kannonfyre
Member
Dear THR friends,
I need your help.
But first, a little background info is in order.......about two months ago, I quit my previous job and landed a post as a research officer for a Member of Parliament (MP) in my country. An MP is analogous to a Congressman in America. Anyway, two days ago, a particularly irritating and “holier than thou” MP with particularly liberal and intrusive state centric tendencies from another district submitted a proposal that a bill for additional gun control measures be tabled in Parliament in 3 weeks time. My country already has tough gun control laws (no CCW, all guns registered, steep licensing fees....etc) and from looking at the proposal that she submitted, she seeks to ban all civilian ownership of handguns, impose ammunition restrictions and other measures which make me want to throw up. Its obvious that she has not done her research (despite being a learned college lecturer) because she ends her proposal by saying that “we must NOT end up like America where rampant ownership of firearms results in catastrophic loss of life through unyielding violence”. My MP boss (he is pro gun ownership) and I share the belief that this anti lawmaker simply wants to be seen to be doing something legislative as she has not proposed any bills in parliament for the last two years (elections are around the corner and she wants to look productive) and her district has seen a 10% increase in gun crime (which has been attributed to weapons smuggled in from abroad).
This morning, my boss set me the task of writing a paper to be submitted to the Speaker of Parliament. As the Speaker has the authority to quash any bill that he deems to be wasteful of parliament’s time, my boss directed me to write a piece about how gun control has not worked in the U.S. and hence will most likely not work in any other country. The anti-gun MP made about half a dozen references to the U.S. in her proposal and my boss sees it fitting that U.S. data be used to debunk her points. Also, he suggested that I use the case of Switzerland as a example of how the large amounts of firearms in civilian hands has not lead to gun crime or social instability.
Essentially, I hope to answer the following questions:
1) Who in American society claims that gun violence is a problem? What segments of society do these people come from?
2) What evidence do these people point to that support their claim of epidemic gun violence? Can it be clearly debunked?
3) What other data and evidence is available which OBJECTIVELY supports or debunks the gun control supporter’s arguments?
4) When did gun control seriously start to arise in the public agenda?
5) Does this point to a change in the social dynamics of American society? (Basically, if we can prove that fear of gun crime is due to greater unfounded paranoia, AND we can draw parallels to local society, we can tell this opposing MP to calm down and shut up.)
6) What exactly is contributing to a greater fear or perception of gun violence in relation to all the other hazards of modern life?
Therefore, it would be good if you guys could point me in the direction of any objective a) mass media articles, b) statistical data, c) authoritative books and d) articles from professional journals that support the stand that gun violence isn’t really that huge a problem and that gun control is effectively useless. Also, any authoritative material, books or statistics about gun ownership and the low level of gun violence in Switzerland would be appreciated.
Many thanks!
I need your help.
But first, a little background info is in order.......about two months ago, I quit my previous job and landed a post as a research officer for a Member of Parliament (MP) in my country. An MP is analogous to a Congressman in America. Anyway, two days ago, a particularly irritating and “holier than thou” MP with particularly liberal and intrusive state centric tendencies from another district submitted a proposal that a bill for additional gun control measures be tabled in Parliament in 3 weeks time. My country already has tough gun control laws (no CCW, all guns registered, steep licensing fees....etc) and from looking at the proposal that she submitted, she seeks to ban all civilian ownership of handguns, impose ammunition restrictions and other measures which make me want to throw up. Its obvious that she has not done her research (despite being a learned college lecturer) because she ends her proposal by saying that “we must NOT end up like America where rampant ownership of firearms results in catastrophic loss of life through unyielding violence”. My MP boss (he is pro gun ownership) and I share the belief that this anti lawmaker simply wants to be seen to be doing something legislative as she has not proposed any bills in parliament for the last two years (elections are around the corner and she wants to look productive) and her district has seen a 10% increase in gun crime (which has been attributed to weapons smuggled in from abroad).
This morning, my boss set me the task of writing a paper to be submitted to the Speaker of Parliament. As the Speaker has the authority to quash any bill that he deems to be wasteful of parliament’s time, my boss directed me to write a piece about how gun control has not worked in the U.S. and hence will most likely not work in any other country. The anti-gun MP made about half a dozen references to the U.S. in her proposal and my boss sees it fitting that U.S. data be used to debunk her points. Also, he suggested that I use the case of Switzerland as a example of how the large amounts of firearms in civilian hands has not lead to gun crime or social instability.
Essentially, I hope to answer the following questions:
1) Who in American society claims that gun violence is a problem? What segments of society do these people come from?
2) What evidence do these people point to that support their claim of epidemic gun violence? Can it be clearly debunked?
3) What other data and evidence is available which OBJECTIVELY supports or debunks the gun control supporter’s arguments?
4) When did gun control seriously start to arise in the public agenda?
5) Does this point to a change in the social dynamics of American society? (Basically, if we can prove that fear of gun crime is due to greater unfounded paranoia, AND we can draw parallels to local society, we can tell this opposing MP to calm down and shut up.)
6) What exactly is contributing to a greater fear or perception of gun violence in relation to all the other hazards of modern life?
Therefore, it would be good if you guys could point me in the direction of any objective a) mass media articles, b) statistical data, c) authoritative books and d) articles from professional journals that support the stand that gun violence isn’t really that huge a problem and that gun control is effectively useless. Also, any authoritative material, books or statistics about gun ownership and the low level of gun violence in Switzerland would be appreciated.
Many thanks!
