the "Japanese has fewer murders" argument

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gibson_es

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It twas used against me. And i cant seem to find a defensive statement that i like. Personallyi think with no gun ban they would have much fewer murders tgen us period. Might be a cultural thing. Im not sure.

For those that arw unaware. Theres a statistic out there showing 12,000 gun murders a year in the u.s. and only 11 in japan (2006 i think) now japan a little less then half the population. Even so. That would be 22-30 deaths a year if they had out population. I was tjinking the best way is to show its a crap statistic foe the anti gun argument. Im thinking if i cab find non-weapon murder rates for the two countries. Showing japan is lower then i can make a defense with the idea that guns or not, they just simply have fewer murders. But i cant find those stats anywere. And i need a better way of wording it.

Any ideas? And yes i know that stats are somewhat crap because they can be twisted to show whatever you want within reason

Yes i see the typos.im on my phone and the cursor wont go were i wanted it too
 
Indeed, Japan has a far lower homicide rate than the US. But that has nothing whatsoever to do with guns. Sure, their gun homicide rate is lower, but so is their knife homicide rate, and their blunt object homicide rate, and their hands/feet homicide rate.

If one believes that Japan has fewer gun homicides because the Japanese have fewer guns than Americans, it follows that Japan has fewer homicides by hands and feet because the Japanese have fewer hands and feet than Americans.
 
The reason for the low murder rate is almost entirely cultural. If you could clone me a millions times and start a new country with just my clones, the murder rate would be zero.

You can't simply compare the behaviors of individual people and try to make conclusions about the efficacy of criminal laws. Release all the prisoners from a high security prison and start a new town with just those prisoners isolated from the rest of the world. Now start another new town composed of entirely Amish people isolated from the rest of the world. No matter what the gun laws are in those towns, I guarantee you that the prisoners' town will have a higher crime rate than the Amish town. Put a total gun ban in place in the Amish town, and have no gun laws in the prisoners' town -- anti-gun folks will then argue, "look the gun ban results in less crime." Put a total gun ban in place in the prisoners' town and no gun laws in the Amish town and the pro-gun folks will argue, "see, gun bans don't work and less gun laws result in less crime."

What it comes down to is that any geographic area is composed of numerous distinct individuals who all make their own choices. If you've got a lot of responsible, honorable, law-abiding people in an area (i.e. Japan), you'll have a lower crime rate. If you have a bunch of gang-banging, criminal-minded degenerates (i.e. Chicago), you'll have a higher crime rate.
 
I'm a firm believer that if we didn't have the large gang issue or share a border with a country almost run by drug cartels that we would be the safest country in the world. Japan doesn't have that same issue. Another thing would be their culture standards seem to be higher in many regards. That does have an effect.
 
First, the proper question is not about murders with guns, it's about murders.

The basic reality is that Japan has a lower murder rate than the United States because it's Japan. And Mexico has a higher murder rate than the U. S. because it's Mexico. Murder rates and crime rates are driven by a complex assortment of cultural, legal, social and economic factors, not solely by the availability of a particular instrument.

There is evidence that some countries with strict gun laws have been experiencing a significant increas in violent crime, while such has been decreasing in the United States.

For example:

  • See this article regarding violent crime in Great Britain.

  • This paper also describes higher and rising crime rates in Europe compared with the United States.

  • The Crime Victimization Survey conducted by the University of Leiden in The Netherlands shows overall violent crime rates in the United States well below those of some of the European countries with the stricter gun laws you favor.

  • The study Crime and Justice in the United States and in England and Wales, 1981-96 conducted by the US Bureaus of Justice Statistics shows decline rates of violent crime in England while the rates in the U. S. are falling.

  • For an excellent study of the rise in violent crime, and the erosion of gun and self defense rights in Great Britain see, Guns and Violence, the English Experience by Joyce Lee Malcolm (Harvard University Press, 2002). It's well worth reading.

  • And here's an interesting article co-authored by well known and respected Second Amendment scholar, David Kopple, on that subject.
 
Anybody tries the international thing, just go to Switzerland and Mexico contrast. Switzerland, lots of guns one of the lowest murder rates, Mexico, tough gun laws, insane murder rate. Also. pointing out that the US murder rate outside of certain usually, urban, areas is in inline with international norms, even gun free countries, is good.

Japan is really, really different. I don't know a great deal about it, but the culture is a huge factor. I believe they have a strong sense of shame about some things, which isn't necessarily bad, and I think they have some laws and practices that would give libs here serious twisted panties.

One thing I know that's a bit of an example is the local policeman of some (many?) districts maintains a booth, and all the people in the area come by to talk to him about problems, and he will stop by district houses and lecture them about things... like reading too much pornography. They have vending machines that sell used panties there (seriously)... if that doesn't show how different things are, I'm not sure what would...
 
The Japanese also have a much lower divorce rate and bans on some violent video games, so maybe that's it.

Though I'm not a fan of comparing our nation to another in the far east. They have a history of deplorable actions.
 
The Japanese also have a much lower divorce rate and bans on some violent video games
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The only thing Japan has banned is rape games where the objective is to go out and rape a girl as part of the game. Other than that they're fine, and Japan for a long time was the video game capital of the world. The stuff that came out of Japan was of the likes of stuff we've ever seen, and the US market has never produced a game that would be banned under Japanese laws so to say that that has any effect is very naive.
 
Japan is not multicultural like the US is. They have their own strong distinct culture and generally keep others out. This is where multiculturalism fails. While people should be free to follow their own way of life and ideals, you need a strong national identity as well. Before around the 1960s, this was the case in America. But then the concept of multiculturalism took hold and we gradually lost our national identity. The end of the Cold War has only further accelerated this due to no longer having something to unify against.

The Swiss come primarily from French and German backgrounds, but they are united under a strong national identity. They are Swiss first, and their ancestry second. Multiculturalism, as we have been practicing in the US, does not work.
 
Japan is a country with a largely-homogenous population. It is very deeply-rooted in cultural values that, due to the lack of ethnic diversity, have not been eroded much in centuries. The country does not border any other country, and there are none that have populations flocking to it and bringing varying senses of value, culture, and practices to it. Its own population is simply not changing in the "progressive" manner that ours is, (in the way we use that word.)

Life and death in Japan are both greatly respected and revered.
 
rub their noses in the suicide rate then add the suicide and homicide numbers together and look at the totals for there and here its surprising
 
Ann Coulter made a good point on fox news:

If you compare the US white population's murder rate it's the same as Belgium's. So we don't have a gun problem, but rather a demographic problem.

Ann Coulter said:
"On the gun crimes, we keep hearing how low they are in Europe, and oh, they're so low, and they have no guns," Coulter told Fox television’s Sean Hannity. "If you compare white populations, we have the same murder rate as Belgium."
Click to expand...

http://www.bet.com/news/national/20...-aren-t-the-problem-the-demographics-are.html

Bottom line, you can't compare an almost completely homogenous society like Japan to an incredibly diverse one like the USA and get any meaningful data.
 
There is also a difference in reporting what a "murder" is.

In the US, if your wife kills you, and then kills herself - it counts as 1 murder, 1 suicide.

In Japan the same situation would be counted as a double suicide.

Sadly I don't have a reference to cite for this, other than conversations over sake with JNP officers visiting in the US as part of their exchange program. (Similar to our FBI National Academy.)
 
First, the proper question is not about murders with guns, it's about murders.
Click to expand...

Just to nitpick I'd argue for 'attacks with intent to kill' - murders plus attempted murders. That should remove any skewing caused from guns being more likely to result in death than other weapons, per attack. Other things even (they never are), countries where guns are very hard to obtain will have lower murder rates if for no other reason than it's harder to kill without a gun than with one.
 
In Japan the same situation would be counted as a double suicide.

yup and likely the kids would be dead as welll
 
Oranges to Pineapples

As far a I'm concerned the US is the US, and Japan is Japan; comparing the two is like comparing oranges to pineapples.

I do not like comparing the US to other nations in general; even if a country has a lot cultural similarities to us, like the UK, or Canada for example, there still are outstanding differences that affect crime rates such as demographics, population size, and bordering countries.
 
The country does not border any other country, and there are none that have populations flocking to it and bringing varying senses of value, culture, and practices to it.
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Ding ding ding.

Entirely cultural. In Japan, things like 'dishonor' still mean something.

Aside from that, they have their own weird (from an American viewpoint) issues. Some things just aren't reported and published, as explained by fellows from or that have lived in Japan. Being openly fondled on a subway rarely even warrants a police report, and the numbers that are published blur the lines between 'groping' and 'rape'. Violent crime can go unreported or just unpublished because it's, to oversimplify it, unflattering.

The US is hardly perfect about it, but there's something to be said about the fact that most of the country has rewritten or simply erased their chapter on WWII...
 
Japan is a country with a largely-homogenous population. It is very deeply-rooted in cultural values that, due to the lack of ethnic diversity, have not been eroded much in centuries. The country does not border any other country, and there are none that have populations flocking to it and bringing varying senses of value, culture, and practices to it. Its own population is simply not changing in the "progressive" manner that ours is, (in the way we use that word.)

Life and death in Japan are both greatly respected and revered.
Click to expand...

This, and what others said about the difference in our societies. Japan doesn't have a plethora of inner city gang bangers with illegal guns committing gun violence. Look at Chicago and other big cities where guns are banned.

Ann Coulter is right, but the politicians are afraid to address the real issue, and enforce existing gun laws.
 
It is all about culture, there is very little violent crime in Japan. Lack of weapons is not a factor.

The Swiss have all kinds of weapons-almost no gun crime.

Mexico? Harsh gun control and violence is everywhere.

Federal prisons? Harsh weapon control-sky high violence and murder rate.


Culture, and by that I mean how people are educated and raised, has everything to to with the problem and weapons have nothing to do with the problem.

Culture and humans are almost impossible to control, that is why the politicos see weapons as an easy target-despite the fact that they have almost zero effect.


As others have pointed out, a certain demographic is almost entirely responsible for the high rate of violent crimes in the US, FBI statistics make this clear, but you will never see this mentioned by any politico or any major news programming.
 
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... and suicide rates per 100K for each are what again?
In 2009, the number of suicides rose 2 percent to 32,845 exceeding 30,000 for the twelfth straight year and equating to nearly 26 suicides per 100,000 people... In comparison, the UK rate is about 9 per 100,000, and the US rate around 11 per 100,000
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and I'm fine with that. Their thing, not mine. (I hope) They exhibit a totally different mindset, etc (see above posts that are spot on).

But be sure to point out the above during your discussion or debate. (called deflecting) Note the quantity of their suicides; +/- 30K for a nation of 130 mill. US Homicide/Suicides by guns +/- 30K for a nation of 330 mill (and yes I'm excluding other homicides/suicides here because we're comparing apples to fish, but we're trying to make a point to whatever person we're dabating).

Ask whoever you're debating (after giving them the above to chew on) "Which is worse if looking at numbers? Both involve death. US numbers include +/- 15K gun suicides, 3-4K LEO/SD/HD types (not sure of exact number), who knows how many gangbangers killing each other (which is still sad for someone) and how many "Truly Innocents" deaths by gunfire? In a Nation of 330 million with 200+ million guns? And you want to compare a select violent US death percap to a select Japanese death percap but easily overlook a major cause of death in their culture?"

(now you're also playing or debating dirty here mind you, by real debate methodology and rules of the game, but hey... who cares? Trying to make them think outside their comfort box and back them up for a minute. They'll try to steer you back to murder but play their game and press on, dont be polite, be... like Bill O'Reilly for a minute and press on in spite of not being fair to them for a minute)

Also, you MUST ALWAYS remind them that "several times in their history, their overlords disarmed them all and dominated them with a VERY FEW armed men. They learned to kowtow or get their head lopped off". Ask opposing debater... "Is that what you want?" "Do you want to live in a nation where your Betters can lop off your head for not kowtowing? Where your children and children's children and even Their children are so brainwashed they will not stand up to tyrants both small and Great?" (you can act all righteous and indignent, faux angry and excited or calm and cool, your choice... but I like to think of Belushi in Animal House delivery myself)

Smile at them.

"Not me." "Thanks for the discussion tho. You made me think for a moment. Thank you again"

Now if they are wise, they might realize you just summed up yourself... and them.

You don't behave out of fear. They do. But NOT the Japanese when in Warrior mindset... which you might also remind your opponent; "great people unless they're trying to kill you, then they can be some kinda brutal."

Which I personally admire. But I bet that whoever you are debating/discussing with never looked at the situation in that light... did they?
 
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