# Those for new gun control laws... **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 3, 2017, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847 "2017-10-03T05:06:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/101 "2017-10-04T20:43:07Z")
> [@DrCube](#): > > Yes, that’s exactly what I said. So how is it a fallacy? I specifically made no inferences from that fact. I suggested that cutting down the amount of guns available would cut down the amount of gun violence (or something like that) and you came back with “Gun homicides have been cut in half over the last 20 years. In the same period, the number of guns owned by US citizens has more than doubled. “The number of guns” is simply not the issue. Pick another argument.” You’re right, you made no inferrence from that. Technically you just dropped a random statement and took off. So I’ll invite you to expand on it since it wasn’t fair of me make an assumption about a statement you used to knock down my suggestion. > [@](#): > > You want to claim that fewer people own guns than did in 1993, and that’s why crime went down even while the absolute number of guns in the country went up? Go ahead and make that case. But the naive “Obviously, fewer guns leads to fewer gun crimes…” argument has been debunked. Oh, and the “more sales = more crimes” and the “more guns in the hands of law abiding gun owners, through loss, theft or worse, supply the black market which leads to more crime” arguments are done as well. > > Maybe it is as simple as fewer people owning guns results in less gun crime. **I’d need to see some evidence though**. Seems like it’s more specific, like fewer criminals owning guns results in less gun crime. “Criminal” in this case referring to rapists, murderers, thieves and arsonists, rather than the catch-all “anything that’s against the law”, as I highly doubt that traffic infractions, marijuana possession, tax evasion, improper disposal of batteries and motor oil, et cetera, correlate with more gun crime. But it’s your argument. Go ahead and make it Bolding mine. I asked you, specifically, for that evidence in my last post. Granted, it was evidence showing that that the years you stated mirror what you said, but still. I got no cites from you. And it’s been shown to work in plenty of other countries, so it’s hardy debunked. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 8:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/102 "2017-10-04T20:55:29Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > There are a number of examples of how guns can be used in self-defense where defenders don’t get shot, or “attackers” who do aren’t innocent, in [this thread](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=773012). > > But more than that, this -shows a fundamental disconnect between the left and the right, on guns but also on other issues. > > My basic assumption, on guns as well as the other enumerated rights in the Constitution, and even on pretty much anything else, is when the government asks me a question, or asks me to justify whatever it is that I am doing, is that “none of your business” is the default answer. I do not have to justify myself, IOW - the government has to justify its asking. I do not have to give them any reasons they think are sufficient - they have to give their reasons to me. > > That doesn’t mean there never are any such reasons - there are a lot of them. But always and without exception the government should accept the default. > > If I want to own a gun just because it is shiny, or to protect myself against zombie invasions, or because I want to defend my home, or because I like to go target shooting on the weekends, and those are not good enough reasons to convince the government that I should be allowed to own a gun, tough fucking shit. > > If I use those guns to commit a crime, no problem - come down on me like the wrath of God. If I don’t, the government doesn’t get to decide that _I_ can’t own a gun because _someone else_ might commit a crime. That’s not how it works, or at least, not how it works in a Constitutional republic. > > Regards, > Shodan That’s not how it works while the second amendment is enshrined in this way, is what you meant to say, right? If 2a wan’t there, would you be able to make the manifesto you just did? Fortunately, every time you abuse it in order to justify your lack of a need to justify your possesion of a lethal device, that 2A takes just that much more tarnish. ---
**Author:** ![DrCube](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a3d4f5/32.png) [@DrCube](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrCube)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/103 "2017-10-04T21:01:46Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I haven’t defined the middle, I’ve asked for gun advocates to take even just a single step towards the middle, and have been refused every time. Give me a solution, if you think that all of our solutions are unreasonable. You tell me what you consider to be a reasonable way to reduce gun violence overall, and prevent shootings like this in specific, from occurring again. Last time I asked that of you, the only suggestion you had was to end the drug war, but the party that you support is against that, so that’s a useless gesture of a suggestion. Do you have any suggestion, and reasonable idea at all, that could be workable, that could reduce gun violence? In other words, “DO SOMETHING!” Whether it helps at all is beside the point. Frankly, I don’t pretend we have the capacity to control absurdly rare, one-off events like what happened in Vegas. Gun crime in general affects almost exclusively a young gang-affiliated crowd in terribly poor areas of inner cities. I suggest ending the drug war and increasing the work we do (and money we spend) to bring people out of poverty. Basic income would be a good start. But there is really nothing we can do to stop people who randomly decide one day out of the blue to kill as many people as they can. All we can do is stop them as quickly as possible once they start. There was a thread a year or so back that I can’t find about a program that was tried in a few cities that cut murder by over 50% in the areas it was tried. Turns out that most murders are committed by a tiny percentage of really bad gang members. Targeting those specific individuals, sending a cop to his house regularly to check up on him, talk to him, make sure his problems are met (his bills are paid, he has gas in his car, etc) cut murders _drastically_. It was really expensive though, and not palatable to the “law and order” crowd, since they were basically bribing the really worst criminals into not murdering people.And of course, the people who end up being saved are other gang members. So the program was discontinued, despite being wildly effective. It was a small trial though, in only a few cities (though the really bad parts of those cities, and like I said, it was very effective). I can’t find the thread nor the wiki article on the program right now. I’m not claiming that is the answer, but it seems to me much more like the _kind_ of solution we should be striving for, one that is targeted and based on actual evidence, rather than the naive “strip self-defense rights from millions of people so that the handful of murderers across the country find it slightly more inconvenient to obtain their murder weapons” plan. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/104 "2017-10-04T21:15:47Z")
> [@DrCube](#): > > There was a thread a year or so back that I can’t find about a program that was tried in a few cities that cut murder by over 50% in the areas it was tried. Turns out that most murders are committed by a tiny percentage of really bad gang members. Targeting those specific individuals, sending a cop to his house regularly to check up on him, talk to him, make sure his problems are met (his bills are paid, he has gas in his car, etc) cut murders _drastically_. It was really expensive though, and not palatable to the “law and order” crowd, since they were basically bribing the really worst criminals into not murdering people.And of course, the people who end up being saved are other gang members. So the program was discontinued, despite being wildly effective. It was a small trial though, in only a few cities (though the really bad parts of those cities, and like I said, it was very effective). I can’t find the thread nor the wiki article on the program right now. [Operation Ceasefire](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Ceasefire)? ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/105 "2017-10-04T21:18:23Z")
> [@DrCube](#): > > No. I expect to retain my basic rights when I seek treatment for my personal health issues. Should we strip voting rights from people who have arthritis? Should we ban the speech of people with cancer? Should the state enforce a religion on people with lupus? Do you think those policies would lead to _more_ people seeking treatment for their medical issues, or less? And I expect that people who seek mental health help should not be able to purchase a gun until a certain amount of time passes to show they are no longer suffering from a mental health issue. I am also in favor of legally blind people not being allowed to drive. I don’t know my feelings on enforcing a religion on people with lupus, 'cause it’s never lupus. ---
**Author:** ![Bone](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bone/32/407_2.png) [@Bone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bone)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/106 "2017-10-04T21:24:52Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > I haven’t defined the middle, I’ve asked for gun advocates to take even just a single step towards the middle, and have been refused every time. Here’s the thing - no one who you want to persuade takes the phrase “reasonable restrictions” seriously. Same for “common sense” when it comes to gun control. I’ve done the same thing you have - take a single step and ask what would be offered in compromise? Anything? Coburn offered universal background checks, but that was rejected by Democrats. Bump stocks I don’t think are much use outside of blowing through a lot of money and I think they’d be an easy target right now. The SHARE act is pending in congress right now to move suppressors from Title II to title I (treated like a firearm, not a machine gun). Would you vote for that if it also included making bump stock type devices illegal? I think that’d be a fair trade. Of course, the bill that Feinstein already floated to do so is trash so there’s that. You say “give me a solution”, but sometimes, there isn’t a good solution. The largest group impacted by firearm homicide is young men between (IIRC) 17-35. Those people need good jobs, and more opportunity to reduce the incentive to engage in a lifestyle that lends itself to killing people and getting killed. The problem is, well, it’s a complex problem and the idea that banning guns or other gun control measures are the way to do it are typically not well thought out. We could quarantine all males between 17-35, or otherwise remove their ability to commit crimes. But that’s ridiculous, right? It’s ridiculous to penalize the entirety of 17-35 year old males because some subset of them commit the most firearm homicides of any group. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/107 "2017-10-04T21:27:50Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > You say “give me a solution”, but sometimes, there isn’t a good solution. The largest group impacted by firearm homicide is young men between (IIRC) 17-35. Those people need good jobs, and more opportunity to reduce the incentive to engage in a lifestyle that lends itself to killing people and getting killed Perhaps a financial incentive to stop using guns to kill people and turn them in to the government? ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [October 4, 2017, 9:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/108 "2017-10-04T21:35:07Z")
I’m starting to think that, at this point, the gun culture in America is really just too deep to weed out this way, period. Sure, there are many countries that ban gun ownership altogether. But the folks in those countries aren’t exactly hankering for guns. In Taiwan, for instance, I don’t know of anyone there who says, “The government bans guns, but I’ve just \*got \*this powerful yearning to have a Glock in my house and my gun-owning needs are suppressed.” Maybe there are some, but I don’t know of those folks, and the lack of ability to own guns is something that hardly even registers as a blip on that public consciousness. It’s just dubious that America could ever get to that point. Centuries of gun ownership and hundreds of millions of guns lying around have left deep, deep psychological roots. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 2:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/109 "2017-10-05T02:03:28Z")
> [@Velocity](#): > > . > > Sure, there are many countries that ban gun ownership altogether. But the folks in those countries aren’t exactly hankering for guns. In Taiwan, for instance, I don’t know of anyone there who says, “The government bans guns, but I’ve just \*got \*this powerful yearning to have a Glock in my house and my gun-owning needs are suppressed.” Maybe there are some, but I don’t know of those folks, and the lack of ability to own guns is something that hardly even registers as a blip on that public consciousness… Guns are not banned in Taiwan. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 3:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/110 "2017-10-05T03:10:48Z")
> [@Slash1972](#): > > And I expect that people who seek mental health help should not be able to purchase a gun until a certain amount of time passes to show they are no longer suffering from a mental health issue. I am also in favor of legally blind people not being allowed to drive. I don’t know my feelings on enforcing a religion on people with lupus, 'cause it’s never lupus. Seriously? Someone with anxiety? OCD? Depression that does not present danger of suicide? ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 3:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/111 "2017-10-05T03:24:46Z")
> [@Doctor Jackson (with some coding changes by septimus)](#): > > Since people are pointing toward Australia as an example, I did some research. Australian implemented their stricter [gun control laws in 2016](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Australia)and the buy back ran for about year (10/16-9/17). Here are the comparative stats for [Australia](http://www.aic.gov.au/dataTools/facts/vicViolentRate.html) and the [US](https://www.infoplease.com/us/crime/homicide-rate-1950-2014) for murders per 100,000 from 1990 to 2013: > > ```php > > Country 1990 2013 Reduction > Aus 1.7 1.2 30% > US 9.5 4.5 53% > > ``` > > ```auto > > Country 1990 2013 Reduction > Aus 1.7 1.2 30% > US 9.5 4.5 53% > > ``` > > What am I missing? > > I mean aside from not being able to get the numbers to line up, no matter what I try… First: please report your findings to the nation’s top law enforcement officer, J. Beauregard S. III. His sources tell him the American crime rate is at record highs. :smack: As for your 1st question, the decline in inner city crime is considered a great mystery! One hypothesis relates it to the banning of leaded gasoline! Another connects it to _Roe v. Wade_ !! To get the numbers to line up, prepare your post using the Courier font in, say, Notepad (using spaces, not tabs); then copy-paste it and enclose in PHP tags. I hope you don’t mind the blue color, since the black-color CODE tags don’t work for Dopers who select the _“Sultan skin: please break code tags for me”_ option (unless they’ve applied **BigT** ’s one-line fix). BTW, I’m surprised you used the difference over 27 years to measure the effect of a 1-year change in Australia, 😕 ---
**Author:** ![jtur88](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9c0ed/32.png) [@jtur88](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jtur88)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 9:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/112 "2017-10-05T09:38:14Z")
Here’s a question for those of you who own a gun for personal security: Do you ever fantasize about actually pulling the trigger? Nobody can legislate that our of your psyche. We are a nation of people who desire to use violence for default conflict resolution. Restricting firearms will not change that. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 12:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/113 "2017-10-05T12:26:39Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > Here’s the thing - no one who you want to persuade takes the phrase “reasonable restrictions” seriously. Same for “common sense” when it comes to gun control. Yes, you consider the very concept to be an oxymoron. If you’re not willing even to acknowledge that there’s a problem, much less offer any steps of your own, then the ones who cannot be taken seriously are _y’all._ Can you really not see that at all? The first step is to figure out how to work around you, since you will permit there to be no way to work \*with \*you. You’ve taken yourself out of the discussion and defined \*yourself \*as the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 1:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/114 "2017-10-05T13:00:12Z")
> [@k9bfriender](#): > > That’s not how it works while the second amendment is enshrined in this way, is what you meant to say, right? No, what I meant to say is what I did say. I also meant to, and did, say the same thing about other enumerated rights and rights in general. > [@](#): > > If 2a wan’t there, would you be able to make the manifesto you just did? Yes, I would. > [@](#): > > Fortunately, every time you abuse it in order to justify your lack of a need to justify your possesion of a lethal device, that 2A takes just that much more tarnish. No, the concept of limited government isn’t tarnished by its expression, and your characterization of doing so as “abuse” is wrong. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/115 "2017-10-05T13:49:51Z")
Yes, it is the default. Then the government explains, or tries to, where in the Constitution the power to deny nerve gas or cigars is granted. But they have to convince me, and enough like-minded people, that their denial is justified. If they don’t convince me, then I vote for Senators and Presidents who will appoint justices to the Supreme Court who will rule in accordance with the Constitution as I understand it. That doesn’t always work, more’s the pity, but the process is based on the idea of limited government - the State is answerable to me, not vice versa. “Whatever is not mandatory is forbidden” applies to the State, not to me. The right of the people to keep and bear arms is enumerated. Therefore, “it’s none of your business” is the default answer to questions like “why do you want to keep and bear arms?” Same as when it is “why do you want to publish those opinions”, “why do you worship in that way”, “why do you have so much more money than your neighbor”, etc. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 1:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/116 "2017-10-05T13:59:03Z")
> [@Bone](#): > > Here’s the thing - no one who you want to persuade takes the phrase “reasonable restrictions” seriously. Same for “common sense” when it comes to gun control. I’ve done the same thing you have - take a single step and ask what would be offered in compromise? Anything? > > Coburn offered universal background checks, but that was rejected by Democrats. Bump stocks I don’t think are much use outside of blowing through a lot of money and I think they’d be an easy target right now. The SHARE act is pending in congress right now to move suppressors from Title II to title I (treated like a firearm, not a machine gun). Would you vote for that if it also included making bump stock type devices illegal? I think that’d be a fair trade. Of course, the bill that Feinstein already floated to do so is trash so there’s that. > > You say “give me a solution”, but sometimes, there isn’t a good solution. The largest group impacted by firearm homicide is young men between (IIRC) 17-35. Those people need good jobs, and more opportunity to reduce the incentive to engage in a lifestyle that lends itself to killing people and getting killed. The problem is, well, it’s a complex problem and the idea that banning guns or other gun control measures are the way to do it are typically not well thought out. > > We could quarantine all males between 17-35, or otherwise remove their ability to commit crimes. But that’s ridiculous, right? It’s ridiculous to penalize the entirety of 17-35 year old males because some subset of them commit the most firearm homicides of any group. So, you are saying that as long as people are given unfettered access to guns, there is no solution to the problem of guns. Hmmm, I can think of a solution to that. You support the party that supports guns, so that’s great. But you also support the party that persecutes the war on drugs, which you have said inceases gun violence. You also support the party that makes it harder for a 17-35 year old male to get jobs, or education, or work themselves out of poverty. I don’t disagree with some of your points, but the party that you support most certainly does. You get _your_ party to address what you see as the systemic problems behind gun violence, instead of fighting tooth and nail against doing anything about it, and then, if we see some results, then your solution worked, yay! And then You can sit back with your guns, knowing that no one will come for them, or care about them, as they are no longer a threat to public safety. ---
**Author:** ![k9bfriender](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/k9bfriender/32/3283_2.png) [@k9bfriender](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/k9bfriender)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/117 "2017-10-05T14:12:29Z")
> [@Shodan](#): > > Yes, it is the default. Then the government explains, or tries to, where in the Constitution the power to deny nerve gas or cigars is granted. But they have to convince me, and enough like-minded people, that their denial is justified. If they don’t convince me, then I vote for Senators and Presidents who will appoint justices to the Supreme Court who will rule in accordance with the Constitution as I understand it. > > That doesn’t always work, more’s the pity, but the process is based on the idea of limited government - the State is answerable to me, not vice versa. “Whatever is not mandatory is forbidden” applies to the State, not to me. > > The right of the people to keep and bear arms is enumerated. Therefore, “it’s none of your business” is the default answer to questions like “why do you want to keep and bear arms?” Same as when it is “why do you want to publish those opinions”, “why do you worship in that way”, “why do you have so much more money than your neighbor”, etc. > > Regards, > Shodan It is enumerated, for now. Keep playing this, “It’s in the constitution, so there’s nothing you can do about it.” game, and you will lose public support. Then, when the govt comes, and you say, “it’s none of your business”, they say, “oh yes, yes it is.” And, no, I don’t think that 2A will be repealed. It will always be part of the constitution, you don’t just repeal, you replace.So, the 2A’s protections would be modified instead by 28A (or later). Some protections may stay in place, it may devolve to the states to pass their own laws, we may allow regulations on some specific types of firearm, we may just ban guns entirely by constitution (I doubt the last strongly, but it depends on how fed up the public is with gun violence by the time this happens). The cool thing about an amendment is that you can’t claim to invalidate it constitutionality, it is the constitution. So, modifications do not need to pass any sort of constitutional test. You compare 1A with 2A, but your comparison suffers from the fact that you can’t kill 58 people in a crowd with speech. You need a weapon to do that. “Why do you want to protest against that?” vs “Why do you want to fire your gun into a crowd?” is a much more apt comparison. ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Jackson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doctor_jackson/32/32_2.png) [@Doctor\_Jackson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Jackson)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 2:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/118 "2017-10-05T14:38:25Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > I hope you don’t mind the blue color… Not at all, thanks for the fix! > [@septimus](#): > > BTW, I’m surprised you used the difference over 27 years to measure the effect of a 1-year change in Australia, 😕 The assumption that I’m hearing is that heavy gun restrictions and buybacks will result in a sustainable drop in murder rates, so I used rates a few years prior to Australia’s gun law changes against the most recent data. The yearly detail is in the links provided, I just didn’t have time to chart the year-over-year results and trends. I used the same time period for the US to get an apples-to-apples comparison. Interestingly to me, the murder rate in AUS stayed statistically level from 1993 to 2002, indicating that the gun laws and buyback had no affect at all. Murder rates start dropping in 2003 and went down 20% by 2013. The US murder rate has trended steadily downward from 1993 (when background checks were made mandatory for purchases through licensed dealers) through 2013. I doubt background checks are responsible for all of the 20 year downward trend, but I do believe it helped. Closing the private sale loophole and requiring that all gun purchases be cleared through an FFL dealer, and include a background check, would likely have another positive correlation to murder rates, but enforcement would be nigh impossible. ---
**Author:** ![Evan\_Drake](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/b487fb/32.png) [@Evan\_Drake](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evan_Drake)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 4:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/119 "2017-10-05T16:27:52Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > Here’s a question for those of you who own a gun for personal security: Do you ever fantasize about actually pulling the trigger? Nobody can legislate that our of your psyche. > > We are a nation of people who desire to use violence for default conflict resolution. Restricting firearms will not change that. Very very true. ---
**Author:** ![Slash1972](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slash1972/32/6461_2.png) [@Slash1972](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slash1972)\ **Post date:** [October 5, 2017, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847/120 "2017-10-05T16:51:42Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Seriously? Someone with anxiety? OCD? Depression that does not present danger of suicide? Yes, that’s exactly what I meant. Would you like to go through the entire list of mental disorders that exist and I will tell you which ones I don’t think should have access to a gun? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/those-for-new-gun-control-laws/797847.md?page=7)