# What are other countries doing right to prevent mass shootings? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 6, 2017, 5:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900 "2017-11-06T17:46:51Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 6
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/101 "2017-11-08T15:03:09Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > Negative correlation means that as gun ownership rate decreases, the rate of homicide increases? Haven’t you got your argument the wrong way round here? > If not, do you have a cite? > > cite? > > predicted by who? You are saying more guns in more hands would equal less deaths? or just less homicides? > > What countries do you mean? where are you getting these stats and predictions from? If they are purely your own then say so. > > I live in the UK, If I make it as easy to own guns here as it is in the USA I predict we will have more homicides, I also predict this for most of western Europe. Are we all aching for revolution? [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20586149&postcount=30](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20586149&postcount=30) ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/102 "2017-11-08T16:12:42Z")
> [@Muffin](#): > > . As mentioned up-thread, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention are being blocked from investigating the gun deaths crisis as a health issue. I put it to you that when a death rate of any type is grossly out of proportion to the rates of a similar type of death in similar nations, and when that grossly disproportionate death rate in the USA ([12/100,000](https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/mortality-dashboard.htm) per year including all types of gun deaths) reflects the gun deaths of roughly 39,000 people per year, you’d think that the government would move heaven an earth to fund the CDCP to do its job, but no, your government and a great many of you prefer to gury hour heads in the sand and ignore the obvious, convincing yourselves you are somehow special such that cause and effect does not apply to your gun death crisis, and that the untolled gun injuries and tens of thousands of gun deaths each year are not a health issue. . Again, the CDC is NOT blocked from investigating the gun deaths crisis as a health issue. It is blocked only from advocating Gun control. As it should be. It’s prior study was written with the objectives of promoting gun control, and that is not the was science should work. Again, using the bogus figure of 39000 “gun deaths” is bogus and undermines any point you are making. 2/3rds of those deaths are suicides. Many argue that suicides is a basic human right. There are about 11000 gun homicides. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/103 "2017-11-08T16:13:34Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > The US has 9.5 times the gun homicide rate per capita that Canada does. 11 times Finland, 22 times Australia, 33 times New Zealand, 36 times Norway, 60 times the UK. > > Blah blah blah, not “mass shootings.” Given that they’re more rare it’s inevitable that anomalies will occur and countries that have far less gun violence will have disproportionate mass shootings. It’s also completely missing the whole point. > > Which is why people point out those kinds of statistics. If you eliminated every gun homicide and assumed that the murderer wouldn’t have committed the murder without a gun, we STILL have highly elevated homicide rates compared to these countries. Why are comparisons of gun homicides useful in any way? ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/104 "2017-11-08T16:22:35Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Other countries don’t have legislative bodies bought and paid for by the NRA. I think we go over this particular factoid every time a gun thread is opened. NRA doesn’t buy very much. They make very few contributions to campaigns. They spend a lot more money attacking people that are anti-gun. That is not exactly how most people would define 'bought and paid for" Mobilizing pro-gun folks to vote against an anti-gun politician is not bribery. Unless you think the legislative bodies are bought and paid for by NARAL and other pro-choice organizations that run ads criticizing the pro-life stance of their political enemies. ---
**Author:** ![Damuri\_Ajashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/898d66/32.png) [@Damuri\_Ajashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Damuri_Ajashi)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/105 "2017-11-08T16:26:03Z")
> [@septimus](#): > > So, the incident confirms the value of the Second Amendment? > Has the White House determined yet whether the shooter was antifa or communist? > > Cite for the part I’ve reddened? What I’ve read is: > > - Suicides are much more likely to be successful when a gun is available > - Violence is much more likely to be fatal when a gun is involved > - Mad killers are much more likely to kill large numbers when a gun is available. Our suicide rate is about average for wealthy industrialized nations. With all the guns we have you would think that we would be awash in suicides compared to other countries but we’re not. I’m sure it makes some difference on the margins but probably not much. Our murder rate is elevated regardless of whether you include gun murders or not. Mad killers may indeed use guns to kill people more efficiently than if they used a machete. Good luck repealing the second amendment, passing a gun ban and then going around confiscating all the guns. I bet someone like Trump would like to try, maybe you could give him a hand. ---
**Author:** ![puddleglum](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puddleglum/32/137_2.png) [@puddleglum](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puddleglum)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 7:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/106 "2017-11-08T19:54:33Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Guns have never really been commonplace in the UK, and never really commonly used for personal self defence, so ‘before gun control’ was not so very different from now. True, that is why it is useless to compare the US and the UK for gun murders. History and geography have made both nations relationship to guns totally different. So if you changed the laws in America to match the UK there is no reason to expect similar murder rates. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 8, 2017, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/107 "2017-11-08T22:41:31Z")
> [@puddleglum](#): > > True, that is why it is useless to compare the US and the UK for gun murders. History and geography have made both nations relationship to guns totally different. So if you changed the laws in America to match the UK there is no reason to expect similar murder rates. I agree - and (as I said upthread) if guns suddenly became commonplace in the UK, even if it happened completely legally, I think it would lead to problems quite disproportionally worse than any problems that the USA experiences arising from guns. ---
**Author:** ![Quartz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quartz/32/267_2.png) [@Quartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Quartz)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 12:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/108 "2017-11-09T00:09:27Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > Guns have never really been commonplace in the UK, and never really commonly used for personal self defence I’m not sure that either statement is correct. Guns were certainly common enough for highwaymen to be a thing, and for coachmen and passengers to carry guns to counter them to also be a thing. And there was a wide variety of pistols available for the discerning gentleman or lady. Shotguns have long been commonplace in rural communities. The [government says](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/firearm-and-shotgun-certificates-in-england-and-wales-financial-year-ending-march-2015/firearm-and-shotgun-certificates-in-england-and-wales-financial-year-ending-march-2015) that there were still 1.34 million shotguns held with certificates in 2015. ---
**Author:** ![filmstar-en](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/50afbb/32.png) [@filmstar-en](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/filmstar-en)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 7:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/109 "2017-11-09T07:00:24Z")
There is long description of the history of firearms policy in the UK here: > **[Firearms regulation in the United Kingdom](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearms_policy_in_the_United_Kingdom)** > > In the United Kingdom, access by the general public to firearms is subject to some of the strictest control measures in the world. However, fulfilment of the criteria and requirements as laid out by the laws results in the vast majority of firearm licence applications being approved. Laws differ slightly in Northern Ireland due to Northern Ireland having its own firearms legislation. Concerns have been raised over the availability of illegal firearms. > Members of the public may own sporting... There have been firearms laws since the time of Elizabeth I. Firearms laws were progressively tightened after wars when returning soldiers might bring them from the battlefield or in times when there was political unrest. There have been many periods like that and the police were given the job of controlling firearms through issuing certificates. Personal safety ceased to be an acceptable reason for gun ownership in 1937. Shotguns are for farmers and gamekeepers or for sports shooting in the countryside. The police have the responsibility of checking on the owner, where the guns are stored, whether the owner has any problems that could cause concern or any medical history. If the licensed gun is used in a crime, the police are held to account for not doing their job properly. There is gun ownership in the UK, but they are controlled sufficiently for gun crime to be a rarity. It is easier to control such things in a geographically smaller country with an urbanised population and no frontiersman tradition. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/110 "2017-11-09T07:17:00Z")
> [@Quartz](#): > > I’m not sure that either statement is correct. Guns were certainly common enough for highwaymen to be a thing, and for coachmen and passengers to carry guns to counter them to also be a thing. And there was a wide variety of pistols available for the discerning gentleman or lady. I was talking about the 20th century - particularly the late 20th - when ‘gun control’ really happened and handguns were banned. At that point, they already were pretty uncommon. Nobody alive now remembers a time when guns were commonly used for self defence in the UK. > [@](#): > > Shotguns have long been commonplace in rural communities. The [government says](https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/firearm-and-shotgun-certificates-in-england-and-wales-financial-year-ending-march-2015/firearm-and-shotgun-certificates-in-england-and-wales-financial-year-ending-march-2015) that there were still 1.34 million shotguns held with certificates in 2015. I’ve already acknowledged that - shotguns for hunting or vermin control remain fairly common. They’re not held for the purposes of self defence. ---
**Author:** ![Isamu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/7c8e57/32.png) [@Isamu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Isamu)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 7:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/111 "2017-11-09T07:52:49Z")
> [@Mangetout](#): > > I agree - and (as I said upthread) if guns suddenly became commonplace in the UK, even if it happened completely legally, I think it would lead to problems quite disproportionally worse than any problems that the USA experiences arising from guns. Curious. Would that be due to racial tensions, houliganism, scarey spice, pub culture, a criminal underclass, any of the above or something else? ---
**Author:** ![up\_the\_junction](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/f1d935/32.png) [@up\_the\_junction](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/up_the_junction)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 7:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/112 "2017-11-09T07:59:26Z")
Piers Morgan. ---
**Author:** ![rat\_avatar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rat_avatar/32/255_2.png) [@rat\_avatar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rat_avatar)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 8:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/113 "2017-11-09T08:08:35Z")
> [@filmstar-en](#): > > There is long description of the history of firearms policy in the UK here: > > [Firearms regulation in the United Kingdom - Wikipedia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearms_policy_in_the_United_Kingdom) > > There have been firearms laws since the time of Elizabeth I. > > Firearms laws were progressively tightened after wars when returning soldiers might bring them from the battlefield or in times when there was political unrest. There have been many periods like that and the police were given the job of controlling firearms through issuing certificates. Personal safety ceased to be an acceptable reason for gun ownership in 1937. Shotguns are for farmers and gamekeepers or for sports shooting in the countryside. The police have the responsibility of checking on the owner, where the guns are stored, whether the owner has any problems that could cause concern or any medical history. If the licensed gun is used in a crime, the police are held to account for not doing their job properly. There is gun ownership in the UK, but they are controlled sufficiently for gun crime to be a rarity. It is easier to control such things in a geographically smaller country with an urbanised population and no frontiersman tradition. We can compare it to other European countries with high per capita firearms. I can’t seem to match the narrative of the OP when I do. The number of firearms per capita in the US doubled from 1968-2009, yet the suicide death rate in the US has stayed steady over that period while the homicide rate has dropped to absolute lows. Note that ‘collectors’ own most of the firearms in the US with some calming that 3% of households owning 50% of all firearms in the US, so these shouldn’t be taken as anything but a demonstration on how little evidence there that legal firearm ownership correlates to the murder rate. Note that while I did select for “Western” countries 1-5 here are the highest rates from countries known ownership. Country TLD - guns per 100 people - firearm homicides per 100k people - percentage of homicides by firearms - Suicides per 100k US - 88.8 - 3.21 - 67.5 - 12.6 CH - 45.7 - 0.77 - 72.2 - 10.7 FI - 45.3 - 0.45 - 19.8 - 22.3 RS - 37.8 - 0.46 - 33.1 - 24.9 CY - 36.4 - 0.46 - 26.3 - 5.9 SE - 31.6 - 0.41 - 33.9 - 12.7 NO - 31.3 - 2.00 - 8.1 - 9.3 FR - 31.2 - 0.35 - 9.6 - 22.8 CA - 30.8 - 0.51 - 32.0 - 16.9 AT - 30.4 - 0.22 - 29.5 - 23.8 DE - 30.3 - 0.19 - 26.3 - 18.9 IS - 30.3 - 0.00 - 0.00 - 18.3 \*Note: I tried to use the most common year across countries, while avoiding mass shootings in Europe but not in the US (E.G. Utøya massacre.) \* Because in the US 50% are owned by 3% fo the population, or rich collectors, the 88.8 could be 44.4 for ownership per household numbers that are closer to the other listed countries. It is clear that the US does have a higher homicide rate, most studies seem to claim that “illegal” guns are a huge portion of these, but that term is not well defined. If we look at the state level much of the US is not far off from our Western contemporaries and I still can’t seem to find a reliable pattern that matches firearm ownership rates either per capita or per household. To clarify again, I am not in the traditional _Pro-Gun_ camp so please provide cites that do show a cause-and-effect relationship. While I do own firearms I would give them up for the greater good. My concern is the political capitol expended on this effort, when no one can show that the cause is being driven by anything but fear. It is hard to correlate data due to many reasons, but both sides only ever seem to resort to selection bias, and when you look wider the conclusions don’t seem to hold. (For the Pro-gun crowd, the numbers don’t seem to show that there is any meaningful impact for the general public as a whole to own firearms either unless one resorts to extreme selection bias) ---
**Author:** ![Mijin](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mijin/32/9369_2.png) [@Mijin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mijin)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 8:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/114 "2017-11-09T08:42:54Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > Again, the CDC is NOT blocked from investigating the gun deaths crisis as a health issue. It is blocked only from advocating Gun control. As it should be. It’s prior study was written with the objectives of promoting gun control, and that is not the was science should work. Would you agree however, that that legislation has had a chilling effect on research? I mean there has been virtually no studies on gun violence in the last 20 years and even Jay Dickey himself, original sponsor of the amendment, thinks it should be overturned. This opinion is supported by 141 medical groups including the American Medical Association and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Plus of course the CDC has essentially zero funds to do this kind of research. Every request for more funds gets blocked by Congress. This is not “as it should be”. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 9:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/115 "2017-11-09T09:07:01Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > [http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20586149&postcount=30](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?p=20586149&postcount=30) I get an error on that second link in that post and the first one shows nothing with any clarity and does not state where the data is coming from nor what the conclusions are or what the curved line is supposed to represent. I see nothing in that post or the single chart I can access that supports your previous points of > [@](#): > > In countries with fewer guns, there are more murders. The US is an outlier on that, but only if you include only those two variables. It’s also the rare outlier on that. It’s actually rather hard to find a set of countries where the homicide rate isn’t negatively correlated to the gun ownership rate. > > Once you run the math to find all the variables most closely correlated to homicide rates, the cause of US homicides is best explained by income disparity. Increasing the ownership of guns, in the US, is predicted to lower homicide rates (though, correlation does not mean causation, so that’s not necessarily true), and gun ownership is not one of the top five most useful variables for predicting the homicide rate of any country. > > There are countries where a higher gun ownership rate would be predicted to increase homicide rates, but usually those are countries where if you look at the other statistics involved, they seem like they’re aching for a revolution. ---
**Author:** ![Sage\_Rat](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sage_rat/32/399_2.png) [@Sage\_Rat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sage_Rat)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 9:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/116 "2017-11-09T09:39:01Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > I get an error on that second link in that post and the first one shows nothing with any clarity and does not state where the data is coming from nor what the conclusions are or what the curved line is supposed to represent. It’s monotonous to type the same things for years and years. Apologies. The graph is from the Wikipedia data sets on Gun Ownership and Intentional Homicide Rates. I graphed them many years ago and should probably make a new one. The horizontal axis is gun ownership and the vertical is homicide. You can grab them from the Wikipedia and graph them yourself. The line is just a general trend on the edges of the dots that I drew in. I’m not sure why you’re getting an error with the second link. Is it for the JAR download or the link to the SDMB? Both work for me just fine across a variety of devices and browsers. > [@](#): > > I see nothing in that post or the single chart I can access that supports your previous points of While I’ll grant that you might not be able to access a link, inability to access something isn’t a counterproof. If you can access the list of Wikipedia datasets being used, you can drop them into the polynomial regression yourself: [http://www.xuru.org/rt/PR.asp](http://www.xuru.org/rt/PR.asp) All I did was take the formula it produced at the end and put it into a Java application so that you can see what it predicts as a homicide rate as you increase/lower metrics. I’ll look for an alternate hosting solution, I guess. But I’d say that if you doubt the results, I’d encourage you to drop any data that you wish into the above site. I’m not affiliated with it and it has no way to know what the meaning is of any column of numbers that you put into it. ---
**Author:** ![Novelty\_Bobble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/a3d4f5/32.png) [@Novelty\_Bobble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Novelty_Bobble)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 12:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/117 "2017-11-09T12:50:40Z")
> [@Sage\_Rat](#): > > The graph is from the Wikipedia data sets on Gun Ownership and Intentional Homicide Rates. I graphed them many years ago and should probably make a new one. The horizontal axis is gun ownership and the vertical is homicide. You can grab them from the Wikipedia and graph them yourself. The line is just a general trend on the edges of the dots that I drew in. The big problem with that dataset is that, to my mind at least, the countries in it cannot be treated as it they are from the same population. You have third world, developing, first world, internal war and strife, peaceful, highly regulated with lots of guns or few guns or low regulation with who knows how many? Not to mention the fact that you can only really trust the data for homicide, type of homicide and gun ownership when you have a country stable enough to worry about such things. This is why I have only really been concerned with comparing the USA with other developed and stable western nations. > [@](#): > > I’m not sure why you’re getting an error with the second link. Is it for the JAR download or the link to the SDMB? Both work for me just fine across a variety of devices and browsers. I get a security warning, both on my work and home laptops, not sure why. > [@](#): > > While I’ll grant that you might not be able to access a link, inability to access something isn’t a counterproof. I agree and wasn’t suggesting so. > [@](#): > > All I did was take the formula it produced at the end and put it into a Java application so that you can see what it predicts as a homicide rate as you increase/lower metrics. > > I’ll look for an alternate hosting solution, I guess. But I’d say that if you doubt the results, I’d encourage you to drop any data that you wish into the above site. I’m not affiliated with it and it has no way to know what the meaning is of any column of numbers that you put into it. No that’s fine, I don’t doubt it behaves in that way you describe. If, however, it is based on the same dataset you suggested then I would not trust the conclusions as it has the same outliers, anomalies and potentially poor quality data. If I were looking to understand what happens when you increase or decrease guns ownership rates I would choose a set of countries that limits the number of other uncontrollable variables. ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/118 "2017-11-09T14:14:29Z")
> [@Isamu](#): > > Curious. Would that be due to racial tensions, houliganism, scarey spice, pub culture, a criminal underclass, any of the above or something else? There are 65 million of us all crammed into a land area about the same size as Michigan - lots of opportunity for our rough edges to grate against each other. Culturally, we like to argue and we like to complain - and we tell stories about how everyone else in our world is an intolerable idiot - those are all generalisations, but they’re commonplace enough to be valid for this purpose, I think. Road rage was one example of the sort of thing that I think would commonly escalate to shooting if the method was to hand, but there are probably others. ---
**Author:** ![Paranoid\_Randroid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/paranoid_randroid/32/18_2.png) [@Paranoid\_Randroid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Paranoid_Randroid)\ **Post date:** [November 9, 2017, 2:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/119 "2017-11-09T14:47:51Z")
> [@Novelty\_Bobble](#): > > The big problem with that dataset is that, to my mind at least, the countries in it cannot be treated as it they are from the same population. There are so many potential confounders that I’d hesitate to draw any firm conclusions from a simple correlation like this. I’d like to see some kind of socioeconomic control here at the very least; the impact of gun availability on violence probably won’t be the same for Columbia and Canada. ---
**Author:** ![vivalostwages](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/d07c76/32.png) [@vivalostwages](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/vivalostwages)\ **Post date:** [November 10, 2017, 4:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900/120 "2017-11-10T04:13:32Z")
My niece insists that the whole mass shooting thing is a “hearts issue” and that more prayers would fix all the hatred. Oh, and we should all be armed. Should every country adopt this policy? Or just ours? :dubious: [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900.md?page=5) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-are-other-countries-doing-right-to-prevent-mass-shootings/800900.md?page=7)