Cite?
Liar.
Unfounded? You’re posting an argument which was totally destroyed. Either you’re too lazy to read the thread, or too stupid to understand it.
Also, as to rudeness, welcome to the Pit. Deal with it.
The absolute temerity of my position! I want to make sure that statistics are used properly! The nerve!
You go back to sniping. Ciao.
Considering that the state I live in has a 2003 reported rate of Forcible Rape of 24.4 per 100,000, which is less than 1/3 the Aussie national average, then yes, I do.
Considering that the state I live in has a 2003 reported rate of Aggravated Assault of 334.5 per 100,000, compared to the Aussie rate of 733.11, then yes, I do.
Considering that the state I live in has a 2003 reported rate of Robbery of 108.7 per 100,000, compared to the Aussie national average of 121.12 per 100,000, then yes, I do. But not by a whole lot.
And finally, considering that over the 1994-2003 time period, the U.S. national rate of Murder dropped 36.7%, the rate of Rape droped 18.2%, the rate of Robbery dropped 40.2%, and the rate of Assault dropped 31.0%, so while I may still technically be in more danger in the U.S., the fact is that I’m getting safer every year, and the Folks Down Under aren’t.
And my particular patch of grass came in 12.28% under the U.S. National Average in Murders, 23.99% under for Rape, 23.56% under for Robbery; we did come in 13% over the U.S. National Average for Assaults, but it’s still 54.37% under the Aussie National Average for the same.
Country-to-country, for 2002 (comparing like-to-like), the U.S. had a Murder Rate of 5.7 per 100,000 to Australia’s 1.6 per 100,000 (pretty bad, I grant you), and a Robbery rate of 145.9 per 100,000 to Australia’s 106.4 per 100,000. But the U.S. had a Rape rate of 33 per 100,000 to Australia’s 90.61 per 100,000, and an Assault rate of 310.1 to Australia’s 809.88 per 100,000.
IMHO a significant amount of the anti-gun sentiment is grounded in ignorance. Today, I hooked up with AirmanDoors and catsix before heading out to a state pistol range. We had the opportunity to practice our skills, and experience the friendliness and sharing of fellow pistol owners. Offers to use one another’s weapon were as free as a church pot luck supper. Safety and courtesy ruled the day, and I found it to be an excellent recreational time.
And yes, even though our per capitia crime is still high, no matter because here I can and do carry with a license and so I and mine have some defense against attack of any kind. If I was attacked in anyway in Australia, England, or Canada, I would have no means of equalization.
So, once a crime is happening, then I’m much more likely to be alright here than in those places. I carry, my wife carries, and we practice, not just with a weapon, but with situational awareness and preventive steps and practices.
Ah. Well, I took the chance that you didn’t live in New York.
Chicago, then. Does the crime in Chicago, ostensibly caused by its population density and economy, affect your circumstances?
The real point is that your assertion that you’d be in any particular danger in Australia isn’t necessarily correct. While it’s true that crime is on the increase, the actual rates are what counts, and the rates of most crimes are still quite low. Assault and rape do appear to be exceptions, I’ll grant you that, but I don’t think guns or the lack thereof is the cause otherwise all criminals would be either deterred or empowered, not just certain criminals committing certain crimes.
I feel pretty secure comparing Australia’s national stats to American large city stats to get a good idea of how the two nations stack up against one another because a nation’s average crime stats based on population will be predominantly determined by the crime stats in large population centers. I’d agree that sitting in the middle of Nowhereville, USA is bound to be safer than in a major metropolitan center in Australia, and vice versa.
If other crimes haven’t translated to more homicides already, why should I expect them to do so in the future?
And if we anti-gunners ignore anything which isn’t supportive, our point is proven, Yes? Can I have a harrumph? HARRUMPH! :rolleyes:
That’s HADLEY.
work work work work (nice view) work work work…
But I’m not anti-gun. The worst you could say about me is that I’m out of practice. I’ve said in this thread that if I lived in a region where I could carry a gun, I would. That doesn’t mean doing so reduces crime, and it doesn’t mean Ex-Tank’s correct when he says an increase in the homicide rate in Australia is inevitable.
I’m pro-gun, but if I lived in an area that I felt a need to carry, I would look to move.
But I do understand that crime can happen anywhere. Including my little secluded spot in the mountains.
That’s just me. Outside of the fact that I don’t want to live in a high crime area, carrying a concealed pistol around must be an absolute pain in the ass. How do you guys do it? How do men conceal them in summer?
All this discussion about crime statistics, Australia, etc. etc. etc. humors me.
I couldn’t care less about crime statistics, i.e. I couldn’t care less if guns increased crime or decreased crime. I have a right to keep and bear arms, and “crime statistics” have no bearing on this right.
Want more? Consider this: Even if it were proven that the presence of guns increased violent crime, I would still believe every free person has a right to keep and bear arms. I would never trade this right for more safety and security.
I pretty much in the same boat Crafter_Man.
I know what I want. I know what I need, and that’s what I will purchase. I was in one small debate here where one person was actually telling me, a total stranger, what I did or did not need. Un-fucking-believable.
Unlike Crafter_Man, and like most Canadians, I believe guns are either tools or sports equipment, not flags or symbols of freedom or expressions of liberty or anything silly like that.
Well, if someone were to, say, steal a certain server in Chicago, it might just. (Look at the bottom of the page)
Not to mention a number of Chicago friends I have who I see over the net. And, of course, any major disruption to the stockyards would cause prices of meat to go up considerably.
I’ve been personally affected by Teamster strikes in California, too. The '04 blackout covered a full quarter of the country. Not to mention this whole mess in Florida that may have a really big impact on what happens to my father’s mother when (and it’s not going to be if) she has another stroke. That isn’t the point, though. Look at the local geography. See how tight things are in the earthlights pictures on the east coast? Look at the size of the area. If there was, and I am using a recent example, a bridge that got set on fire by a tanker crash in CT, it affected my daily drive. If I was in Spain, that bridge was in France. And it still affected me. Pressure matters. There’s a daily in and outflow of around 13 million people in NY. Or is that Manhattan alone? That’s three to four times the population of Sidney, circa '96, and damn near the entire population of the country. Er. Why are we discussing this? Well, I guess it’s when you crush the entire population of Australia in about 30 square miles, crime goes up.
I agree. Except it has become somewhat symbolic for me. But not in the ‘freedom, liberty, patriotic’ sense.
I don’t like politicians using them to get votes. And scaring those that don’t know anything about guns to do so. And demonizing me in the process.
I used to be more moderate about gun control. Then I educated myself. I discovered that those that would control, or outright ban guns know very little about them. And their supporters know even less.
In hindsight, maybe it is about freedom and liberty.
I was once more moderate. Right or wrong, but I was. The anti-gun groups have turned me completely pro-gun. I don’t like being mislead. And I think that those that write policy should know a little bit about the subject.
They (the anti-gun folks) brought it on themselves. Fuck ‘em. Am I right? Am I wrong? It doesn’t matter. The anti-gun folks are the ones that have made me pro-gun. I used to just be a gun owner.
IMHO, the anti-gun folks are their own worst enemy.
It would seem so.
If you want to form your opinions out of spite, that’s up to you. To me, registering firearms and keeping them locked up when not in use are ideas that make a lot of sense. If my firearms are registered I may get them back if they’re stolen then recovered, and if they’re locked up when I’m not using them the chances of their being stolen (or used in the heat of anger, I suppose, although that’s not the motivating factor) are slim. That won’t change no matter how much poo is flung. Ideas stand or fall on their own merits as far as I’m concerned.
Are my opinions based on spite? To a degree. From what I see, the anti gun folks are just that. Anti-Gun. They claim they only want one more law, but in fact, they want many, many more.
Like I said, from what I see. This is my opinion based on what anti-gunpeople have said. This has made me ‘pro-gun’.
I would agree that registering firearms would be a good idea. But, from what I have seen, this is just a step toward confiscating them.
So, as a previously moderate person re gun laws. I now say NO.
It has nothing to do with my attitude towards guns. It has everything to do with the anti-gun folks attitude towards guns. The anti-gun folks have made their bed. But they can’t sleep in it and support their position. Yep. Fuck ‘em.
Because of the anti-gun folks, this formerly moderate person will vote against any new gun laws.
Wrong! :mad: I said that if I lived in Australia, I would feel so much safer (safer than what, I didn’t say; you assumed that I meant safer than the U.S.), and then demonstrated with your own cites that in three major categories of violent crime, Australia’s crime rates are increasing at double-digit rates.
I then demonstrated that Australia’s crime rates exceeded the U.S.'s in two major categories, and that in my particular home-state, Australia’s crime rates exceeded us in three major categories.
Wrong again! :mad: :mad: Concealed Carry could quite conceivably dissuade those Assaulters and Rapists, if you could just wrap your brain around the concept that in most of the states where Concealed Carry is legal, violent crime rates are dropping faster than the national average.
A metro suburb is hardly “Nowhereville”.
It’s called trends, and while they often take some time to appear, they’re staring the folks Down Under straight in the eyes.
On an emotional level, I agree 100% with Crafter_Man and Enipla. But gun owners can’t be so assertive and dismissive about the matter, what with the major media so liberally slanted, and “guns” being one of their top ten of “things that have to go.”
Anti-gunners have almost entirely framed the terms, terminology, and conditions of the gun control debate in the media, as evidenced by Nametag’s “90/10 rule” and the continuous lumping of criminals who use firearms into the category of “gun owners” in order to establish a meme by which gun owner = criminal in the minds of the populace. This is insulting to the lawfull gun owners, and just not true.
The overwhelmingly vast majority of lawfull gun owners do believe in gun control, but only to a certain extent; beyond that point, we believe it’s up to law enforcement, the courts, and the prison system to come down like a ton of bricks on the violent criminals who cannot and will not abide by the conventions of peaceable society.
As an example of gun control laws I could go for:
A state-administered Federal licensing law for gun owners; with a ten-year sunset provision to guard against abuse.
A manufacturer-to-distrubutor-to-dealer firearm registry, to aid law enforcement in tracking the guns that are getting to criminals.
In exchange for that, I would want:
Federal pre-emption laws to protect lawfull commerce of firearms from frivolous lawsuits at municipal, county and state level. This legislation would cover “environmental based” suits and “nuissance” suits, such as landowners suing outdoor shooting ranges for “noise complaints.”
Federal pre-emption laws to restrict municipalities, counties, and states from passing their own “gun bans” and restrictive registration and licensing schemes. This would have to be retroactive to repeal many state bans currently on the books.
Sure, maybe. Big maybe. It could prevent them from being resold. Except from a criminal to another criminal. Oh. Ooops.
I agree that it’s not a bad idea to lock up weapons. I would prefer that people with weapons would just be responsible with them. Teach their kids about them.
Sadly, in today’s world a .22 rifle is something to be afraid of. In my childhood, it was a tool and something to respect.
It makes me sad that some parents won’t educate their children about firearms. I think every kid should be shown how to handle a gun.