Question for people Pro-guns....

[Tomeran]

I should probably don the flameshield for this, as the "guns are great!"-arguments are hailing left right and center. Looking from an outside perspective its actually a little scary to see to what extent people will argue and defend their "god-given rights!" to wear a lethal weapon that is primarily meant to fire projectiles into another human being.



So yeah, a few things that are fairly obvious if one just takes a deep breath and looks at this with a shred of sanity:

1: Gun laws and regulation help reduce gun-related crime. In fact according to most statistics it helps reduce most fatal crime-related incidents altogether. That's pretty much a no-brainer, as guns are generally A LOT more fatal then other substitute weapons.
True, if someone really wants to kill you they can do it with a knife or whatever, but its fairly obvious they'd have a much easier time doing it if they had a gun.

2: Regulating guns and making them harder to get makes them harder to get for criminals as well.
Seriously, the "If all people arent allowed to carry guns it'll be just the criminals doing it, since they dont care about laws!"-argument is stupid. Criminals are, in most cases, ordinary people that have ended up in a gang culture or are just really poor and desperate. If you open up a store that sells them guns, you can be pretty darned sure their access to it will be a LOT easier then if it is regulated and forbidden. Not all criminals have some sort of master-minded connection to a shady underground black market with AK-47's piled up for "buy 2 for the price of 1"-deals. This will highly vary on where you live of course, but usually gun-laws and regulation will mean the criminals have a much harder time getting firearms.

3: "Its in the constitution!" Really? Its written in a document that is over 200 years old, at a time of war and chaos, where an armed militia was pretty much the most effective ways to summon up an army quickly. Try to look at things with a bit of perspective.

4: Easy access to firearms does not only increase gun-related crime, it skyrockets the amount of gun-related accidents. Families keeping firearms at their homes are a cause of a great deal of accidents and deaths. USA being a primary example of this, especielly since they have more guns then people.

5: "Guns are good for your personal safety." Really? Imagine this then: If you walk down the street in a country with no gun-regulation and get robbed, chances are high that the thug has a firearm. Even if you have a firearm, you're in a fight where he's going to shoot you if you try to shoot him. Chances are high that someone's not going to walk out of that one alive, and that's never good, not even if the criminal gets killed. And the fact that you DO have a gun on you might even further increase the chance that you want to use it, despite the risks, and further increase the risk of you getting yourselves shot.
If you're in a country with good gun regulation and where its royally hard to get a firearm, and you get robbed, the thug probably has a knife. If you somehow get the idea to resist, he'll stab or cut you. And chances to survive a knife-stab or cut are -astronomicly- higher then to survive gun-shot wounds.


All this being said, I realize that in a country such as the states, there is such a hard-bred culture that "guns are good for you! and your personal safey!", all statistics be hanged, that changing it is going to take decades, if not centuries. It might be a good time to start gradually though, perhaps by starting to make it harder for people to access high-powered weapons.


After thinking this through, I can only think of one beneficial thing with the USA having such lax gun control and regulation: If there ever is a zombie apocalypse, you guys are in a slightly better position then the rest of the world.
And I dont see that happening anytime soon.

 

[Souplex]

Britain still has some problems because they allowed farmers to buy shotguns which can be converted into concealed weapons. (Which is the only kind that crimes are committed with)

 

[Tanner The Monotone]

Now, a handgun or something along those lines are illegal because their sole purpose is to kill a human being as it would be bloody difficult to hunt Game with one of those.

Yeah, in most cases. Though, most hunters do carry a side arm in case they have to use it if something would happen to their long rifle.

 

[Raesvelg]

1) You can be pro-guns but please don't be stupid. You know the answer and its pretty obvious by the OPs statement of reduced gun crime that it does work.

Problematically, reduced gun crime is not necessarily reduced crime.

And most statistics don't support the conclusion that by getting rid of guns, you reduce crime, save for those instances where the process by which guns are taken off the streets is also accompanied by aggressive policing. Which definitely sheds doubt on any causal link between gun control and crime reduction.

Fact of the matter is that despite an ever-increasing set of gun control regulations, the murder rate in the UK remained more-or-less constant. There was no magical amount of gun control that stopped crime. And straight-up "violent crime", {ie assault, muggings, etc) is a much bigger problem in the UK than the US. Like four to five times bigger, depending on which set of statistics you use.

 

[dexxyoto]

Gun are not a problem, When a 12 year old can pick up a gun for less then a new video game with out a problem, that is when it becomes a problem. Plus in the US they hate educating people and that just lead to more problems.

 

[senordesol]

The ONLY reason why guns are legal in the US is because there's money to be made from selling them. The same way that here in the UK, they have the double standard of labelling cigarette packets with warning messages but still want the tax off the products. If the governments really cared about people developing lung cancer or being killed in a rampage, they'd ban the products.

No, that is not the 'ONLY' reason.

Another reason is that the federalists would not sign the Constitution without certain provisions made with regard to limiting the power of government. The right to bear arms was one of those provisions, a provision upheld by the highest court in the land time and again.

Unless you're suggesting (and hopefully have proof) that the Supreme Court is on the take, then: NO, that is not the only reason.

Okay I can accept that. But it is the main reason, obviously.

That's right, it being a civil right is the main reason.

No. It's all about money dear boy. No need to delude yourself with fanciful romantic notions like that.

The reason it is a "right" (meaningless term, I quite like this commentary on the idea:

Spoiler

) is because they can make money from it. If the best quality heroin could be produced in the US you can be damn sure that would be a "civil right" as well....

Oh I have no 'fanciful' notions. I am, in fact, quite grounded in my reasoning.

Anyone in government who wants to remove the right (a quite meaningful term) to bear arms is going to face a political shit-storm. We Americans happen to be quite touchy about our Bill of Rights and do not at all appreciate it being infringed upon.

I am not saying the money is not a contributing factor, but to say it is the primary factor is specious. After all, the government could save more money if it eliminated the right to a public defender if you can't afford a lawyer.

It would salvage a lot of tanked cases if damning evidence couldn't be thrown out because it was obtained improperly.

Just so, Chicago and D.C. attempted to enact pistol bans only to be overturned for legal reasons, not monetary ones.

 

[gufftroad]

1) You can be pro-guns but please don't be stupid. You know the answer and its pretty obvious by the OPs statement of reduced gun crime that it does work.

Problematically, reduced gun crime is not necessarily reduced crime.

And most statistics don't support the conclusion that by getting rid of guns, you reduce crime, save for those instances where the process by which guns are taken off the streets is also accompanied by aggressive policing. Which definitely sheds doubt on any causal link between gun control and crime reduction.

Fact of the matter is that despite an ever-increasing set of gun control regulations, the murder rate in the UK remained more-or-less constant. There was no magical amount of gun control that stopped crime. And straight-up "violent crime", {ie assault, muggings, etc) is a much bigger problem in the UK than the US. Like four to five times bigger, depending on which set of statistics you use.

as much as i hate citing this http://www.gunfacts.info/pdfs/gun-facts/6.1/gun_facts_6_1_screen.pdf page 3 has a wonderful graph proving just this

Gun are not a problem, When a 12 year old can pick up a gun for less then a new video game with out a problem, that is when it becomes a problem. Plus in the US they hate educating people and that just lead to more problems.

ok i need to know were i can get a gun for less then a game the cheapest one i have ever seen was $75 before DROS and ATF check and it was as close to nonfunctional as you could get and still have it be considered a gun the cheapest gun you can get that wont kill you when you try to fire it is more like $100+

 

[gufftroad]

The ONLY reason why guns are legal in the US is because there's money to be made from selling them. The same way that here in the UK, they have the double standard of labelling cigarette packets with warning messages but still want the tax off the products. If the governments really cared about people developing lung cancer or being killed in a rampage, they'd ban the products.

No, that is not the 'ONLY' reason.

Another reason is that the federalists would not sign the Constitution without certain provisions made with regard to limiting the power of government. The right to bear arms was one of those provisions, a provision upheld by the highest court in the land time and again.

Unless you're suggesting (and hopefully have proof) that the Supreme Court is on the take, then: NO, that is not the only reason.

Okay I can accept that. But it is the main reason, obviously.

That's right, it being a civil right is the main reason.

No. It's all about money dear boy. No need to delude yourself with fanciful romantic notions like that.

The reason it is a "right" (meaningless term, I quite like this commentary on the idea:

Spoiler

) is because they can make money from it. If the best quality heroin could be produced in the US you can be damn sure that would be a "civil right" as well....

Oh I have no 'fanciful' notions. I am, in fact, quite grounded in my reasoning.
I am not saying the money is not a contributing factor, but to say it is the primary factor is specious. After all, the government could save more money if it eliminated the right to a public defender is you can't afford a lawyer.

Total political contributions from firearm industry members, PACs and employees was
under $4.4 million in the 2002 election cycle, which made the industry the 64th ranked
contributor. Compare that to $33 million from the American Federation of State, County &
Municipal Employees

thought id add some facts to help you on this point

 

[RyuujinZERO]

How come I'm not seeing anyone bring up the point of availability.

Take for example a husband comes home, finds his best friend in bed with his wife... OH SHI- he's seeing red. In a country where firearms are not a typical household item, the offending gentleman is likely to get a punch in the face, maybe whalloped with a loose object; and it could well kill him. But... probably not.

In a country where a gun is close to hand, it's THAT much more likely in his moment of rage he's going to grab the gun out his bedside cabinet.

This is the sort've crime where the main difference occurs. When people are of diminished responsibility due to alcohol, drugs, or just plain old rage, having a lethal weapon close to hand makes it that much more likely it'll be used, as opposed to resorting to more primitive (And survivable) tactics like clobbering them with your bare fists.

 

[cikame]

In the UK too, bad people can get guns because bad people don't have rules, it's good that as a law abiding citizen you are granted the capacity to protect yourself, your family and others from these people wi- oh no wait, you can't.

My snarkiness aside the UK has a population of 62,641,000 (2011) and America has 311,591,917 (2011), comparing crime figures between those two numbers is almost pointless.
There is much more that needs to be considered before any comparison is made, history, immigration, gangs, low income areas etc etc...

Picking at one law as if that's the answer? i don't know about that.

 

[RyuujinZERO]

My snarkiness aside the UK has a population of 62,641,000 (2011) and America has 311,591,917 (2011), comparing crime figures between those two numbers is almost pointless.

Are you being willfully ignorant of the fact most these statistics are measured in quantified units, such as "per 100,000 people"? - The rate is higher no matter how you cut it; but yes as you say culture is a lot to do with it and is why the arguement is never as simple as "ban all guns", simply because the US is NOT Europe, it does not have the same history and guns have played an important roll in American culture from day 1, so there's a lot more hurdles and issues to address than merely saying "ok guys, hand in your guns we're going to start thinking logically like Europe"

America'd benefit from the change, but it'd never happen overnight

 

[Ryotknife]

Also, how does making guns illegal stop CRIMINALS from getting them? Really, I'm dying to know.

Also, also, whom to trust with my life: myself, who knows how to operate a firearm safely and responsibly; or an incompetent police force? I don't think the decision is a hard one.

1) You can be pro-guns but please don't be stupid. You know the answer and its pretty obvious by the OPs statement of reduced gun crime that it does work.

By making guns illegal you make them exponentially harder to obtain, and overtime can work on shrinking the available pool of firearms from the market, legally obtained or otherwise. Yes you can obtain handguns still, but ONLY from illegal dealers and with no new ones being fed in, overtime it will only get harder to get them. Yes you can smuggle in whatever you like, but its a hell of a lot harder than just popping into a legal place of business and acquiring one. It doesn't take some genius intellect to figure out making an item illegal might not eliminate but certainly impedes it being available.

No, that is one of the arguments against gun ban. It is impossible to enforce a ban as they can be smuggled in with ease. That is just one of MANY reasons for not banning guns. We can not even enforce a drug ban, with illegal drugs being readily for anyone at their convenience. There nothing that proves without a shadow of a doubt that a gun ban will help, nothing.

This is coming from someone who does not own a gun nor has any desire to own one.

 

[MorganL4]

The following are the facts as copied from the sited sources. Do with them as you will( the per 100,000 stats mean that for every 100,000 people in the country that is how many fall into said category) :


Total homicides in US in 2005: 16,740

Total homicides with a gun 2005: 10,158

Unintentional gun related deaths 2005: 789

Total homicides per 100,000 people: 5.66

Total gun related homicides per 100,000 people: 3.43


US Population in 2005: 296 million








Total homicides in the UK 2005: 764


Total homicides with guns: 50

Total unintentional gun related deaths 2005 unavailable, last available year 1999: 6

Total homicides per 100,000 people: 1.3

Total homicides with a gun per 100,000 people: .1

England and Welsh Population in 2005 53.4 million


http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Customs/questions/population.html


http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2008/02/11/us-population-projections-2005-2050/

 

[spartan231490]

Gun are not a problem, When a 12 year old can pick up a gun for less then a new video game with out a problem, that is when it becomes a problem. Plus in the US they hate educating people and that just lead to more problems.

You can't buy a gun in the US till you're 18. And no gun is less than a new video game.

 

[spartan231490]

The following are the facts as copied from the sited sources. Do with them as you will( the per 100,000 stats mean that for every 100,000 people in the country that is how many fall into said category) :


Total homicides us 2005: 16,740

Total homicides with a gun 2005: 10,158

Unintentional gun related deaths 2005: 789

Total homicides per 100,000 people: 5.66

Total gun related homicides per 100,000 people: 3.43


US Population in 2005: 296 million








Total homicides in the UK 2005: 764


Total homicides with guns 50

Total unintentional gun related deaths 2005 unavailable, last available year 1999: 6

Total homicides per 100,000 people: 1.3

Total homicides with a gun per 100,000 people: .1

England and Welsh Population in 2005 53.4 million


http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region

http://www.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/Customs/questions/population.html


http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2008/02/11/us-population-projections-2005-2050/

This means absolutely nothing. Comparing one country to another doesn't accomplish shit statistically. Statistically, there is no evidence whatsoever that increased gun control reduces gun crime. These are the results of my attempts to find evidence real scientific evidence that increased gun control reduces crime, I was unable to find even one such piece of evidence.

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


How about I give you a few more useless facts that have no context or meaning:
During the years in which the D.C. handgun ban and trigger lock law was in effect, the Washington, D.C. murder rate averaged 73% higher than it was at the outset of the law.

Here's one about your English gun control that you seem so fond of(not implying you live there, just that's the data you were using): the British homicide rate has averaged 52% higher since the outset of the 1968 gun control law and 15% higher since the outset of the 1997 handgun ban.

Since the outset of the Chicago handgun ban, the percentage of Chicago murders committed with handguns has averaged about 40% higher than it was before the law took effect.

Since the outset of the Florida right-to-carry law, the Florida murder rate has averaged 36% lower than it was before the law took effect.

Since the outset of the Texas right-to-carry law, the Texas murder rate has averaged 30% lower than it was before the law took effect.

Since the outset of the Michigan right-to-carry law, the Michigan murder rate has averaged 4% lower than it was before the law took effect.

In 2007, there were 613 fatal firearm accidents in the United States, constituting 0.5% of 123,706 fatal accidents that year.

In 2007, there were roughly 15,698 emergency room visits for non-fatal firearm accidents, constituting 0.05% of 27.7 million emergency room visits for non-fatal accidents that year.

In D.C. v Heller, the 2008 Supreme Court ruling striking down Washington's D.C.'s handgun ban.

http://www.justfacts.com/guncontrol.asp


"This Article has reviewed a significant amount of evidence
from a wide variety of international sources. Each individual
portion of evidence is subject to cavil?at the very least the
general objection that the persuasiveness of social scientific
evidence cannot remotely approach the persuasiveness of
conclusions in the physical sciences. Nevertheless, the bur‐
den of proof rests on the proponents of the more guns equal
more death and fewer guns equal less death mantra, espe‐
cially since they argue public policy ought to be based on
that mantra.
To bear that burden would at the very least
require showing that a large number of nations with more
guns have more death and that nations that have imposed
stringent gun controls have achieved substantial reductions
in criminal violence (or suicide). But those correlations are
not observed when a large number of nations are compared
across the world."

http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf

 

[Raesvelg]

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.

 

[DarthNader26]

*Sigh*

You make a good point and it gets buried amidst all the sensationalist arguments. Again, guys, the US is -full- of areas where police response time can be half an hour or more.

Compare:

http://www.crisishq.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/z_us_population_density_map_2010.gif

And

http://static.ddmcdn.com/gif/maps/pdf/EUR_GB_THEM_PopDensity.pdf

(Misinterpreted the first map I posted. This is a better one)

On top of that, if there's only a sheriff and two deputies in your county, you're livestock getting taken by wolves or a rabid dog on your property isn't going to be his top priority. Even if someone is breaking into your house, you have to call the police, explain the situation, and then wait for him to wind his way down dozens of dirt roads to come save you. Meanwhile, whoever is breaking in is doing whatever the hell he wants. There was a woman in the county I used to live in that answered the door for a stranger. The stranger happened to be an escaped convict, and when she realized who he was and tried to call for the police she was beaten to death in the time it took for the police to get to her house. There's a reason several of my friends and neighbors kept a revolver near the door.

Out here, you're often on your own. The culture gap between urban and rural areas, especially in the US, makes it a hot button issue, as in urban areas guns tend to be used solely for violent crime and the police are always seconds away. It's hard for people who grew up like that to imagine what it's like to be relying on your firearm to stay alive and protect your life and property. Trust me when I say that taking guns from citizens in the US is both an impossibility and a death sentence for many, many people.

 

[Shynobee]

Here is how I see it, if someone wants to commit a crime with a gun, they will get a gun whether they are illegal or not.

So, when you make guns illegal, all you are doing is taking guns away from law abiding citizens who would be using them for recreation or self defense. This seems rather counter intuitive to me.

 

[FireDr@gon]

As Cris Rock said "all you have to do is make bullets cost $5000 - that would at least mean that there would never be any innocent bystanders killed" by the way this is a misquote but the gyst is the same.

This is semi-facetious as (although I am actually anti-gun) I actually agree with the points raised by farson 135.

I consider it a shame that it's got to this point at all though - guns may be tools to help us cope with our environment, but to mass-produce something that can so easily take a life, human or animal, is slightly sickening to me.

If guns were not around there would be other means of mass-destruction and there already is anyway - that's just human nature - we want to kill each other sometimes. To be honest we're probably not doing it fast enough either considering the vast, irreversible damage caused by overpopulation.

My suggestion is a non-lethal sterilisation gun, dont end a sukas' life; just stop their bloodline in it's tracks

EDIT: Does it occur to those talking about "pest control" that those bears and pigs might consider humans to be the pests? They have as much right to life as you do, they own the land just as much as you do - but at least they don't choose to be pests, they're there because people settled on their land - not the other way around. Besides, can't people resolve these problems of land ownership without resorting to "Kill, kill, kill"?