Another Phony Pro Gun Argument

Big G writes:

Just for reference, NYC has the third highest gun crime and murder rate in the US. They are behind other gunless cities like Detroit and Washington DC. As a matter of fact, the top ten most dangerous cities to live in the U.S. are gunless. Seems to me somebody would get the picture.

This pro gun argument obviously makes no sense at all. Many countries around the world have more or less banned gun ownership. One would think that guns would be smuggled in anyway, but it just doesn’t happen. The more the state restricts guns, the lower the homicide rate. Sure you can use knives and whatnot to kill people, but they do not work very well. Guns work much better. All of those huge cities that banned guns did so because they had massive gun crime. That’s why they banned them. The gun nut argument makes it out like they banned guns, and then the crime rate went up, but it didn’t work that way. They had horrible gun crime, so they banned guns. Who knows how well that works though because they just smuggle guns into the city from outside the city? Chicago has a huge problem with guns being smuggled into the city. Also the US is presently awash with guns so banning them in one location does not really work as they will just keep coming in from other locations where guns have not yet been banned.

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0 thoughts on “Another Phony Pro Gun Argument”

  1. The reason why USA has so much gun crime is due to
    1) Inequality
    2) the quality of people is too low due
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Number_of_guns_per_capita_by_country
    Switzerland also has a very high gun ownership ratio and I have no heard to any shooting spree.
    The plight of USA is entirely cause by her elites. It appears to me that unlike Switzerland, USA elites do not want to educate her people. I have yet to meet a uninformed Swiss, but there are some US graduate who amaze me by their dysfunctional level of literacy. Not to mention the drop outs and non graduates.
    Compared to Switzerland or German, the quality of USA population is incredibly low. If you have such a semi-educated population, unless you are a Muslim countries, you will have a sorts of funny firearm crime.

    1. I believe that Switzerland lets you have a longarm. I am not sure they let you have a handgun, and I know they do not let you have an automatic weapon. Furthermore, those Swiss people do not own any of those guns. All guns held by Swiss citizens are owned by the Swiss state.

      1. There are some groups of people I would rather be armed than others and the Swiss are in the can be armed category. Like the affluent Swiss, I don’t think middle class Americans being armed is a big problem but what about in the ghetto or the trailer park? I think its better they can’t reach for firearms at the first sign of a dispute.
        In the documentary’ the interrupters’ about homicide in Chicago, one the ‘interrupters’ (basically activists who try to stop people killing each other) says that there’s a misconception its all gang violence- actually a lot of petty random encounters involving ‘disrespect’ escalate into murders.
        Switzerland would have a low homicide rate no matter what. But I wouldn’t want everybody in Britain armed!

  2. The redneck argument makes sense because, as you said, they just bring in weapons from outside the city. The only way to have effective gun banning would be total banning everywhere. The gun thing is similar to the capital punishment. Capital punishment doesn’t work because it’s only enforced in some states, and it’s not done immediately, like in China.

  3. I don’t mind the idea of homeowners protecting their family and property from home invaders. So here is my suggestion: You can own a gun on two conditions: 1) you own your own home 2) you have no criminal record. Possibly 3) you have to be at least 30 or 25 (time to make sure you are mature and prove you aren’t inclined to criminality).
    If some in society must be armed, make it the mature and responsible, upstanding citizens.

      1. No, sir. You can own a shotgun or a rifle for hunting and my uncle who moved to the country has these but that’s all.
        If I sleep alone in the house, I sometimes keep a weapon next to the bed. If there was a high threat level of armed invaders or there was a specific threat against me, I may want a gun. That’s why I can symnpathise with the wish for a right to bear arms. I think the right to defend oneself is a natural right or as close to one as there is.
        I would probably not be in favour of introducing the right to bear (fire)arms to Britain at this point but we are talking about America and total abolition is not realistic. I think my proposal is sensible for that context. It empowers mature and responsible citizens relative to the others.

        1. Trust me, it ain’t going to work.
          You already have longarms to protect your home. What more do you need?
          Any nation that liberalizes its gun laws to be more in line with America’s is insane.
          If we seriously cracked down on guns here, I think we could put a dent in gun crime. For instance, outlaw all semiautomatic weapons. Maybe have a buy-back program. That should put a sizable dent in gun crime after a while.

        2. “Any nation that liberalizes its gun laws to be more in line with America’s is insane.”
          Based on the evidence from America, yeah.

        3. we have longarms? what the hell are longarms. never head of them, never seen one… do we have them? No ordinary people have firearms in Britain, only a few hunters and criminals. Even the ordinary police don’t have them.

        4. oh, well we don’t have them to protect our homes. Maybe farmers and a few hunters but not the vast majority of people. I think you need a licence and they wouldn’t give you one unless you went hunting or something like that. You can’t have them to protect your home..

  4. Once again we skew the facts. Like everyone in an a discussion once you run out of facts you attack. I see that even though you choose to avoid the points I brought up. I’m a gun nut. So as if to say even though I was clear on the auto semi issue. I was clear on the large magazine issue . I clearly showed how the liberal media demonized by using improper words like assault weapon( made up word) you side step all the points I made and told your readership something else. The simple facts are forgotten. You say presently America is awash with guns. Americans in the majority have always had guns. I explained that your position is from a city while being within close proximity if law enforcement. You continue to discuss other countries and their gun laws. Once again. Jews ww2 had their guns taken from them by Hitler. Pol pot took guns away from the populas before killing million. You cannot control the ” people” if the people have guns. I find it amazing how very smart people can’t see that protecting yourself and family with a gun is the single greatest law that makes america free. All dictatorships have gun laws forbidding gun ownership. And if you badmouth the gun nut don’t do it under the blanket of security that he provides you and the other amendments.

    1. We lost our democracy a long time ago. There has never been a risk of dictatorship in the US, gun laws or no gun laws. Many nations with strict gun laws have very effective and free democracies. Northern European nations are vastly freer than the US and their gun laws are very strict.
      In the USSR, every household had a gun. In Iraq under Saddam, nearly every household had an AK-47. Yemen is armed to the teeth but has had dictatorships for most of its history.
      I personally do not thank gun nuts for keeping me free. I condemn them for putting me at extreme risk in a gun-flooded nation.

      1. It seems what is missing from the discussion is the root cause analysis. The cliche that guns do not kill people is true. Using the Swiss as an example again, they are far better educated and their culture revolves around family and community. It used to be that way here in the US. Our poor education and lack of family values contributes significantly to the gun/murder problem. I live in a high rise (Chicago) full of great people. I would feel much safer if every single one of them owned a gun.

        1. The gun nuts keep saying this, but it’s a bad argument. Obviously there are some root causes.
          Ok we have poor educational standards. People have been screaming about that for 30 years now. When are we ever going to fix the problem.
          Lack of family values? How long have we been complaining about this now? 40 years? 50 years? When are we ever going to fix the problem? Probably never.
          Also the Swiss example is very bad in that sure every house has a gun or two, but they are all unloaded and the ammo is stored elsewhere. It seems obvious that a nation with an unloaded gun or two in every house would have low gun crime rates!

  5. Not allowing a law abiding citizen to own a gun, is against fundamental liberty. I come from Denmark, where gun laws are very strict, but I still think the whole issue is more about people and society than about guns them selves.
    And of cause, more strict gun laws, will lower gun related homocide, but I think gun ban would be 99% symptom management, and will not address the actual problems.
    Belive me when I tell you, that I thank my maker every day, that I live a place, where you don’t need to lock your door.

    1. Looking around the world, it is clear that the fewer guns society allows, the less gun crime there is. In strict gun controlled nations, there is little gun crime or homicide. Sure, people can use other methods to kill each other, but those methods do not work very well.
      Any strictly gun controlled state that loosens up its laws on the order of US style gun liberalism is bound to see a massive increase in gun crime and gun homicide. It’s only logical.
      For Denmark to go the US route would be not only stupid but also insane.

      1. Switzerland does show that isn’t NECESSARILY the case. I do not really want more guns in Britain though and you may be in general right. It would be good if you could show us a graph or a map comparing gun ownership and homicide rates.

      2. Yes, I see and agree with the logic, but my point is, that instead of narrowing the discussion to pro/kontra guns, we should take a broader perspective. But I know that can seem impossible in a public discussion.
        I think that the fact that many people in America are raised, thinking some other people (based on politics, race or what ever), are less worthy than others, is a fundamental flaw. Misconception of pride and honor is also keeping the murder rate high.
        Pride can make people think, teach and do crazy things. And that goes for academia too.
        I don’t wish for Denmark to take the USA route, on that issue. Don’t you worry 🙂

  6. Making gun ownership illegal in the US isn’t going to prevent organized crime from arming themselves and using those weapons. Consequently who benefits? Mind you I don’t live in the States.

  7. A very excellent discussion Robert. Of the 10 or so open minded and intelligent people that commented above, I’m sure we could replace our current Congress and quickly come up with some very meaningful laws (or do away with the bad ones).

  8. Here’s something to look at on the subject of gun ownership: Illinois recently became a state where anyone without a criminal record can get a concealed weapons permit. Let’s see whether gun crimes become more or less common, especially in Chicago.
    Two Chicago policemen have a blog in which they encourage law-abiding persons to keep firearms, saying,”When seconds count, the police are only minutes away.”

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