How many more? School shooting, many dead.

[mapleboy]

Banning gun ownership wont solve the problem. This is a simplistic solution that is no solution at all. It might be a solution for small nations but it's far more complex in a nation with a population of over 300 million

Sorry, that's nonsense. Look at a community of, say, 50,000 people. How many guns are in it? Everyone in the community turns ALL their firearms at their local police station. They've got a month to do it or they risk a life sentence if caught in possession, no excuses, no parole. No one could claim, "But I didn't know it was illegal to have a gun your honour."

 

Now replicate that across an entire country of whatever size. People in California don't tend to shoot people in New York on a daily basis. So deal with the problem at a local level.

 

The problem is stupidly easy access to firearms on a nationwide basis that is played out at a local level.

 

Thank god I live in Britain, where gun possession is a very rare thing.

[geared]

The Russian military and the US police dont use AK47s by the way and they cannot be bought legally in stores here either

 

Here as in California or USA?

 

cos I've seen alot of US tv documentarys where people have an AK47.

[Harleyman]

Not everyone in America lives in a City the size of NYC or Chicago. Most of us live in small towns with a very small police force, and most of us live there peacefully and happily, many of us own a handgun as well as a hunting rifle and shotgun as well. Some houses are in remote areas as well, and the hand gun gives people a feeling of relief. Home invasion is on the increase, with a noted case here in Connecticut where two ex cons broke intio a home, bludgeoned the Doctor owner almost to death, strangled his wife after raping her, then tied her two daughters to a bed, and set the house on fire, killing them. A handgun could have saved them. The two men are in the death house, but are not likely to be executed. Its not the done thing in Connectiut

 

 

The Night Stalker murders in Los Angeles and surrounding areas in the early 1980s prompted many homeowners who had never owned firearms before to go out and buy a hand gun. All of a sudden home burglaries dropped to unprecedented lows not seen in decades.

 

Washington DC has the most stringent gun control laws in the country yet the highest rate of gun crimes along with it.

 

I need to be careful what I say about why this exists as I dont need to get another ban but I leave it to you to read between the lines

[Jessica23]

For anybody who actually wants to know, the official (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime) statistic for the most recently available complete year (2009) data shows the relative murder rates as:

 

UK: 1.2 per 100,000 people (total of 722)

US: 5.0 per 100,000 people (total of 15,399 which is down from many previous recent years)

Canada: 1.8 per 100,000 people (total of 610)

 

There are an awful lot of places where it is much more dangerous to live, like Honduras, with a relative rate of 91.6 per 100,000 people, but I'd still rather live in a country which has a lower murder rate and any country which has murders (any) and doesn't ask the question of how the rate can be reduced really isn't being responsible to its citizens.

 

And when you narrow that down to gun-related homicide, here are some further figures that have been flying around:

 

Researchers determined that the rate of homicides with guns in the U.S. was 4.1 per 100,000 people; the same rate combining the 22 other countries was 0.2 per 100,000 in 2003. The rate of homicides using guns in the U.S. was 19.5 times the rate of the other countries.

 

We decided to see if there were more recent numbers than 2003. U.N. and national statistics for those same countries showed the gap closed. The most recent data, mostly from 2009, shows a gun homicide rate of 3.0 per 100,000 people in the U.S. and 0.2 in the 22 other countries used in the firearm fatality study. The U.S., with its decrease, had a rate around 15 times those of other countries.

 

The source for those figures is outlined here - the other countries compared include Australia, Austria, Canada, Czech Republic, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Luxembourg, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, United Kingdom (England and Wales), United Kingdom (Northern Ireland) and United Kingdom (Scotland).

[mapleboy]

That's a totally stupid knee jerk response.

Remind me how radically and rapidly the gun laws changed over here after Dunblane?

 

There is NO valid, logical or sane reason for a typical citizen of any country to possess or have access to a firearm. What possible use could a typical Sheffielder have for one that was vital to their life assuming that no other Sheffielder had one?

 

Now replace Sheffielder with any town or city in the US.

[Jessica23]

Powerful piece in the New Yorker by Adam Gopnik about people who defend the right to bear arms here:

 

After the Aurora killings, I did a few debates with advocates for the child-killing lobby—sorry, the gun lobby—and, without exception and with a mad vehemence, they told the same old lies: it doesn’t happen here more often than elsewhere (yes, it does); more people are protected by guns than killed by them (no, they aren’t—that’s a flat-out fabrication); guns don’t kill people, people do; and all the other perverted lies that people who can only be called knowing accessories to murder continue to repeat, people who are in their own way every bit as twisted and crazy as the killers whom they defend. (That they are often the same people who pretend outrage at the loss of a single embryo only makes the craziness still crazier.)

 

So let’s state the plain facts one more time, so that they can’t be mistaken: Gun massacres have happened many times in many countries, and in every other country, gun laws have been tightened to reflect the tragedy and the tragic knowledge of its citizens afterward. In every other country, gun massacres have subsequently become rare. In America alone, gun massacres, most often of children, happen with hideous regularity, and they happen with hideous regularity because guns are hideously and regularly available.

 

The people who fight and lobby and legislate to make guns regularly available are complicit in the murder of those children. They have made a clear moral choice: that the comfort and emotional reassurance they take from the possession of guns, placed in the balance even against the routine murder of innocent children, is of supreme value. Whatever satisfaction gun owners take from their guns—we know for certain that there is no prudential value in them—is more important than children’s lives. Give them credit: life is making moral choices, and that’s a moral choice, clearly made.

[geared]

They have bears and wild cats and stuff out in the countryside tho.

 

but I agree, no-one in a city needs a gun - they only have them to protect themselves from other people with guns.

 

It's human nature unfortunately, cave man thinking.

if someone menacing has a stick you feel most comfortable holding your own stick.

[Harleyman]

Sorry, that's nonsense. Look at a community of, say, 50,000 people. How many guns are in it? Everyone in the community turns ALL their firearms at their local police station. They've got a month to do it or they risk a life sentence if caught in possession, no excuses, no parole. No one could claim, "But I didn't know it was illegal to have a gun your honour."

 

Now replicate that across an entire country of whatever size. People in California don't tend to shoot people in New York on a daily basis. So deal with the problem at a local level.

 

The problem is stupidly easy access to firearms on a nationwide basis that is played out at a local level.

 

Thank god I live in Britain, where gun possession is a very rare thing.

 

OH yeah sounds just wonderful. Ignore the second amendment, screw the constitution and fill the skies with choppers full of heavily armed black uniformed, black helmeted BATF agents who will descend on your neighborhood smashing down doors and forcibly hauling out weapons that were never used in any crime by the owners and threatening them with 10 years in prison if they so much as hide a .22 calibre pop gun.

 

That should solve the problem right away !

[andygardener]

Remind me how radically and rapidly the gun laws changed over here after Dunblane?

 

There is NO valid, logical or sane reason for a typical citizen of any country to possess or have access to a firearm. What possible use could a typical Sheffielder have for one that was vital to their life assuming that no other Sheffielder had one?

 

Now replace Sheffielder with any town or city in the US.

 

Hunting and target shooting?

[Harleyman]

Here as in California or USA?

 

cos I've seen alot of US tv documentarys where people have an AK47.

 

There's no gun store anywhere in this state that would sell you an AK over the counter. They dont stock them. You wouldnt even be able to buy an AR-15 either anymore. Several years ago magazines that held more than ten rounds were also outlawed. I bought a couple of banana clips just before they were banned for my little Ruger. 22 rifle which I use at the shooting range. The marshalls at the range said they're okay to use but if you fire too rapidly even with my pop gun they'll yell at you over the speaker to "slow fire rate"

 

Now if you want an AK you probably need to go to an area where gangs are active and if you have the money and somebody puts you in touch with "the man" he'll sell you one out of the trunk of a car... no questions asked. But these days you'd more than likely get busted big time by a member of the police gang suppression squad ten minutes later.

 

---------- Post added 15-12-2012 at 00:22 ----------

 

Sorry, that's nonsense. Look at a community of, say, 50,000 people. How many guns are in it? Everyone in the community turns ALL their firearms at their local police station. They've got a month to do it or they risk a life sentence if caught in possession, no excuses, no parole. No one could claim, "But I didn't know it was illegal to have a gun your honour."

 

Now replicate that across an entire country of whatever size. People in California don't tend to shoot people in New York on a daily basis. So deal with the problem at a local level.

 

The problem is stupidly easy access to firearms on a nationwide basis that is played out at a local level.

 

Thank god I live in Britain, where gun possession is a very rare thing.

 

So a nephew of mine whose a member of the Cheshire Constabularly didnt really need to patrol the motorways in that part of the UKs in a souped up Volvo with orders to stop any car and search it if it was thought that it might be transporting illegal weapons ?

 

---------- Post added 15-12-2012 at 00:23 ----------

 

Sorry, that's nonsense. Look at a community of, say, 50,000 people. How many guns are in it? Everyone in the community turns ALL their firearms at their local police station. They've got a month to do it or they risk a life sentence if caught in possession, no excuses, no parole. No one could claim, "But I didn't know it was illegal to have a gun your honour."

 

Now replicate that across an entire country of whatever size. People in California don't tend to shoot people in New York on a daily basis. So deal with the problem at a local level.

 

The problem is stupidly easy access to firearms on a nationwide basis that is played out at a local level.

 

Thank god I live in Britain, where gun possession is a very rare thing.

 

So a nephew of mine whose a member of the Cheshire Constabularly didnt really need to patrol the motorways in that part of the UK in a souped up Volvo with orders to stop any car and search it if it was thought that it might be transporting illegal weapons ?