So only 0.3% of a gun death was used in a violent crime? What was the other 99.7% of that gun death used for? 
You’re attempting to establish that tighter gun control will make society safer…by citing opinion polls?
Get some facts.
Hey I’m coming on late but,
SuaveSkin if you like a good arguement, maybe you should start out further on one of the wings. If you try to hold the middle, these people will slaughter you with details. There are some BIG sharks in these waters. But keep going you are doing fine.
Off the subject but,
You hear this often. I that doesn’t make it so. IIRC the Navy and the Marine Corps trace their existance back to the revolution.
I don’t recall about the Army, but No Army at All? I don’t know.
People forget that while the British surrendered. The Iroquis did not. This led directly into the Ohio War. So troops were needed. But many of the brush wars to steal Native territory were fought by the “well regulated militias”.
Anyway SuaveSkin keep on fighting. Documented statistics are good.
Just wanted to put in my 2sense.
I am NOT a sock puppet! am I? AM I?
SingleDad:
So, just who might the ‘authorities’ be, if all these are ‘irrelevant’?
“Buy a gun – piss off a liberal”
Single Dad:
Using your logic, all the amendments, and the Constitiution itself should be repealed.
Danielinyehlionsden: I’m probably somewhere in the middle on the types of guns being purchased and used.
One of my hobbies is Single-Action Shooting, also known as “Cowboy Shooting”, using old west single action revolvers, lever-action rifles and single- and double-barreled shotguns. It is one of the fastest growing shooting sports in America.
The reason that I have all three types of weapons is that they have radically different ballistic characteristics, thus each presenting the shooter with unique challenges, and are graded in competition in three seperate categories.
Most of my collection of firearms are based upon 19th century technology. This doesn’t make them any less lethal, just signigantly less effective on the modern battlefield, and therefore not suited for use in any “militia” service. Or so the experts claim.
Although my Browning Model 1885 BPCR (.45-70) would make a pretty good sniper rifle, and I’ll stack my Winchester 94 Trails End (.45 Colt) against the Army’s M-16 any day of the week, at least in my hands.
And puh-lease! I’ve fired the M-9 Colt that the Army jokingly calls a “sidearm”! Some “Urban Pacification” specialist would be totally outgunned going up against these beuties: Colt Cowboy or the Ruger Vaquero, if only because the people who own and shoot these guns are avid shooters.
Single Dad: kudos to you from a gun-nut! We may disagree, but the intellectual honesty and integrity you display is a welcome change from the typical gun-control tactics of Lying and Demonizing us who disagree with them.
You are a truly dangerous opponent, and one deserving of respect.
ExTank
ExTank: <bows> I do my best. Still learning though.
CalifBoomer: Learn about the correct and fallacious use of the argument from authority. You also use the Straw Man fallacy.
SuaveSkin: A classic example of the fallacy of argument from popularity.
See my thread [url=http://boards.straightdope.com/ubb/Forum7/HTML/001595.html]Logical Fallacies** for a more in-depth treatment of these fallacies.
If Cecil Adams did not exist, we would be obliged to create Him.
Sigh…
Logical Fallacies
Singledad,
I take issue with your claim that I used a “straw man” argument above. My point, very clearly, is that you cannot make an argument that a right should be attacked because people exercise it.
I was responding to a claim that the 2nd amendment should be repealed because of the fact that people keep and bear arms. (?!) That makes no sense. The reason it is protected is so that people are able (LEGALLY) to do so. It wasn’t put into place with the idea that nobody would bear arms, taking comfort in that they could if they wanted to.
By simple extension, you can apply the same logic to any legally protected behavior: It’s legal, people do it, so we have to make it illegal.
The 2nd Amendment is there because the act of arming and protecting yourself is a basic condition of humanity, not a “right” granted by the government. If you pay attention to the wording, it doesn’t say “we hereby grant the right to bear arms,” but rather “the right…shall not be infringed.”
That language is very clearly stating the fact that the right to be armed is a pre-existing condition that “shall not be infringed.” And a pledge that this new government, while imperfect, will not attempt to interfere with those few basic human conditions:
The freedom to speak your mind.
The freedom to believe as you will about religion.
The freedom to assemble.
The freedom to distribute information truthfully.
The freedom to arm yourself and defend yourself, your family, your home, and if need be, your nation. Even from its own leaders.
It is very telling that our current government is trying so valiantly to remove those basic rights from us.
Mere Life is not Victory.
Mere Death is not Defeat.
Joe Cool
2sense wrote:
Bricker didn’t say there was no army at all, he said there was no “standing” army. The Continental Army that fought the American Revolution was thrown together out of the various State militias. When the Revolutionary War was over, the Continental Army disbanded.
This is nothing at all like the modern United States Army, which stays together both in wartime and in peacetime. (Incidentally, the Constitution forbids appropriations of money for the Army to last for more than two years, so I guess Congress has to vote to fund the Army again every two years. The Navy is under no such restriction.)
Knowledge
The lack of knowledge is not surprising, many other surveys have found low levels of knowledge about justice matters (Roberts 1994). One effect of not knowing that there is already an extremely comprehensive and strict law on the books is that people continually think there must be a need for more laws. Even when a new law is passed most will not learn of it, and as long as murders continue to take place there will always be a demand for more laws.
The lack of knowledge among gun owners is worrisome, as they are presumed, in law, to know the law. I suspect most gun owners in Canada are not certain whether or not they are obeying the current law completely. The present law is so complex (it has more than 17,000 words), and has changed so often, that only a few dedicated professionals can claim to really know it.
I often find people are astonished when they discover that there are only about 60 fatal firearms accidents a year in Canada, that firearms are used in only about a third of suicides and homicides, that over 90% of those who die from a gun shot are males, and that last year in all of Canada there was a total of 21 women killed by a domestic partner using a firearm. If all firearms were to magically disappear, including those held by the police, the army, and the criminal population, people determined to kill themselves would mostly find other means, violent husbands would mostly use knives or blunt objects, and, obviously, there would be no gun accidents.
References
DuWors, Richard.
1992. “Robbery in Canada.” Juristat: Service Bulletin. Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics. 12:10. May.
Fedorowycz, Orest.
1992. “Break and Enter in Canada.” Juristat: Service Bulletin. Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics. 12:1. January.
Mayhew, Pat.
1987. Residential Burglary: A comparison of the United States, Canada and England and Wales. National Institute of Justice. Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office.
Roberts, Julian V.
1994. Public Knowledge of Crime and Justice: An Inventory of Canadian Findings. Technical Report, Department of Justice Canada. TR1994-15e.
Wolff, Lee, Shelley Trevethan and Tracy Hoskins.
1991. “Weapons and Violent Crime.” Juristat: Service Bulletin, Canadian Centre for Justice Statistics, 11:12. August.
hmmm? i don’t understand
-suaveskin
(gun deaths? 0.3%)
again, you might not understand this but there is no reason an every day citizen like you and me should have a auto/semi-automatic weapon…no purpose, nothing showing why we SHOULD own one…why we SHOULDN’T is because we don’t need them only armies need them unless you go around shooting at pretend bad guys in your backyard 
there is just no reason! THANX
SUAVESKIN
Why should I only be allowed to own a particular firearm if I need to? Why do I have to come up with a “justified” reason at all? What’s so awful about owning an AR-15 because I happen to like AR-15s? Maybe I enjoy shooting military-style rifles. Maybe I used to be in the Army or Marines and I had gotten used to the feel of an M-16 in my hands, and owning a civilian model of that gun brings back those pleasant feelings. Maybe I had some military experience firing a gun on full auto, and would enjoy the chance to do so again.
I just do not buy the notion that something should be outlawed merely because I don’t “need” it.
(And, yes, I know the AR-15 is only semi-automatic. I was bringing up the “I might like firing full auto” idea in the context of the earlier message saying that civilians don’t need full auto.)
Agreed, 100% tracer.
If we needed to prove and justify a need for every purchase we made (you have to apply your logic to all purchases, you can’t arbitrarily specify firearms), we wouldn’t be allowed to own much at all.
The beauty of Liberty is that we don’t have to prove that we need something in order to own it. The government has to prove that there is a valid and strong reason why we shouldn’t be allowed to own it.
Mere Life is not Victory.
Mere Death is not Defeat.
Joe Cool
I’m not convinced that SuaveSkin knows the difference between ‘automatic’ and ‘semi-automatic.’
Go look it up and give us a report, buddy.
A good point. I don’t need a television, an electric can opener or a hot computer. Why should I have any of those things.
The “you don’t need it” argument is very weak. You must make the argument that owning a gun is somehow bad, not only for the owner but for other people; i.e. it is not in the public interest.
The need argument is really only a refutation that “The right to bear arms is necessary for hunting” or some such; you then demonstrate that they don’t need this specific item to fulfill their more general need.
You must assume nothing Suave. Do not assume that people agree that gun ownership is good despite the inherent dangers of guns; do not assume that people agree that guns are only warranted for some set of specific functions.
Your post “Knowlege” used good paragraph and sentence structure. Strive to bring all your posts up to this level.
If Cecil Adams did not exist, we would be obliged to create Him.
I want a (fully functional) oil refinery. In my back yard.
Peace,
mangeorge
Spiritus: why not put people in jail for not registering their guns? Well, in CA they passed an “assault weapon” ban/registration about a dozen years ago. Maybe 20% were registered. Now, some didn’t hear about it, some were out of the county & were unable to, & some didn’t know THEIR gun was included. (Oh, and for those folks who watched too many “dragnet” episodes", ignorance of the law IS an excuse, under certain circ). But most, COULD NOT register, there were no forms & the Sheriff’s office would not let you register w/o proper form. Viola! 100,000+ instant felons! Now, it’s true that these arrests do not usu hold up in court, BUT, the police get to keep the gun anyway. These kind of arrests are also used in the new version of “throwing the book”, ir they find some guy who has downloaded a nude of Traci Lords on his computer, plus a bunch of other non-identifieable porn, and they charge him w/ 100 counts of possessing child-porn, + 4 counst of illegal “assault” weapons, plus mopery & dopery, w/ a comined prison sentence of 1000 years, and the poor guy has no choice but to plea-bargain to 1 year in a minimun security “hotel”, even tho he has commited no crime.
Tracer: when I said “machine gun”, I didn’t nessesarily mean an “assault rifle”, I meant a crew served .50 type, mass destruction, belt-fed mutha.