British gun control at work

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jimpeel,

All of the stories in the British and world press on the failure of the handgun ban to staunch the rising British crime rate have been wrong because the law was never written with that intention in mind.
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for a start, few writers outside the US have linked the gun ban and the crime rate. secondly, you yourself said that the gun ban had achieved its aims (of removing firearms from criminal hands), when you argued that it had caused criminals to stop using firearms and switch to something else.

Have you found any evidence that shows your theories are correct? I have provided the debate in the Commons about the ban AND the links for you to try and find, you havent so I guess not. As Mk VII shows, the ban was about guns and gun crime (powered by the emotion of post-Dunblane), the "general crime rate" didnt enter into it because it would have made no sense to anyone.

All of the writers in the European, American, Canadian, and Australian press have been under the mistaken impression that the law was written as a crime reduction and public safety measure when the law actually had the singular intent of preventing another school shooting and nothing more.
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again, the vast majority of what passes as writing when the link between the ban and the rising crime rate is wrong, as demonstrated on this very forum. In addition, I have never said that it "had a singular intent of preventing another school shooting", as you well know:

If you had said just "public safety" as opposed to saying just "crime reduction", then you would have been correct
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If you want to have a debate, then we can have one. Regretfully what we are having now is you making a point, me disproving it, you making a different point that is not the same as the first and accusing me of not answering the new point, me disproving it and pointing out the change, you retreating to cut and pastes of news articles that dont prove either of your first two points, me pointing this out, you retreating to a "Well you dont have RKBA" rubbish and then accusing me of not answering points already made.
 
agricola

coolhand, if you didnt have me on ignore you would have realised he was backing me up.
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Actually, he was not backing you up but showing that part of the debate, in difference to your claim to the contrary, was about the effect of the gun ban on crime and getting guns off the street.

Your contentoion has been that the law was not passed as a crime control measure.
That stands in direct opposition to the message that has been prevalent on this board, and that which Lott, Nemorov and Malcolm (and ilk) have been spewing - that the gun bans have seen crime rise in the UK. Thats something thats palpably false, and indeed its doubtful that anyone at the time saw a ban as going to effect the general crime rate one way or another.
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As Mk VII shows, the ban was about guns and gun crime (powered by the emotion of post-Dunblane), the "general crime rate" didnt enter into it because it would have made no sense to anyone.
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... the vast majority of what passes as writing when the link between the ban and the rising crime rate is wrong ...
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jimpeel,

we will have to wait for mkvii to respond, but trying to say that what I said:

If you had said just "public safety" as opposed to saying just "crime reduction", then you would have been correct
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As Mk VII shows, the ban was about guns and gun crime (powered by the emotion of post-Dunblane), the "general crime rate" didnt enter into it because it would have made no sense to anyone.
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and from the link he posted:

Questioned about legislation relating to the use of handguns, the PMOS said that the purpose of the Firearms Amendment Act 1997 had been to ban the private ownership of small firearms. There was clearly a further issue relating to illegally-held guns being used for crime given the increasing gun culture in parts of this country. That was obviously something which we had to address. "
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are all that different would be clearly wrong. It was not passed as a crime control measure, because it would only ever be expected to affect one small area of the criminal statistics that would never affect the general rate as you contended:

...its doubtful that anyone at the time saw a ban as going to effect the general crime rate one way or another."???? This was going to be the panacea. This was gooing to reduce crime...
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Jimpeel:

Actually, he was not backing you up but showing that part of the debate, in difference to your claim to the contrary, was about the effect of the gun ban on crime and getting guns off the street.

Your contentoion has been that the law was not passed as a crime control measure.
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Agreed.
 
agricola

You left out this part:
"... In this case, however, we were talking about tackling illegal guns which were coming into and being used in this country, in addition to the issue of replica weapons. Put to him that the only practical way to tackle the problem of gun crime was through a return to 'sus', the PMOS said that that wasn't necessarily the case. The amendment was about tightening up gun laws to take guns off the street and send a strong signal to those who might use them.
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jimpeel,

er no, i didnt:

As Mk VII shows, the ban was about guns and gun crime (powered by the emotion of post-Dunblane), the "general crime rate" didnt enter into it because it would have made no sense to anyone.
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I have said, at least twice, that the ban was about public safety and guns (and gun crime) not, as you contended, about "making crime fall" which didnt enter into anyones heads at the time.
 
ag, this has got to be some of the hair-splittingest stuff you've posted in a long time!

Look: Had guns not been involved in heinous crimes, guns would not have been banned. The issue, then, is an effort to reduce crimes, not MERELY look at guns as the be-all and end-all of criminal misbehavior.

The over-arching question is whether ALL violent crime has been reduced as a result of banning guns (or, "some guns", if you prefer), not whether gun-crime and only gun-crime is reduced. That's why I make the "hair-splitting" comment.

So the primary question about England, then, is whether or not the rate of violent crime has increased, decreased, or remained stable. Whether or not the rate of violent crime where firearms are involved is lessened is irrelevant.

Another question I have is whether there has been any change in the rate of deaths from criminal violence (by whatever means; guns, knives, clubs, etc.).

Art
 
Art,

I would hardly call it "hair splitting" - dont forget, at the time of the ban we were seeing total firearm crime (minus air weapons) of 6000 offences. When it was being proposed, the main thrust of the public debate was firstly "never again" (referring to Dunblane and Hungerford) and secondly "why does anyone need a handgun anyway" (this was particularly made clear during the second ban of .22 weapons) and allusion to those 6000 offences (which ignored the points made by Greenwood and others that the vast majority of those offences were committed with illegally held weapons anyway).

My focus on minutae in this debate has also been due to jimpeels tactic of making comments that are demonstrably false, as anyone who has been to Madame Tussauds will attest. Its nitpicking, but its important to expose the small lies because they illustrate the bigger one.

Thats why I said:

As Mk VII shows, the ban was about guns and gun crime (powered by the emotion of post-Dunblane), the "general crime rate" didnt enter into it because it would have made no sense to anyone.
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What jimpeel has been trying to argue is that the 1997 ban was brought in to reduce crime (initially he didnt reduce this to "gun crime", though he has since its become obvious even to him that he is wrong). MkVII's post showed that is the case, as did the Hansard report I linked to. Jimpeel is now claiming (along with coolhand, who still has me on ignore) that what I said was not what I said.

The over-arching question is whether ALL violent crime has been reduced as a result of banning guns (or, "some guns", if you prefer), not whether gun-crime and only gun-crime is reduced. That's why I make the "hair-splitting" comment.
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As I said above, that isnt (and never was) the question over here. Given the extremely small number of offences pre-ban, even a totally effective ban that reduced the offences to zero would have a statistically minute (viewed against the total number of crimes) effect in the criminal statistics.

I appreciate that, in the US, this link between gun bans and reduced crime has been made by the antis'; that does not mean that it was made here (especially at the time of the 1997 ban).

So the primary question about England, then, is whether or not the rate of violent crime has increased, decreased, or remained stable. Whether or not the rate of violent crime where firearms are involved is lessened is irrelevant.
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If you are talking about the crime rate generally (ie: without mentioning firearms), then thats a valuable debate - the reasons for the rise are interesting and varied. However, to (as is done all the time on this board) link the rise with the 1997 ban is totally false, for reasons that have been posted tens of times here and on TFL.

Another question I have is whether there has been any change in the rate of deaths from criminal violence (by whatever means; guns, knives, clubs, etc.).
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there has, but the reasons are not a disarmed populace - pre-1997, the populace as
 
ag, in order to avoid the old cliche about "figures don't lie, but liars figure" certain things are needed.

To me, all these arguments of whatever sort require certain data, possibly in the form of a graph.

In such a graph, I'd like to see a line indicating the violent crime rate, say from 1990 to the present. Along that line, points should be indicated where there were notable changes in the law, including changes in any gun control laws, or changes in sentencing policies. If there are changes following such nodes, there is room for debate.

As it is, we're stuck with what's available in the English press, since most of us aren't going to delve deeply into the problems of another country. Certainly we're not going to fight our way through the differences in how words are used, as we've mentioned before. Face it, we know that stricter gun controls were enacted in England. We see an apparent increase in the reporting of the amount of violent crimes of whatever sorts. Ergo, "If A, then B."

I'd also comment that each and every little nit-picky comment is just not worth bothering with. Extraneous, irrelevant, etc. Heck, just use PM to let somebody know their BS is getting so deep it's stressing your hipboots. :D

Art
 
art,

such a graph would be useless, because (as I showed) you could illustrate whatever theory you liked.

As I pointed out, the 1997 ban "affected" only 6000 crimes (in fact rather less, since it was targetted on handguns), so you would have to justify why it was included and not something that could generate more of a statistical impact.

If you want to see the data, please look at pg 79 (pg 68 on the text) onwards from

here

which should prove illuminating.
 
ag, I tried the link, but it came up too small to read...

But look: You have some rate of violent crimes, recorded year by year. You have some rate of people dying from these violent crimes, whether from knife, gun or whatever, recorded year by year.

To me, the pertinent questions about any sort of gun ban is whether or not the rate of violence changed, and whether or not the death-rate changed. That is, is there any apparent effect from the ban on these rates?

"As I pointed out, the 1997 ban "affected" only 6000 crimes (in fact rather less, since it was targetted on handguns), so you would have to justify why it was included and not something that could generate more of a statistical impact."

Is "6000" the total of violent crimes in 1997? Of these, how many resulted in fatalities?

After 1997, were there more or fewer than 6000? What is the trend, over these last six or seven years? And, what sort of change is there, if any, in the rate of fatalities?

In the U.S., 80 to 90 percent, roughly, of all unlawful homicides are committed via use of a handgun. (I'd have to hunt through the CDC data to be more accurate.) How did (does?) that compare with England?

Art
 
Art,

There are three illustrations of "pages" with the upper right hand corner turned down at the top of the page in the header. Click on the one on the right (Fit Width) and it will zoom to readable proportions.
 
I've been trying to follow the general debate without getting bogged down in the stats, as I think comparing them from different countries and from bureaucracies that changed their collection methods during the period in question is of very limited value. I also have very litttle faith in the accuracy of such statistics, but that is another subject. The question that I would like agricola and/or any other of our English bretheren to address comes from the statement "never again". If the goal of firearms elimination wasn't crime reduction but only to reduce injury/death from firearms, is it the Crown's contention that death from firearms gets you deader than a hammer up side the head? What exactly IS the point? I've followed this debate for a long time and have had a hard time getting an answer simple enough to wrap my dumb redneck brain around. This might be a good time to get it settled so I can quit reading these threads. They usually end up making my head hurt.

Please, type slowly and use small words.
 
"also, about 6000 is the number of total firearm offences in the last year before the ban"

ag, that's a nice datum, if and only if one also knows the answers to my other questions in my preceding post.

As a solitary data point, it's useless.

I'll try the link again when I have time.

Art
 
So if the Brits state that the intention of the law was never to reduce crime; but only to disallow the perpetration of one singular type of specific crime -- school shootings -- which was never a prevalent crime in the first place, then they can also state that the rise in crime cannot be tied in any manner to the firearm ban. Neat.

The problem then is, lacking that reason, that the British population is becoming increasingly more aberrant. The crime rate escalating has to be caused by some factor, or set of factors, and the firearm factor has now been eliminated.

So why, in the face of cameras in every aspect of their lives; and laws that have criminalized simple bad behaviour, is the crime rate up? Is it because the laws are now so numerous that they have criminalized behaviour which was formerly legal; and a new class of criminal has been created -- the formerly law abiding? Has British society come to resemble that in Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged"? Are the Brits becoming just so many Hank Reardons?
"Did you really think that we want those laws to be observed?" said Dr. Ferris. "We *want* them broken. You'd better get it straight That it's not a bunch of boy scouts you're up against– then you'll know that this is not the age for beautiful gestures. We're after power and we mean it. You fellows were pikers, but we know the real trick, and you'd better get wise to it. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when there aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor objectively interpreted – and you create a nation of law-breakers – and then you cash in on guilt. Now that's the system, Mr. Rearden, that's the game, and once you understand it, you'll be much easier to deal with."
-- Ayn Rand, _Atlas Shrugged , Ch. III, "White Blackmail"
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jimpeel,

So if the Brits state that the intention of the law was never to reduce crime; but only to disallow the perpetration of one singular type of specific crime -- school shootings -- which was never a prevalent crime in the first place, then they can also state that the rise in crime cannot be tied in any manner to the firearm ban.
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Please, respond to what was written and not what would make your argument easiest. The ban was brought in as a "public safety" measure inspired by Dunblane (though the only reason it was done is because of Dunblane). I appreciate these are similar but they are not equal. To illustrate this, I draw your attention to the following quote from the later 1997 debate (to add .22 handguns to the section 5 list, the speaker is Sir Nicholas Lyell, Tory MP for North-East Bedfordshire, emphasis mine):

In summary, therefore, this is what the House is considering. Here we have a popular sport, an Olympic sport, a Commonwealth games sport, enjoyed and participated in by people who are recognised to be highly responsible. There is no real case that these comparatively light pistols are exceptionally dangerous or that they are any more dangerous than the other implements and substances that I mentioned. The use of such pistols by club members is closely licensed and monitored and is demonstrably responsible. It is not necessary in the public interest to ban them. There was indeed overwhelming political feeling following Dunblane, which led to the 1997 Act which introduced a regime that is already more draconian in its controls and more stringent than those that exist almost anywhere else in the world. Nothing further will be gained in public security by a complete ban. As is now widely recognised, we in Parliament have, in these circumstances, a duty to protect the liberties of our constituents and the rights of minorities.
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I would also point out that few people have become criminals because of the changes in legislation - the thing about law-abiding people is that they abide by the law, when it changes they change. Where (especially with regards to this) people have fallen foul of the law, its usually because they have turned to doing things that were illegal before the change - eg gun shop owners who dispose of their "illegal" stock to criminals. (hope this answers longriflemans question as well)

Art,

its not a solitary datum - I published the table it was on earlier in this thread, and the .pdf contains pretty much all of the criminal statistics from that given year.
 
Art

The links are working fine. Do you have Acrobat Reader? If you do, perhaps it would be better to do the following:

Right click on the link

Choose "Save Target as"

Save the PDF file to your hard drive at a location of your choosing

After it downloads, use Windows Explorer to open the file locally.

If you are on diaup, and you left click on the link, it will try to open directly from the website and can take quite a long time to do so. Opening it locally is vastly superior to opening the file over the Internet, especially with dialup.

Sorry if it caused any consternation.
 
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