Resonable Reasic’s silence is deafening.

The crickets chirp….and chirp…………..

Yes, I’ve been both sick and busy. I’ll share some thoughts now.

I know you lefties always want to make America to be the worst, but, England has one of the highest crime rates in the 1st world.

Possibly, but the point should be on the number of gun-related fatalities, since that is the subject. Let’s just compare, for instance, homicides involving firearms from the UK and the US. In 2004, the UK had 68 firearm homicides, while the US had 11,624. Now, their respective populations are 60,943,912, and 303,824,640. Those are 2008 populations, but for the purpose of calculating rates, they sould be close enough. This makes the rate of gun-related homicides about 0.0001% in the UK, compared to 0.004% for the US. This makes the RATE of homicides from firearms in the US 34 times greater.

So, it’s extremely important that we first get our facts straight. Then, maybe we can look at why this could be. Maybe it has to do with the fact that there are about 65 million handguns in the US, with very little if any restrictions on them, while they are virtually non-existent in the UK.

You guys should know that I’m not a rabid anti-gun nut, who doesn’t want hunters to have shotguns or licensed and trained citizens to be able to safely store a handgun in their home. I just think there should be a reasonable level of compromise, which involves bans on certain types of guns (do you really need an AK-47?) and restrictions on storing your guns (so your child can’t accidentally shoot his friend with it).

Handguns are a big part of the problem. Of all firearm-related crimes, 86% involved handguns. At the same time, a handgun in the home is 22 times more likely to be used to injure or kill family member or friend than to be sucessfully used in self defense. However, I can definitely agree that a properly trained person who safely stores their gun away would not likely contribute to this statistic. So, I do believe that a ban on certain weapons, and limited restrictions on others, which are properly enforced, would be very effective in helping to lower these unfortunate statistics.

My main problem with this post, Duncan, was that you took one incident and complained that a gun ban should’ve prevented it, which is nonsense. No law is going to prevent every crime from occurring. However, they could be greatly reduced, while at the same time, allowing responsible hunters and sportsmen to store guns in their homes.

Oh, I know! It’s because of the overtly conservative press shielding the Great Unwashed from such news. Right, reasic and apple?

And Apple,

Besides, for every article like the one Duncan posted you could probably find at least 3 in the US where someone was killed with a legally purchased handgun.

Really? Could probably?

Using Duncan’s theory of statistics you would have to conclude that legal handguns cause crime.

Nice strawman there. I’d never say that, as guns are a tool and it is the criminal who is the cause of crime.

The crickets chirp….and chirp…………..

And it looks like it has done a lot to stop the killing by guns.. or not..

According to government statistics, the number of people killed by guns has essentially stayed the same, with dips and spikes, as before the 1997 gun control laws went into effect: There were 55 shooting deaths in 1995 and 50 last year in England and Wales. By comparison, there were 137 fatal shootings in the District of Columbia last year.

The number of crimes in which a handgun was used in England and Wales has risen from 299 in 1995 to 1,024 last year. Offenses committed with all types of firearms, including air guns, have also increased.

and perhaps they should ban knives and fists as well:

David Wilson, a professor of criminology at the University of Central England in Birmingham, said more people are killed in England by a knife or a fist than by a gun. England does not have a culture of “a right to bear arms,” Wilson said, and even before the Dunblane incident, England was known for tough gun control.

Would a firearm have done anything to defend the family in the post I wrote above? Probably not since unless they had the firearm on their person, there apparently was no time to retrieve it from wherever it would have been secured. Would the possibility of a homeowner possessing a gun been a deterrent? Possibly, since I could find a statistic that the per capita crime of Washington D.C is higher than say… Texas. I’ll look for it. Had these scumbags broken while the homeowner was in bed or near access to the pistol or firearm, atleast he would have had the option to defend his family and home. Instead they were at the mercy of druggies, who could have done God only knows what to them had they chosen to.

At the end of the day, my point is that only law abiding citizens will follow the laws and not own firearms if there is a ban. If I want to kill myself, I don’t have to use a firearm if I am really motivated, nor is my only option in a domestic violence situation a firearm. At the end of the day, “gun violence” might no longer be the major cause for “violent crimes”, though I don’t know how you can then reason that there will be a “reduction in violent crimes” to follow.