urbanSTL

shimmy wrote:

MarkHaversham wrote: I like to think I'm surrounded by people who are willing to obey the law, not murderous thugs intent on permitting their neighbors to live only so long as they get their way. If 30% of Americans would really prefer to shoot their way through a squad of policemen than honor a gun ban then A) I'm terrified and B) all the more reason to disarm those psychopaths.

As for gun culture, the number of Americans owning guns has been decreasing over time, so in the long term at least gun regulation might be more likely.

The number of Americans owning guns has been decreasing for two primary reasons.

1) The number of Americans who hunt has decreased dramatically, due in large part to urbanization.

2) Rise in single-person households. Men are much more likely than women to own guns, so in the modern age where there are more women living by themselves and out of a household with a gun, then this has an effect on the overall number of Americans who own a gun.

So really, it's other events that are causing the decline in gun ownership, it's not because Americans are finding guns to be more evil (which, as I previously linked, is the opposite of what's actually happen).

And you can like to think you're surrounded by whomever you want, but that doesn't change the reality of who you are actually surrounded by. It's like when people say "I like to go outside my home and feel safe." Well, just because you feel safe doesn't mean you are safe. And no one has any obligation to conform to your thoughts or feelings.

So in effect, you're terrified because 30% of Americans have the audacity to disagree with you and that they take their Constitutional rights seriously (50%+ if you take the number of Americans who believe that gun rights should be expanded). I'm sorry that you think over half of your countrymen are psychopaths, but that says something about liberal "tolerance". Also, you keep advocating that these "psychopaths" should be disarmed. Who exactly is going to do the disarming when law enforcement has shown that it has no desire to infringe on people's Constitutional rights?

shimmy wrote:

MarkHaversham wrote: I just want to point out that I'm not actually terrified, because I disagree with you that 30% of Americans would rather mount an armed insurrection than obey the law. And nobody is talking about an unconstitutional gun ban here; I'm only discussing a hypothetical gun ban or restriction under the 2nd amendment's "regulated" clause or after an appropriate new amendment.

As to they why of gun ownership declining, I don't think that's necessarily relevant. People are less likely to passionately stonewall gun control if they don't own or care about guns. At least, I would imagine most card-carrying NRA members are gun owners.

Fair enough. I disagree with you on the issue but you're entitled you're opinion (and I mean that sincerely, not snidely). My point is that with the way the debate is going currently (gun rights winning), I don't see this hypothetical gun ban, or anything like it, happening any time in the near (or distant, for that matter) future. And with various current gun bans having as high as 90% non-compliance rates, I think it very likely that a large number of that 30% would resist any hypothetical gun ban.

Also, as threatening as it sounds because it is commonly pointed out by fringe militia groups, only 3% of colonists fought against the British during the American Revolution. So even if only 1/10 of that 30% passionately stonewalls gun control, well then that's 9 million armed Americans willing to mount an armed insurrection. And in my experience, the most ardent supporters of the 2nd Amendment are military and LEO, and I'm sure many of them would be counted in that 3%.

We've spiraled deep into the realms of hypotheticals and perhaps outside the intent of this thread. So to summarize, I believe such a hypothetical gun ban has absolutely zero chance of gaining any traction, let alone actually getting passed, and thus debating it as a real policy proposal is pointless. I do, however, enjoy the intellectual debate and appreciate your involvement.

audac1ty wrote:I hate these types of articles, they're so disingenuous. Of course if you take away guns, the gun homicide rate declines. That's an obvious and irrelevant data point. Its like saying "if you took away cars, car related deaths would decline." Well yes. Obviously.

audac1ty wrote:A more interesting statistic...

Why is it irrelevant? Isn't the goal to eliminate gun homicides? What's disingenuous is the suggestion that guns and cars are of equal utility in modern society.

audac1ty wrote:I hate these types of articles, they're so disingenuous. Of course if you take away guns, the gun homicide rate declines. That's an obvious and irrelevant data point. Its like saying "if you took away cars, car related deaths would decline." Well yes. Obviously.

A more interesting statistic would be overall homicide rates in a country pre and post gun ban. Fortunately, we have just such a thing! And from an apolitical official government office in the UK (http://www.statistics.gov.uk) no less. (I don't have Australia's numbers handy but I'll see if I can't get them)

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... sb0212.pdf

I would direct you to table 1.01 on page 32 of the report, the final column "Offences currently recorded as homicide per million population." I would further remind you that the handgun ban took effect in 1997. To save you the trouble, here's the relevant bits:

Year Homicides/Million
1997 11.8
1997/98 11.6
1998/99 12.2
1999/00 12.7
2000/01 14.4
2001/02 15.2
2002/03 17.9
2003/04 14.6
2004/05 14.7
2005/06 13.3
2006/07 13.3
2007/08 13.6
2008/09 11.8
2009/10 11.1
2010/11 11.5

I think even the most ardent gun control supporter would have trouble arguing that the handgun ban had any real effect on homicide rates in the UK. Though if you spin it like this Vox article does, you sure as hell could say "gun crime way down in the UK!" even though just as many people are being murdered. Its entirely dishonest.

Aesir wrote:Stabbings are. And I'd much rather get shot than stabbed or sliced.

audac1ty wrote:Of course if you take away guns, the gun homicide rate declines.

audac1ty wrote:Its entirely irrelevant because if you take away guns and the homicide rate doesn't drop, there was no point in taking away the guns.

audac1ty wrote:Presumably the goal is to reduce the total number of homicides. Are knife homicide or club homicide somehow preferable to gun homicide? Of course not. If the same number of murders are taking place with or without the guns, then the guns weren't the problem and your "solution" didn't do anything.[

audac1ty wrote:Framing it as "we took away guns and the gun homicide rate dropped" is disingenuous because it implies a drop in crime when no such drop occurred, people just started killing each other in other ways.

shimmy wrote:^First, scroll up a bit or go back a page to read the study I posted on Australia's gun laws and its effects on crime. In short, the decrease in Australia's homicides decreased at the rate it was already decreasing prior to the ban. To be fair, on the flip side, gun rights advocates arguing that Australia's assault rate has increased 800% since the ban, while correct, are also disingenuous because assaults increased at the rate they were already increasing by prior to the ban. And what's not to get about audac1ty's points? If a country's homicide rate remains the same after a gun ban, then the gun ban had no effect on the homicide rate of that country. So either people started killing each other in other ways, or the gun ban was absolutely useless in getting guns off the street. However, if the gun homicide rate decreases but the overall homicide rate stays the same, then that implies that homicides committed by something other than guns increased to make up for the decrease in homicides committed with guns. I'm not sure what you're arguing here.