Started to avoid hijacking the Fred Thompson thread. Thompson says yes, apparently. I say no. I’m not talking about whether it makes the invidual gun owner’s home or business safer, but whether it makes the community as a whole safer. Look around the world: It seems that the more widespread gun ownership is in a country/community, the more violent crime there is (not to mention gun-related accidents).
I’m just curious if you missed all the gun control debates we had post-Virginia Tech massacre?
If not, you’re probably aware there’s many examples of countries with tons of guns, but with low violent crime rates. It’s certainly true that the United States, which has relatively liberal gun laws, has a high violent crime rate in comparison to many other western countries. But that’s just association, not causation, so to bring it up without actually making any attempt whatsoever to establish causation means that bringing it up is without value. If you want to prove their is causation, you need to do so, just pointing out two pieces of associated data without establishing a causal link is poor grounds for debate.
All that aside, my gut feeling is that established personal firearm ownership makes homeowners slightly safer. Personal firearm ownership also, however, makes a home a bit more dangerous, too. So I think it’s mostly a wash.
That’s without getting in to the debate about rifles versus handguns talking just about rifles, several countries with extremely low violent crime rates have extremely high rates of rifle ownership but extremely restrictive hand gun laws.
Can anyone find an example of a country that has powerful gun control laws, but high violent crime rates? I think that would be the best way to disprove a correlation between gun control and safety.
As far as I know, no such country exists, so I’m going to go ahead and use logic. Easy access to powerful weapons probably leads to more violent crime, and certainly leads to more fatal accidents.
Unfortunately, there is no definitive proof either way on this. I can provide plenty of data which (I argue) should compel the conclusion that an armed citizenry is safer than an unarmed one, generally speaking.
People on the other side of the debate can provide different data, as well as argue that my data should be read in a different way, to suggest the opposite conclusion.
We have had many gun gontrol debates on this board, most recently stemming from the tragedy at Virginia Tech.
The only absolutely wrong and indefensible answer in this debate is to suggest that one side or the other is incontrovertibly and utterly true.
:rolleyes:
Wow.
We might apply the same “logic” to cars: easy access to powerful vehicles probably leads to more fatal accidents, to say nothing of crimes committed with the use of cars.
But that’s obviously not the end of the analysis: despite the obvious dangers of cars, we should not forbid private ownership of automobiles, because the benefits to society outweigh the costs.
Access to powerful weapons permits people to defend their lives against physical deadly force, especially when they could not defend themselves otherwise. A ninety-pound woman is at a distinct disadvantage agaiinst a 220 pound man, except if she’s armed with a .45 ACP. This is a benefit to society, one that innures to law-abiding citizens and against those committing crimes.
But you’re confusing the issue there. Cars have a lot of benefits, but they don’t make society safer; in those terms, it’s almost all on the negative side of the ledger. Outside really bizarre and unusual slasher-film circumstances, the only motor vehicle that will ever save your life is an ambulance.
Owning a gun might make you and your family safer (provided you are a responsible and law-abiding adult, keep control of your temper, and understand the importance of a trigger lock); but we’re not talking about the question on that level, but about the safety effect on society as a whole of having a great many firearms in private hands.
Easy. Mexico.
On the other side of the ledger, Finland, Switzerland, Israel – lots of guns, little violent crime.
What would be better (though obviously far from perfect) is to look at rates of change. In situations where countries implemented tougher gun laws, what happened to the rate of violent crime? Simply stating Country X has strict gun laws and Country X also has low crime rates doesn’t really tell you a lot.
Viva Mexico!
You have much more violent crime, and a similar rate of firearm murders, as well as much more draconian firearm laws, especially with regard to handguns.
This site says that there are 23 countries with higher murder rates than the US. I see that Russia’s murder rate is 4 times that of the US, and I believe there is a strict prohibition on Russians owning pistols. Mexico’s murder rate is about 3 times that of the US, and has laws more restrictive than the US. Looking at Wiki, there’s a case to be made that South Africa’s gun laws are also more strict than the US, and the murder rate is much higher.
So I think your point is refuted… in a way. Clearly there is not a direct correlation between gun control and murder rates. I’d just say that gun control is one among many, many factors that may or may not bear relevance on crime rates.
Ravenman, your (our) location also acts as a pretty good example of an area with tight gun laws and high levels of violent crime.
Absolutely true. The question posed by the OP didn’t ask if there were benefits to gun ownership though, only whether they are likely to be unsafe.
Also true. Now you just have to make the next step in your assertion, which is that a 90 pound innocent woman is more likely to be armed with a firearm than a 220 pound criminal man in a society that allows citizen arms.
Good point about Switzerland. Males of military age are required to keep a gun at home. However, note the details about the ammunition:
So, although there are lots of guns, it would appear that it’s not all that easy to use one illegally. Still, there are lots of guns…
That’s in a population of about 7.5M.
That would equate to about 80M guns in the US (assuming 2M guns in CH). From the wikipedia article on the US, the FBI estimates there are about 200M guns in the US, although about half of all households have guns in them.
Good point. That would reduce the impact that culture (and the government’s ability to enforce law) has on the issue.
So has a country enacted stricter gun control laws, but gotten more violent anyway?
No, the OP did not ask if gun ownership was likely to be safe. It asked if it made societies safer. There’s a pretty huge difference there.
As far as I know, and I will look it up later if no one else does, the UK rates of violent crime have risen since gun laws were tightened.
Sure, that’s the literal meaning of the title, but the body of the original post suggested that guns are unsafe, leading me to believe that was the intent of the post.
Arguably the UK and Australia have (cites are to partisan articles but the statistics seem legit).
http://www.geoffmetcalf.com/guncontrol_20010302.html
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=15304
Mexico
And lets keep in mind that gun control laws in the US are largely state and local laws, having very little, if anything, to do with who is president (which is what got this whole thread started). The SCOTUS has not incorporated the 2nd amendment yet, and I don’t see that happening any time soon (not to mention the fact that incorporation has been mostly a liberal movement, not a conservative one).