? or do they have any?
They are gun crazy, and I never trusted them while they were in my platoon (which is where I know them from), but I dont think they would kill anyone.
I was attempting to point out that the ratio of guns, both illegal and legal in Sweden while dramaticly lower, is still high enough, that if there was a strong causitive relationship it would have manifested.
I think another problem is that your trying to generalize the situation in sweden via knowledge of two individuals who while strange from your point of view are essentialy law abiding, other then the fact that they are hording illegal firearms.
In order to get a more accurate view of the distribution of firearms wouldnt you have to figure out what the distribution of illegal firearms would be.
Your arguments seem to gloss over the fact that despite what many would have you believe glocks are not sold in 7/11's to kids. The US has laws on distribution of firearms, which include age restirctions, criminal background restrictions and mental health restrictions.
Id like to do a true comparison of the crime rates across the board in the US and sweden however swedish crime statistics post 1998 are impossible for me to find.
People commit crimes. Like Tyvar said, it is a cultural thing. Crime existed long before firearms, and it will exist even if they are made obsolete by newer weapons.
Here in the US, local violent crime numbers tend to go down after laws allowing concealed carry of pistols are enacted.
And didn't British and Australian violent crime rates go up dramatically after strict gun control laws were passed? I don't have numbers at the moment to back this up, but I have seen some pretty convincing statistics in the past.
[B]Your claim is that the high ratio of homicde in the united states is either entirely dependent on, or highly dependent on the ratio of guns to people. My point is that its there may not be a strong relationship between the two.[/B][/QUOTE]
I never said such a thing.
Yes, I know I am generalizing here.
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them, and the chance is less that someone that has a gun would go berzerk when youre around..
Read my posts..
[B]
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them [/B][/QUOTE]
Less LAW ABIDING CITIZENS would have them. Making guns illegal does nothing to stop the already illegal gun exchange.
That is the real point of the Penn & Teller episode, and what just about everyone else is saying.
If you outlaw guns only outlaws will have guns.
Does that REALLY help lower crime? NO. Again because criminals WITH GUNS know they have no fear of having a gun pulled on them when they commit a crime. Look at Texas, I know its the asshole of America, and I know they have some problems, but we allow concealed carry around here, there arent road rage shootouts every day, there arent people shooting each other over who gets the last can of tuna in a grocery store, in fact violent crime with guns occurs less than it did before the concealed carry laws.
Guns in the RIGHT HANDS are not dangerous its the guns in the hands of CRIMINALS that are. And once again, criminals dont buy their guns legally, so gun control does nothing to prevent crime.
[B]Less LAW ABIDING CITIZENS would have them. Making guns illegal does nothing to stop the already illegal gun exchange.[/B][/QUOTE]
Of course, because the people who would have illegal guns are by default, not law abiding.
But if you think that in two given countries , one with guns being illegal, where X = percentage of population with illegal guns, and Y = percentage of population with legal guns and X + Y = Z, that Z is the same. I highly doubt it..
[B]And didn't British and Australian violent crime rates go up dramatically after strict gun control laws were passed? I don't have numbers at the moment to back this up, but I have seen some pretty convincing statistics in the past. [/B][/QUOTE]
Quite so sir, I mentioned it in one of my previous posts. Outlawing guns does not eliminate gun crime.
[QUOTE][i]Originally posted Messiah[/i]
[B]Of course, because the people who would have illegal guns are by default, not law abiding.[/B][/QUOTE]
But surely it's the application/use of an illegal item which is the real acid test of legislatory success? If guns were outlawed, I very much doubt the formerly responsible owners would immediately use them to commit crime, just because of their prohibition. (Criminals, however, have no such compunction.) Illegal gun ownership does not automatically result in violent gun crime being comitted: This factor is determined by the individual.
In essence, it's the guns that are in the hands of criminals that are the problem - Spiritone has this bang on.
Im NOT saying if everyone had guns there would be no crime, I AM saying it makes no sense to pass legislature that restricts what guns a non-criminal can have. Gun control doesnt prevent crime.
[B]I never said such a thing.
Yes, I know I am generalizing here.
what I was trying to point out though, is that if guns were illegal, less people would have them, and the chance is less that someone that has a gun would go berzerk when youre around..
Read my posts.. [/B][/QUOTE]
Again, dispite hollywood and stuff, crazy guys going berzerk with guns doesnt happen that often. And nor is it even a sizable portion of our homicide rate. Hell, mass murder incidents is probably something like 1 percent of our homicide rate, if that, considering their are 14,000 homicides in the US in any given year. Most of our homicides are again occuring in the context of pre existing criminality.
It seems to me the big problem is you dont understand the reality of the situation here regarding US homicides. While guys "going crazy" and killing people is sensational and it hits the news, the reason why it hits the news is its fairly rare.
In the US civilians commit justifiable homicide in defense of their persons about 260 times a year. Thats probably greater then the number that get murderd as a result of some guy snapping.
[B]But surely it's the application/use of an illegal item which is the real acid test of legislatory success? If guns were outlawed, I very much doubt the formerly responsible owners would immediately use them to commit crime, just because of their prohibition. (Criminals, however, have no such compunction.) Illegal gun ownership does not automatically result in violent gun crime being comitted: This factor is determined by the individual.
[/B][/QUOTE]
The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL].
[B]The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL]. [/B][/QUOTE]
But only in the hands of those who intend to use them in a lethal capacity. I think we've established that the overwhelming majority of gun owners do not think this way.
And considering the arguments put forth in this thread, I really think the speculative contents of that link do not count for much. Existing records both here and abroad agree that reducing the availability of guns does not result in a decline in either gun crime, or the lethality of gun crime.
[B]The availability of firearms may not cause violence, but it makes violence more [URL=http://www.saneguns.org/crime/homicide_means.html]lethal[/URL]. [/B][/QUOTE]
While firearms are the weapon of choice in criminal activities in the US, it doesnt necessarily imply the violence is more leathal because of guns. Again, Id refer to you to Taiwan which has a homicide rate higher then the US, yet over 90% of those homicides are not done with firearms. Hell one of the surpsing bits of information that came out about the Rwandan genoicide is that the most common cause of death in that hell was the machette.
If there is a will to commit murder, you can do it with a variety of implements and tools, that are fairly effective in killing someone. Even if you magicly removed firearms from the US altogeather, I wouldnt be suprised to see that it would result in only a negligible drop in our homicide statistics.
Most of the homicides that occur in the United States feature some form of premediation, not just guy A gets in argument with guy B and guy A whips out gun because he's angry and shoots guy B. Even murders involving an argument often have a good amount of time lapse between the first incident and the homicide. With the idea of premediation kept in mind, the perpatrator if he doesnt have firearms availible will often find some other method of attack.