Arguments Needed Please

[woad_yurt]

Back when I lived in NYC, 3/4 of my friends were born somewhere other than here in the US and lots were from countries that totally restricted private firearm ownership. Quite a few of 'em told me that machetes were often the weapon of choice for armed robberies (banks, jewelry stores, etc.)

 

[Mozart 2]

Vermont has CCW or OC with NO PERMIT REQUIRED. Vermont is the only state in the U.S. that TRULY understands the second ammendment. Gun ownership is passionately defended in Vermont.

Oh yeh...Vermont has the second lowest violent crime rate in the country...hmmm.

Even though I'm quoting a statistic here, this entire argument is a falacy. Statistics rarely (if ever) prove anything. Correlation is NOT cause. There was a T.V. commercial airing a few years ago with a claim that teenagers of families that regularly eat dinner together have a lower rate of drug use. Therefore, eating meals together prevents drug use. What??? As rediculous as this claim sounds, they actually made it! The relationship between these two events is one of correlation, not causation. It's more probable that both events share a common cause or link. A family that eats dinner together does so in part because they value each other and their time together. These values usually align closely with anti-drug use. So a similar value system causes one event and prevents the other.

Statistics alone are worthless. It's the interpretation of those statistics that gives them meaning. Keep in mind that the interpretation and subsequent explanation are subject to human error...and two people can "say" two very different things using the same stats.

 

[oneounceload]

One factor to be considered is this: the ethnic and cultural diversity of a country. The US has more ethnicities and folks from different cultures than anywhere else. Countries with more homogeneous populations do not exhibit the crime. England's rise in crime has been tied to immigration of many cultures and the subsequent clashes such minglings bring. Like it or not, most folks like to associate with "their own kind" - it is not meant to be racist or condescending, just a fact, and they have issues with other groups when they feel encroached upon. Add to this this country's endless love for super rich models, athletes, etc. and folks who are not as fortunate tend to feel deprived and want some of it. Then add in the amount of illicit drug use and you can see why crime is higher. When you couple all of that with the readily available amount of guns, guns will be used more. However, if the guns aren't there, the crime doesn't drop - in England, crimes with knives, etc. soared to the point they want to register kitchen knives.

When any group thinks banning an inanimate object will cure the societal ill, they find nothing works. The old adage - "Blaming guns as the cause of crime is like blaming erasers on pencils for spelling errors"

 

[MikeNice]

The US is actually #49 by murder rate in the world. Ask him why Brazil has a higher murder rate than the US when hand gun sells are restricted to police.

Ask him why England still has over 7,000 firearm offenses per year if gun bans work. Ask why Scotland was deemed the most violent "developed" country in the world in 2005 (according to the UN). You are more than twice as likely to be violently atacked in Scotland than America. Getting rid of guns does not make people safer. It makes criminals braver.

Why is it that despite relaxing gun control laws the nation as a whole has seen a two decade drop in crime? Should we follow the lead of England and OZ? After enacting radical restrictions on guns they saw increases in sexual assault, robbery, domestic abuse, and violent assault.

 

[MikeNice]

When Brady was put in place originally there was a waiting period for handguns. The GUN suicide rate dropped dramatically during that time, leading anti's to jump for joy claiming things were fixed. However, during that same time period the OVERALL suicide rate stayed exactly the same, other methods were used.

Guns are tools. For some things they are the handiest tool but lacking the availability of that tool humans are pretty good at finding other tools to use.

This reminds me of an article I read praising Bloomberg. It seems that in 2008 there was a significant decrease in the number of murders involving guns, in NYC. However, more than 80% of the decrease was offset by murders using knives. The complete murder rate for NYC actually went up.

People that wanted to murder did. Those that were scared too, became braver.

 

[Dstoerm]

In countries with restrictive private firearms possession laws the number of crimes commited with guns will decease after a given number of years under such laws, given that neighboring countries follow suit with their gun laws.

It is simple: guns become scarce and the pentalties for possesion become greater.

However, the violent crimes stats and murder stats per capita do NOT decrease. The criminal offenders simply choose another means to commit violent crimes as guns become scarce.

This is why many EU and Latin countries are now enacting ever more restrictive knife laws. Next it will be pipes, clubs, hammers, etc.

I count personal defense against crimes as one very important reason for personal firearm ownership, but it is not, by far, the top of my list. Australian, British, Mexican, German and French citizens now have no viable means for defense against their loss of freedoms as free citizens.

The second ammendment was not about hunting or personal defense.

 

[Owen Sparks]

There has been no looting reported in Japan after the recent disaster and almost none in New Zeland after the horrific earthquake there. Contrast this with what happened in Hati after the earthquake or New Orleans after Katrina. Crime has more to do with the quality of people than the avalibility of weapons. My sister in law worked in an inner city school and they had to stop the kids from using protractors (the thing with a short pencil and a metal spike used to draw circles with) because the little nippers were stabbing each other with them.

 

[jon_in_wv]

You will find that countries with lower violent crime rates also have lower rates of rape but it is not because the men there are not "armed". I could give you some statistics proving why crime is very low in countries like Japan, Norway and Sweeden Vs. Detroit and Chicago but that might get this thread locked.

Crime has more to do with the quality of people than the avalibility of weapons.

You seem to be implying that certain "people" (read ethnicities) are at issue when it comes to crime. I think I can speak for a lot of us when I say that argument has no merit. Its like Michael Moore saying that white people in the midwest just want guns because we are all racists who think minorities are going to break in to our homes. He then argues that white people in the midwest all have guns but there is no crime to defend from. Well, no kidding. Could it be there is no crime BECAUSE we all have guns??
Also, cities like Detroit, Chicago, Baltimore, New York, all have stringent gun control laws. This, to me, is the largest factor in their high crime rates. For instance, if you compare Detroit to Atlanta Georgia both are a majority of black people. In 2009 Detroit had a murder rate of 40.2 per 100,000 while Atlanta had a rate of 14.5 per 100,000 and Birmingham, AL had 28.6. And while you may hail the Asians for not looting you must not have lived in the Anaheim, Garden Grove CA area in the 90s like I did when asian gangs committed hundreds of violent home invasion robberies in those towns. The fact is if you try to break down US cities by ethnicity to correlate to crime rates you will have a hard time making the case. There are too many factors involved that anyone can take just about any statistic they want and make what sounds like a case for why crime is high in one area and low in another. The bottom line to me is that historically more gun laws do nothing but disarm good people and embolden criminals. Guns have less to do with CAUSING crime than gun laws have in making people criminals.

 

[crossrhodes]

Fbi report

The latest FBI report stated that crimes involving firearms is at it's lowest in 30 years. They contribute it to the fact that more states have passed CCW laws for it's law abiding citizens. The Brady Bunch was not happy with the FBI report. I think they would be happy that crimes involving firearms went down.
Just proves you can't argue with the village idiot.
Also, those countries with the ultra low crime rate have VERY strict immigration laws. Yeah. England may have less crime involving firearms, but they are beating the pants off use when it comes to public bombings.
I'd rather dodge bullets then IED's any day of the week.

 

[Dstoerm]

When crime statistics for cities are compared I cannot follow the line of reasoning that would follow that some 'types' of people are inherently more violent or prone to crime... and you know what I mean.

I think that most often a variety of common factors play into the higher crime stats, with the highest on my list being the lack of in-home fathers and a PERCEPTION of almost zero opportunities.

Guns or race are not, in my opinion, the cause of violent crime.
Kids who are dirt poor in shi**y towns don't always turn to crime. The fathers, uncles, or whomever, who care that live with them simply will not allow it.

Young males without strong guidance will always struggle to do the right thing since doing the wrong things are so easy and are perceived to be 'cool' with their equally unguided friends.