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Study finds Australian gun laws stopped mass shootings and suicides

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Is there a racist aspect to gun control with too much unsaid to ever have a real honest debate.

Gun control is by necessity federal initiative and the south hates those by default (like Medicare)
Guns protect my family from poor black criminals with Saturday night specials that want to rob me.
Guns are necessary because gun violence among minorities is very high and I am worried about the future.
Guns are safe when in the hands of educated stable families with good solid income and friends, why should we give them up because (black) people misuse them?

I wonder if this is what most of the politically active nra think, but only whisper. So we get these ludicrous justifications because people are talking around these thoughts. There can be no progress if people dare not say what they are thinking. The arguments become meaningless.
And the only time the gun control debate reaches the senate floor is when a slaughter doesn't fit the template and had a high body count. White gunman. "Terrorist" gunman. Student victims.
Another thought: There is still racism in the world and gun control could, like three strikes on drug possession, be another way it can come out. Huge penalties for possession of any weapon without correct papers could end up punishing poor minorities by a police force not exactly known for unbiased application of a law.

Don't get mad this is just an outsiders view. Might be totally off base.
Probably the only solution is very very gradual, not revolutionary change. I heard Barney Frank say that a few days ago in regard to fixing anything. Perhaps start by a tax on bullets purchased for use away from gun ranges.
 

Xater

Member
Gun laws work? Who would have thought? It's not like we had statistics from most major civilized countries to support this.
 
Is there a racist aspect to gun control with too much unsaid to ever have a real honest debate.

Gun control is by necessity federal initiative and the south hates those by default (like Medicare)
Guns protect my family from poor black criminals with Saturday night specials that want to rob me.
Guns are necessary because gun violence among minorities is very high and I am worried about the future.
Guns are safe when in the hands of educated stable families with good solid income and friends, why should we give them up because (black) people misuse them?

I wonder if this is what most of the politically active nra think, but only whisper. So we get these ludicrous justifications because people are talking around these thoughts. There can be no progress if people dare not say what they are thinking. The arguments become meaningless.
And the only time the gun control debate reaches the senate floor is when a slaughter doesn't fit the template and had a high body count. White gunman. "Terrorist" gunman. Student victims.
Another thought: There is still racism in the world and gun control could, like three strikes on drug possession, be another way it can come out. Huge penalties for possession of any weapon without correct papers could end up punishing poor minorities by a police force not exactly known for unbiased application of a law.

Don't get mad this is just an outsiders view. Might be totally off base.
Probably the only solution is very very gradual, not revolutionary change. I heard Barney Frank say that a few days ago in regard to fixing anything. Perhaps start by a tax on bullets purchased for use away from gun ranges.

The NRA was founded as an organization that wanted to get guns out of the hands of African Americans. (I'm serious.)
 
I think any country that has mass shootings on a regular basis should adopt Australia's policies. Since it has obviously worked.

A country that goes so far as to license non firearms? Even a fucking BB gun? No thanks. Europe is doing just fine without Australian laws, thank you. And no other countries except the USA has mass shootings on a regular basis. So you support taking normal people's private property away just because some crazy shoots up a place? Sensible, proportional regulation is what's needed, not any knee jerk responses. What's crazy is that in Australia an airsoft/paintball gun is treated in exactly the same way that an actual firearm is. Ridiculous.
 

LordRaptor

Member
Is there a racist aspect to gun control with too much unsaid to ever have a real honest debate.

If there is, it's not based on the aspects you described, it's based on the fears uppity minorities are going to push back harder than they did on the Bill of Civil Rights and use their guns for exactly the purpose pro-gun ownership lobbyists claim to support; namely the violent overthrow of a corrupt authority.
It's why "socialism" is a terrifying word too, because it hearkens back to the Russian Revolution.
 

Lead

Banned
So...why? Why do you own an AR-15?

It just seems like such a wanna be tough-guy thing to own. You're not in a video game. You live in a peaceful civilized society.

To me it just seems embarrassing. Even as a hobby....it's a symbol of the absolute worst of humanity.
I own an AR-15 because shooting sports and hunting is a hobby and passion of mine. My government trust me with this because I'm a responsible person, I've managed to live a long time without committing any crimes, I have no mental health issues (crazy I know, sane persons own firearms? wat?).

What you think it symbolizes, I gotta be frank, I really don't give a shit. A lot of people that have ideological issues with guns are often people raised in urban areas. Firearms and by extension hunting is a major part of life in the rurals which by size does make of the majority of earth.
Maybe there will always be those that get through the net. But you argue that because one will get through, it's pointless. You like bringing up Breivik a lot, which goes to show you have very little mass shooters in your corner of the world. Here in the US, we have so many names we have to get into the specific location to keep track of what happened with the shooter.
I keep mentioning Breivik because it's the most prolific, but Europe have had their share of mass shootings in the past 15-20 years. The list is rather long.
Those don't apply to shooters of

Orlando
Sandy Hook
Aurora
Virginia Tech
West Nickel Mines School
Isla Vista

And also we know we need a lot of equality reform. And will that reduce gun violence? Absolutely, as there will be less crime. But then don't go tell me that's all there is to it
No it doesn't, but it applies to the thousands of homicides committed by impoverished people in hotspots like Chicago.
I support a mass ban on guns. I am biased.

But I am honestly, actually, for the first time in a long time on GAF, truly annoyed at someone. That you would make that comparison.

Breivik was an anomaly. Mass shooting sprees in countries with heavily regulated gun laws do not happen like they do here.

Do you know how many fucking massacres we've had in the US? For you to say this like Breivik can be compared to Orlando is extremely upsetting. Off the top of my head, Sandy Hook, Aurora, dude from Santa Cruz or whatever (the misogynist), V Tech, the church in Charleston... holy shit dude the list goes on and on and on and fucking on. There is no comparison. There just is not.

Even if I don't agree with you, I'm glad you're standing up and arguing for what you believe in, but to flippantly say something like that makes me irrationally angry. Please don't. As an American, it really hurts to see someone not from here dismiss the horrors of lax gun control so casually. Most likely, and hopefully, you'll never ever ever be fucking affected by the massacres here. You'll never have to live through what we do, on a fucking yearly basis as a nation. An entire fucking nation, ever year, grieving.

We go through this shit over and over and fucking over and it's. so. fucking. maddening.

*edit: Just to be clear, this is not an appeal to emotion argument. I am not trying to argue with you about your other points. I just wanted to address the bolded comparison.
I keep mentioning Breivik because it's the most prolific, but Europe have had their share of mass shootings in the past 15-20 years. The list is rather long.
Is allowing people to more easily fire a gun for sport worth the increased risk to public safety caused by laxer gun control though?

I'd say, speaking as a UK citizen, that it definitely isn't.
Most countries in Europe are safer to live in than the UK and they all have a lot more lax gun laws.
Strange how you didn't bring this information:
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/compare/194/rate_of_gun_homicide/10,192,50,177,178,69,49

Into the "liberal echo chamber," nor did you put down the US statistics.
So that you could show this:
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/compare/194/rate_of_homicide_any_method/10,192,50,177,178,69,49

And chose to ignore readily available information in one source, to provide other less useful information without context.

I mean I'm sure there's nothing going on here, and the 3.43 deaths by gun homicide per 100,000 has nothing to do with the total death rate by homicide being 4.96, while the other countries you chose to show have rates all around 1 for the total homicide rate. And neither of these have anything to do with the US being the only country amongst them that has guns so readily accessible that ownership per capita is a whole number.

This all without factoring in, as already pointed out, why you can own a gun, what you have to do to get one, what kind of guns you can own, what kind of guns people do own, and what you have to do with a gun once you own one in these other countries.
I didn't because it's a given that more guns = more gun homicides.
It's not what I set out to do, I set out to show you that a society as a whole does not get more dangerous because there's more or less guns, there's no corelation in Europe.

The second stat proves my point again. The United Kingdom have one of the highest homicide rates in Europe but the absolutely strictest and most draconian gunlaws.
 
Not having guns = less murders? Nah, can't be.

But seriously, isn't there some kind of nationwide mandatory background check at least for both seller and buyer?
 
Lets not get in the way of a good old liberal echo chamber.

United Kingdom-
Firearms per 100 people: 6.7
Homicides per 100.000 people: 1.0

Denmark-
Firearms per 100 people: 12.0
Homicides per 100.000 people: 1.0

Sweden-
Firearms per 100 people: 31.6
Homicides per 100.000 people: 0.9

Switzerland-
Firearms per 100 people: 45.7
Homicides per 100.000 people: 0.5

Germany-
Firearms per 100 people: 30.3
Homicides per 100.000 people: 0.9

Czech republic-
Firearms per 100 people: 16.3
Homicides per 100.000 people: 0.7

Sources: 1 and 2

Switzerland has very strict gun controls. A nation can have a high rate of gun ownership, but still reduce gun crime via gun controls.
 

Opto

Banned
No it doesn't, but it applies to the thousands of homicides committed by impoverished people in hotspots like Chicago.

Did you decide to ignore the second fucking half of my post?

And like, everything else. For a Dane you're drinking a lot of the NRA koolaid
 

dpunk3

Member
I will say that one benefit Australia had over the US in controlling guns is that when they enacted a ban, it was much easier to prevent new guns from entering the country after the buyback. Australia has a substantially fewer number of weapon manufacturers than the US.
 
A country that goes so far as to license non firearms? Even a fucking BB gun? No thanks. Europe is doing just fine without Australian laws, thank you. And no other countries except the USA has mass shootings on a regular basis. So you support taking normal people's private property away just because some crazy shoots up a place? Sensible, proportional regulation is what's needed, not any knee jerk responses. What's crazy is that in Australia an airsoft/paintball gun is treated in exactly the same way that an actual firearm is. Ridiculous.

Hence my comment about any country that has mass shootings. If European countries start having frequent mass shootings then they should implement Australia's policies, if they don't there is no need. Simple. The Australian government did not take everyone's guns, they bought them at a fair price including those that were no longer legal. Fact: there are now more guns in Australia than before the buy back.

Paintball guns were treated the same way because they fall under replica firearms. A cop probably can not tell the difference 100m away from a replica M16 paintball gun and the real thing. There are numerous cases of people getting shot or almost getting shot due to that mistake. So not so ridiculous. You want to play paintball, get a licence.
 
A country that goes so far as to license non firearms? Even a fucking BB gun? No thanks. Europe is doing just fine without Australian laws, thank you. And no other countries except the USA has mass shootings on a regular basis. So you support taking normal people's private property away just because some crazy shoots up a place? Sensible, proportional regulation is what's needed, not any knee jerk responses. What's crazy is that in Australia an airsoft/paintball gun is treated in exactly the same way that an actual firearm is. Ridiculous.
I don't see why regulating paintball guns is so crazy
 
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