Doesn't this speak volumes?

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That's pretty irrelevant. I could just say if people were allowed concealed carry in Japan, then the whole thing wouldn't of happened. I think you missed the point I was trying to make which is that a determined killer can kill in many ways whether it be a gun, a kitchen knife, or a bomb that anybody could make with household items. It's not realistic or, honestly, a big enough threat to justify taking away people's rights.

Pretty big claim and absolutely unsupported. If what you are saying is true, then large scale killings would not happen in the United States............. (sounds of crickets chirping). However, since the introduction of strict gun control measures in Australia no such killings have occurred...........



Sure, a determined killer can theoretically kill in many ways. However most school shootings in particular take place with legal weapons that are readily accessible. Restricting access to guns is the obvious solution, that works, some just do not want to see. I personally have lived my entire life without the right that you think is worth the words worst gun death statistics in a first world country.

Last edited by 91 on 09 Jan 2011, 4:25 am, edited 1 time in total.

Then, of course, you should agree, since nobody disputes that a driver should not drink and thereby impair his judgment, that a gun carrier who can be just as lethal as a drunken driver, should be subject to arrest if found carrying a gun while under the influence of judgment impairing material.

I'd just like to point out that in Japan, where the Akihabara and Osaka massacres happened, even most police don't carry guns - despite the presence of one of the world's most notorious organized crime meta-networks. It is illegal to own a firearm in Japan; the high school gangsters carry swords, knives, staves, pipes etc., not handguns as they do here in the U.S. Japan has one of the lowest crime rates in the first world.

I don't know enough about these issues to attribute that to any one thing, but it certainly shows that, at least in some cultures, handgun prohibition can work. Personally, I chalk the high murder and gun crime rates in the U.S. up to socioeconomic problems, not deficient laws. I have no sympathy for the right-wing suburban and rural white people who think they need to carry a firearm, though. I live in an inner urban warehouse and club district, on the edge of skid row, and I do occasionally feel uncomfortable at night; I've also been subject to various incidences of queer-bashing throughout my life, including being ganged up on by five guys who knocked two of my teeth out and left me unconscious on the sidewalk. Even so, I don't feel the need to walk around with a concealed handgun. I've thought occasionally about training with and carrying a small, portable stun-and-flee weapon, but that's just as well accomplished by a kick to the side of the leg with my steel-toe boots anyhow. I've gotten in fights now and then, but carrying a handgun is a whole different matter. This country has enough gun crime violence already; I don't need to add to the tally.

He could have gotten one or maybe two with a knife. But not five or six.

Guns are more effective weapons than knives.

The nutter could have gotten dozens or a hundred with a bomb.

ruveyn

http://www.swissinfo.ch/eng/swiss_news/Number_of_gun_deaths_goes_down_in_Switzerland.html?cid=29125162



This means I'm still right about Switzerland not drowning in a blood bath. Gun control statistics are skewed all the time just like any other statistic, and numbers without context leaves it open to that. Isolated incidents involving the rare weirdo who randomly goes on a killing spree doesn't justify taking everyone else's rights. It's only gonna leave everyone else defenseless.

Correlation does not imply causation. It's not me being hard headed, it's me being a critical thinker and attributing things to more than just the availability of guns.

AceOfSpades

Your use of an article to prove that the number of gun deaths in Switzerland is going down is a moot point when one considers how much higher they are than the rest of the developed world's. Yes the numbers are low but Switzerland has a population smaller than New York's. Your article does nothing to disprove the correlation which was rendered pretty obvious by the two sources I provided.



Hold on a minute, you cited the fact that Switzerland was so different to the United States and that this made it proof positive that there was no correlation between gun ownership and deaths. You went to great pains to illustrate the difference

here:

and here


Correlation does indeed seem to imply causation in your two arguments here (this is not to mention the comparisons you drew between Japan, Mexico and gun deaths), why should my argument exist separate to the logic that you are using to defend your position?

However when I showed you statistics that proved your connection wrong and demonstrated that Switzerland does indeed have a large proportion of gun deaths per 100,000 people, suddenly you argue that there is no connection.

If you look at the evidence I provided (here http://neilharding.blogspot.com/2010/06 ... f-gun.html and here: Simon Chapman PhD FASSA, Firearm deaths in Australia after law reform (2006)), that are peer reviewed from respectable journals (the website shows a graph based on multiple academic sources) and compare it to the conjecture that you seem perfectly happy to submit as your own evidence for linkages then how can you not accept the evidence I am putting forward?

It seems that you are using a pretty obvious double standard to view your evidence. The link that I have made seems amply supported.

Double standard my ass. I already disproved that link with the link I posted, which shows that the vast majority of gun deaths in Switzerland are suicides. So why would I accept that link you posted if I've already proven most of the gun deaths on it are suicides? The correlation between gun deaths and gun ownership doesn't imply that they are caused by homicides.

Switzerland doesn't have the same sociological problems that countries like the state or Mexico faces, and I still stand behind that. The homicide rates are low, and statistics have shown that.

Anyways, I found a link for Simon Chapman PhD FASSA, Firearm deaths in Australia after law reform (2006)
http://msl.rsmjournals.com/cgi/content/full/50/1/53





So looks like gun suicides went down and homicides went up. Anyways, that was a real pain in the ass to read so I'll probably read it more thoroughly when I get back to it.

Here are some links proving gun prohibition hasn't done s**t for gun homicides:

http://www.ssaa.org.au/press-releases/2 ... arget.html



http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/curr ... paper.aspx



So there you go. All prohibitions really done is decrease the number of gun suicides. Like I said, if there's a will there's a way. With stricter gun control, crooks are still obtaining guns illegally and people are ODing on pills or hanging themselves instead of blowing their brains out. And the vast majority of guns used in homicides are illegally obtained. I still stand behind everything I'd said, so if you wanna say I'm hard headed or stubborn, then so be it. I'm not stubborn for it's own sake, I simply don't see the sense in ridiculous gun control.

The majority of gun deaths in the United States are also suicides.



I was not making a point correlating gun deaths and homicides. I was making a link between ownership of guns and gun deaths, if you reduce access to guns, you get less gun deaths and also less gun homicides. Now you are projecting arguments upon me.



Umm. No. Please read the article again, since it is talking about the rate of firearm homicide reduction. The quote you cited demonstrates this.



Now they are sure. The number of homicides by gun has gone down. Citing that the majority of the remainder are committed by illegally obtained weapons does nothing to disprove the trend. What it does prove however is that there will be a remainder, it will be lower due to regulation of firearms.



Gun control is clearly not ridiculous.

Yeah sorry, I read the quotes from the journal wrong. It's been on the decline 3% per year before the reforms, then it went down to 7.5%. It's been going down before the reforms, so I'm still skeptical about attributing it to stricter gun control. Yes a lot of gun deaths in the states are mostly suicides, but the homicide rates per capita from firearms are still very high. In 2008, there has been 259 gun deaths in Switzerland, 239 of em being suicides. So that means the rest of the 20 are either homicides or something other than a suicide (Accident? Reckless discharge? etc...)

New York's homicide rates have also been on the decline and it's not as bad as it was in the 80's. Does this has to do with NY's strict gun control laws? Not really cuz DC's homicide rates are ridiculous and they have some strict gun control laws too. Gentrification and declining unemployment rates had a lot to do with New York's declining crime rate. The crack epidemic in the 80's is what caused a huge spike in crime back then, and it definitely had nothing to do with the availability of guns.

There's a s**t load of drive by's that occur in California which has some of the most ridiculous gun laws out of all the states. This is because of the way ghettos are structured in Cali. There's a whole bunch of alleys and bungalows, which breeds more opportunities for em.

What arguments am I projecting on you? This thread is about some crazy f**k who killed 6 people, and the incident happening after concealed carry became legal. So obviously I'm trying to separate gun deaths from homicides. I can see how you see that less guns = less gun deaths = less homicides, but that doesn't fly with me because the vast majority of homicides are committed by people living a criminal lifestyle, so it's not going to deter em or make it less easy for em to obtain guns.

I don't know enough about Australia to know where to attribute the decline to, but from what I see in the states, gun control laws aren't usually responsible for declines.

In Canada, the majority of homicides are committed with pistols, which are ridiculously hard to obtain as well as concealed carry being illegal. When either pistols or rifles are used in crimes, crooks usually have more than 10 rounds in pistols and more than 5 rounds in rifles. If the legality of guns were really responsible for homicide rates, then everyone would be getting killed by hunting rifles out here.


EDIT: Did some more research and found this:

http://jpands.org/hacienda/comm8.html





I'm certain that the increase of robberies is caused by store owners being disarmed, but I'm still not sure if the increase has to do with the ridiculous gun control or if there are other factors (Increasing strength of gang culture, increasing unemployment, etc). But one thing I know for sure is that strict gun control does not work at all.

Last edited by AceOfSpades on 09 Jan 2011, 1:00 pm, edited 2 times in total.

^^^^^

Once again you are failing to distinguish between gun control laws and effective enforcement. They are two issues, criticizing the latter does not disprove the former.

California's pretty tight assed about enforcing its gun laws and that hasn't stopped Oakland from being among the cities in the states with the highest crime rates. You can't tell me California has ineffective enforcement since the gun laws are not only strictly enforced, but on top of that there's the three strikes law. Anyways, we're going back and forth and this is ridiculous, so I'll leave it to others to prove strict gun control isn't the way to go...

California's laws are very liberal by Australian standards. Here you cannot have anything semi-automatic (pistols or otherwise) or pump action shotguns, without going through a serious evaluation. Just to get any firearm requires an application for a license and a reason for it's possession. There are also very long wait times.

I agree with you there.

Plus if people were to ban guns now, the fact remains there would be so many illegal weapons in circulation that people would be even more vulnerable.

Explain Canada.



Good point

I'm afraid I must agree with John_Browning. Shooters don't care about laws against shooting people, so why would they care about laws regarding weapons?