Question for people Pro-guns....
- Thread starter Moth_Monk
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The figures over time do not record how the victims died, drawing a conclusion like "turning gun murders into knife murders" is impossible from that data.Raesvelg said:Correspondingly, here's a few handy official graphs taken from the UK National Archives...
First, a graph on murder rates from 1957 to 2009. Notice the trend.
Second, a graph on murder weapons in the 2008/09 recording period.
Source: http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110218135832/rds.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs10/hosb0110.pdf
What can we draw from those graphs?
First, that increasingly restrictive gun control (major gun control measures in the UK were passed in 1968 and 1997) do not appear to have any significant effect on homicide rates.
Second, while the use of a firearm to commit homicide might be reduced by gun control measures, mostly you're just turning gun murders into knife murders.
It could just as easily be down to guns not being used much in murders over the whole period in the first place, which would result in the increased firearm control not having much effect as well. Either way that data is not detailed enough to make any conclusion about the effect firearm control had over murder rates.
spartan231490 said:
I just wanted to point out that I did not in fact make any argument one way or the other, I simply felt that it would help the debate if some reference-able facts were available, and you proceeded to get offended by the facts and started swearing at me.
Also, if I cannot compare a country to another country, what can I compare a country to? A tree?
Oh, I have not read the 16 pages worth of other comments here, so I am going to reply directly to the OP (if something I say has been said before my apologize but I did say I wasnt going to dig through all that right now).
Here it is, in America we have a national history of using/liking/needing firearms. Without firearms our country wouldn't be "our" country, we'd still be a summer home for another nation. So part of our national law became the right to own guns. There is a LOT of debate as to how far that right is supposed to go, but that isn't important. What is important is that for a long time we had them, and we Americans are big on our rights. If it is something that we've had as a right and someone tries to come along and say "Can't do that anymore for some arbitrary reason someone came up with!" we get into a big huff over it. We do this because it's part of our national psyche. Someone tries to stop one thing we're allowed to do? Clearly they're gonna go after other rights...(mind you, I'm not saying they WILL, just that is the feeling of it).
There are a lot of American firearms companies, importers, sporting events with firearms etc. That is a big business and it has enough fans to actually keep that industry going. Mind you those are all law abiding people, criminals are an entirely different issue. What it comes down to is people suddenly being told "Hey, we know you personally didn't do anything wrong, but now you can't keep that thing you've spent your hard earned money on." that is unreasonable to tell someone who has not been reckless with something. Sure, if someone drinks and drives a lot, you take away their car. They'v eproven they shouldnt have it. That's how our system works. You can have the internet until we catch you trading kiddie porn. You can have your guns until you kill tweleve people just trying to watch a movie (and of course whenever a newsworthy violent act comes up it will start this debate all over again)
I want to preemtively talk about one other issue that tends to pop up for no reason at all, if the guns were legally owned or not. The media LOVES to mention that firearms used in a violent crime were all legally owned, but never seem to bother mentioning it when the opposite is true. What never gets talked about is how if someone has a desire to cause death or destruction they will find a way. Even the most recent event the firearms we legal, but the explosive materials found in his home were not. Proof that even if he didnt have access to firearms he could have simply built an explosive to do the same thing. Clearly he was educated enough to do so. Killers will always find a way to be killers. They dont need to walk into Dicks and buy a hunting rifle if they can walk into Walmart and buy bleach, amonia and some...I don't know....baking soda? (I've never actually looked up how to build a bomb out of household stuff as I am not a lunitic)
Here it is, in America we have a national history of using/liking/needing firearms. Without firearms our country wouldn't be "our" country, we'd still be a summer home for another nation. So part of our national law became the right to own guns. There is a LOT of debate as to how far that right is supposed to go, but that isn't important. What is important is that for a long time we had them, and we Americans are big on our rights. If it is something that we've had as a right and someone tries to come along and say "Can't do that anymore for some arbitrary reason someone came up with!" we get into a big huff over it. We do this because it's part of our national psyche. Someone tries to stop one thing we're allowed to do? Clearly they're gonna go after other rights...(mind you, I'm not saying they WILL, just that is the feeling of it).
There are a lot of American firearms companies, importers, sporting events with firearms etc. That is a big business and it has enough fans to actually keep that industry going. Mind you those are all law abiding people, criminals are an entirely different issue. What it comes down to is people suddenly being told "Hey, we know you personally didn't do anything wrong, but now you can't keep that thing you've spent your hard earned money on." that is unreasonable to tell someone who has not been reckless with something. Sure, if someone drinks and drives a lot, you take away their car. They'v eproven they shouldnt have it. That's how our system works. You can have the internet until we catch you trading kiddie porn. You can have your guns until you kill tweleve people just trying to watch a movie (and of course whenever a newsworthy violent act comes up it will start this debate all over again)
I want to preemtively talk about one other issue that tends to pop up for no reason at all, if the guns were legally owned or not. The media LOVES to mention that firearms used in a violent crime were all legally owned, but never seem to bother mentioning it when the opposite is true. What never gets talked about is how if someone has a desire to cause death or destruction they will find a way. Even the most recent event the firearms we legal, but the explosive materials found in his home were not. Proof that even if he didnt have access to firearms he could have simply built an explosive to do the same thing. Clearly he was educated enough to do so. Killers will always find a way to be killers. They dont need to walk into Dicks and buy a hunting rifle if they can walk into Walmart and buy bleach, amonia and some...I don't know....baking soda? (I've never actually looked up how to build a bomb out of household stuff as I am not a lunitic)
Keep clinging to your delusions if it makes you happy, I suppose.J Tyran said:
The data shows what the data shows, and if you want more in depth data, follow the link provided to the source.
Gun control increases -> homicides increase. Not that this is a causative link, just a correlative link, but the fact that that is the case definitely undermines the position that more gun control = fewer homicides.
Finding similar long-term data on method of homicide in the UK has proven somewhat difficult, to be honest, but what I have been able to find in the post-97 (handgun ban) data actually supports your idea that people in the UK mostly didn't use firearms for homicides anyway.
Though again, it showed a definite upward trend after the ban, corresponding with the general spike in murder rates in the UK for that period.
The point, however, is that even if you ban the guns, people will still find ways to kill each other.
And what would you propose I wonder?FireDr@gon said:
Pigs are pests because they ruin farmland which WE need to -you know- eat. To wit, they are also very aggressive, often attacking perceived threats that come into their territory. And if you think they're just harmless little piggies...Google is your friend.
They also have sex. A lot. So much so that 'their land' (as you call it) quickly expands into our land. And since pigs don't really understand things like 'property lines', 'keep-out signs', or fences (beyond horrendously expensive ones), they need to be culled.
Survival of the fittest, baby.
Captcha: Sharp Stick. Whatever works for you Captcha, but I wouldn't recommend it.
I live in a country where guns are illegal. You even need a hunting licence to buy an air rifle. But being a corrupt country where gangs pretty much control everything, yes they all have guns. But they don't show them. Most robberies are made with blades or replica guns. So our police is quite relaxed, they're almost pushovers, you can talk with them, you can argue with them, even if you spit one in the face they're not about to smack your face on the concrete or put 10 bullets in your head. In fact, whenever police shoot a runner in the leg (or worse, thanks to poor shooting skills), the media bashes them till doomsday.
One time however, an idiot started playing with a replica gun and threatening policemen. A bystander filmed the whole thing. Things got serious very very fast. Our police doesn't kid around when it comes to pistols. But... they didn't shoot the guy. He lived. I remember thinking about how you can get shot by police in America simply for putting your hand in your pocket. Here police doesn't treat civilians as potential murderers or terrorists. And I don't blame the american police for doing that.
One time however, an idiot started playing with a replica gun and threatening policemen. A bystander filmed the whole thing. Things got serious very very fast. Our police doesn't kid around when it comes to pistols. But... they didn't shoot the guy. He lived. I remember thinking about how you can get shot by police in America simply for putting your hand in your pocket. Here police doesn't treat civilians as potential murderers or terrorists. And I don't blame the american police for doing that.
I didn't mean if the government screwed up. I meant that if they became to "powerful", so to say. Now, keep in mind I am speaking for guns in the USA.scully745 said:
"The security of a free state" can be taken two ways, and they are both valid. The first way is the obvious "if we are ever attacked by another nation". The second is that the state remain "free". So, if the government ever threatened our freedom we could protect the security of our free state. When the the government actually threatens our "free state" I don't know. There are many things that could "threaten" our freedom, but where is the point that enough is enough? The wording is a bit to unspecific in that regard.the second amendment said:
You're forgetting the context for the 2nd amendment. Simply put, if not for the vast abundance of firearms in the US, we never would have won our independence from Great Britain. The fact that almost every citizen had a firearm allowed them to quickly and cheaply raise an army to fight the well trained, well equipped British army. If we didn't have the same access to firearms we -never- would have been able to stand up to the Brits. So yes, the Founders were kind of big on readily available firearms, as they were very concerned the new central government might end up as oppressive as the Monarchy was, and they wanted to be sure that if a revolution ever had to happen again the people would be prepared for it.scully745 said:
So yes, the second amendment exists -entirely- to allow for another revolution if the US government ever gets too batshit bananas.
Read this: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/1566715.stmMoth_Monk said:Yep this thread had to get posted.
Although it only occurred to me after reading some of the pro-gun Americans responses in comments sections/threads to you-know-what
The question is this: I live in the UK, where firearms are illegal, even the police do not have them, and the rate of gun crime is SIGNIFICANTLY lower than gun crime in the US. I have not even heard what a gun shot sounds like outside of TV and video games - think of that. With this being a fact, how can you people who are pro-guns; that don't like the idea of guns being made illegal, even rationalise why it would be a bad thing?
The only reason for thinking guns are needed, as far as I can tell, is if you think you need to kill somebody for some reason with them.
Captcha: hunky-dory
I <3 Captcha's irony.
All I have to say after that is: correlation does not equal causation.
I am not sure comparing UK to USA is really fair. UK has an area of about 250,000 sq km and population of 63,000,000, while the US has an area of about 10,000,000 sq km and a population of about 314,000,000.
As someone living in the UK, I personally think that our police should be armed more, if not every officer that at least one firearm per car, this is partially due to my "Do crime-Be Punished" stance, and I would much prefer to see more criminals dead than rotting in a jail cell; but per person? Hmmm... well, if the logic behind owning a gun is to protect the owner from burglars, the burglar is also armed, if no-one could by guns, some people may be less confident in burglary, and therefore not attempt it, it would at least prevent more people being injured during burglaries, bad enough that your stuff gets stolen, but you have to go to hospital? And don't you have to pay significant sums of money for healthcare in america? No guns for civilians could solve a few problems...
Please do correct me if I'm wrong on any of these.
Additional: I do go slightly off tangent, but less guns would mean less bullet wounds.
Please do correct me if I'm wrong on any of these.
Additional: I do go slightly off tangent, but less guns would mean less bullet wounds.
You tried fudging the nature of the statistics to try and make a point. Your point is based on a completely flawed foundation, not only is the data is insufficient to make a conclusion from its actually irrelevant data to begin with.Raesvelg said:
Homicide under UK law is any unlawful killing and that includes things like causing death by negligence or recklessness and not just murder. I don't think its me clinging on to delusions here.
Simple, because a criminal (or someone who's soon to be, i.e. has no prior record) can't just walk into a store, or because someone who's already a criminal can't just ask his friend (who doesn't have a record) to buy one for him.matrix3509 said:
It also reduces the general count of guns in circulation (from whatever cause) therefore making them generally harder to acquire.
I didn't get offended by the facts, I was not offended at all. I curse a lot, I wasn't cursing at you, "doesn't accomplish shit" is just the phrase I use when something doesn't accomplish shit.MorganL4 said:
I misspoke myself, you can compare one country to another all you want, but the results won't be significant because you have no way of controlling for other variables such as population density, cultural background, and economic stability, just to name a few. If you want to draw any meaningful conclusions about gun control, you need to look at how the implementation of gun control has effected the area that implemented it, or examine a very large number of nations in a statistical analysis. Every single one of my sources did one of these things. Also, why did you cut out the greater part of my post? It had some of the most relevant information, including links that would have told you all this.
Which still doesn't reduce crime rate. It doesn't even reduce murder rate. I'll post links, but if you don't believe me or my links, go to google and type in "gun control reduces crime" I did this, and many other searches, trying to find scientific evidence that more gun control reduces crime rate, or murder rate, or suicide rate, and I couldn't.Enverex said:
http://www.fff.org/freedom/fd0210e.asp
http://www.justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp
http://gunowners.org/fs0404.htm
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/29/weekinreview/29liptak.html?pagewanted=all
http://www.cato.org/pubs/journal/cj26n1/cj26n1-6.pdf
http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf
I'm disabled. A handgun in my house would be the great equalizer during a break in. Otherwise, I'd be quickly overpowered.Moth_Monk said:Yep this thread had to get posted.
Although it only occurred to me after reading some of the pro-gun Americans responses in comments sections/threads to you-know-what
The question is this: I live in the UK, where firearms are illegal, even the police do not have them, and the rate of gun crime is SIGNIFICANTLY lower than gun crime in the US. I have not even heard what a gun shot sounds like outside of TV and video games - think of that. With this being a fact, how can you people who are pro-guns; that don't like the idea of guns being made illegal, even rationalise why it would be a bad thing?
The only reason for thinking guns are needed, as far as I can tell, is if you think you need to kill somebody for some reason with them.
Captcha: hunky-dory
I <3 Captcha's irony.
If you make guns a crime, then only criminals will have guns.Moth_Monk said:Yep this thread had to get posted.
Although it only occurred to me after reading some of the pro-gun Americans responses in comments sections/threads to you-know-what
The question is this: I live in the UK, where firearms are illegal, even the police do not have them, and the rate of gun crime is SIGNIFICANTLY lower than gun crime in the US. I have not even heard what a gun shot sounds like outside of TV and video games - think of that. With this being a fact, how can you people who are pro-guns; that don't like the idea of guns being made illegal, even rationalise why it would be a bad thing?
The only reason for thinking guns are needed, as far as I can tell, is if you think you need to kill somebody for some reason with them.
Captcha: hunky-dory
I <3 Captcha's irony.
The reason crime in the UK is much lower is not because guns are outlawed, but simply because there are less violent criminals there. In the US, there are reasons for our high crime rate, and it has to do with racial and socio-economic issues that aren't present in the UK.
Crime is about the people, not their weapons.
I don't care what other reasons others espouse. I can quote all kinds of statistics and people will argue or agree with them however they fucking want, but the fact remains that the right to bear arms holds one very important role in the constitution; it is supposed to provide a last recourse against a government that has gone out of control. Thommas Jefferson's own words on the matter were "At times it is required for the tree of liberty to be refreshed with the blood of tyrants and patriots."
We here in America have a government that is becoming increasingly militarized and a president who signed an executive order authorizing the military to round up American citizens "suspected of having terrorist connections" and detain them indefinitely without trial or official charge and you guys want to give up the only means the constitution gave us of resisting this kind of government behavior?
I'm sorry, if the shit really hits the fan, I want the American people to have the ability to go down shooting if they must, because an militarized authoritarian government is a far worse criminal than someone who just up and decides to rob a 7-11.
We here in America have a government that is becoming increasingly militarized and a president who signed an executive order authorizing the military to round up American citizens "suspected of having terrorist connections" and detain them indefinitely without trial or official charge and you guys want to give up the only means the constitution gave us of resisting this kind of government behavior?
I'm sorry, if the shit really hits the fan, I want the American people to have the ability to go down shooting if they must, because an militarized authoritarian government is a far worse criminal than someone who just up and decides to rob a 7-11.
I fudged nothing; the data speaks for itself.J Tyran said:
An increase in gun control was not accompanied by an decrease in homicide rates. Unless you're now asserting that the UK simply became increasingly negligent over the past 50 years.
The fact of the matter is that the data simply does not support the conclusion that gun control makes people's lives safer to any significant degree. Murderers will murder, regardless of the necessary hurdles they have to clear, and while it could conceivably be argued that gun control might mitigate the severity of the occasional rampage killing, such killings are just a blip in the overall statistics to begin with.