Gun Control

Greetings, I would like to start by thanking my opponent for taking the time to debate this subject, and I hope it turns out to be a very good debate. I will commence with three contentions. However, do note that I will be arguing against all forms of restrictions on firearms such as background checks, bans, buy backs, registration, etc. Contention 1: Safeguard and defense against a tyrannical government My first contention will be on the issue of the defense of liberty. A well armed civilian population is the biggest safeguard in case our government crosses the line and decides to become tyrannical. The founding fathers put in place the 2nd Amendment for this very reason, so that the masses of citizens of our country may use force in the case the state tries on override the Constitution and seize our natural rights. So essentially, the right to bear arms is in place to protect all our other rights. History has proven every time a population is disarmed, the government almost always takes advantage of the chance and lays waste to its peoples rights. We see this in Stalin's Russia, Hitler's Germany, and Mao's China. Every time, the people were unable to resist the tyrants and because that many hundreds of millions of people died at the hands of governments. It is for this reason that we should not disarm the population, but rather, arm it with even more then it already is. There is nothing worse then a government with nothing to fear. Contention 2: Gun Control is over all, inefficient and counterproductive My second contention will be that gun control of any all kinds are counterproductive. I will prove this using national and international cases that show that gun control generally backfires where ever it is instituted. Proof from the U.S. 1. In 1976, Washington, D.C. enacted one of the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation. The city's murder rate increased by 134 percent through 1996 while the nation murder rate dropped 2 percent [1]. 2. Maryland claims to have the toughest gun control laws in the country and it ranks #1 in robberies and #4 in both violent crime and murder. The robbery rate is at 70 percent more then the national average [2]. 3. New York has one of the most restrictive gun laws in the U.S. and also have 20 percent of the armed robberies [3]. 4. According to the federal government, gun buy backs have no effect [4]. 5. Buy backs remove no more then 2 percent of the guns from the community. And the ones that were removed didn't resemble the guns used in crimes [5]. From the rest of the World 1. In Canada around 1920, before there was any form of gun control, their homicide rate was 7% of the U.S rate. By 1986, and after significant gun control legislation Canada’s homicide rate was 35% of the U.S. rate – a significant increase. 320 In 2003, Canada had a violent crime rate more than double that of the U.S. (963 vs. 475 per 100,000) [6]. 2. firearm use in crimes in the UK has doubled in the decade since handguns were banned [7]. 3. Britain has the highest rate of violent crime in Europe, more so than the United States or even South Africa. They also have the second highest overall crime rate in the European Union. In 2008, Britain had a violent crime rate nearly five times higher than the United States (2034 vs. 446 per 100,000 population) [8]. 4. Crime has been rising since enacting a sweeping ban on private gun ownership. In the first two years after Australian gun-owners were forced to surrender 640,381 personal firearms, government statistics showed a dramatic increase in criminal activity [9]. In 2001-2002, homicides were up another 20% [10]. From the inception of firearm confiscation to March 27, 2000, the numbers are: Firearm-related murders were up 19%, armed robberies were up 69%, and home invasions were up 21%. So as we can see from these facts from us and our gun controlist allies that gun control is very counterproductive. This should be no surprise however, common sense should tell us two things. 1) The only thing that can stop a bad guy with a gun, is a good guy with a gun. 2) And criminals simply do not obey laws, and that means gun control would only be disarming law-abiding citizens. Background Checks? Background checks are inefficient. The majority of criminals that are in prison today because of gun violence did not buy their guns from a licensed gun dealer. As a matter of fact a 2004 survey says that approximately 1/10 of prisoners bought their weapons from a licensed gun dealer [15]. There is also another problem with background checks. The criteria for stripping people of their 2nd Amendment are unfairly broad. They put pot growers, hubcap thieves, and guys who got into a bar fight 20 years ago in the same pile as violent predators. It's just absurd. With these problems it is no surprise that a 2000 study by criminologists Philip J. Cook and Jens Ludwig found no evidence that background checks had an impact on homicide rates [16]. Contention 3: More guns, less crime My third and final contention will be that more armed citizens there are the less crime there will generally be in any society, including the U.S. Guns prevent an estimated 2.5 million crimes a year or 6,849 every day. Often the gun is never fired and no blood (including the criminal’s) is shed [11]. A study found that 60% of convicted felons admitted that they avoided committing crimes when they knew the victim was armed. 40% of convicted felons admitted that they avoided committing crimes when they thought the victim might be armed[12]. In 1982, Kennesaw, GA passed a law requiring heads of households to keep at least one firearm in the house. The residential burglary rate dropped 89% the following year[13]. So, I think we can see that there is no real reason to suspect gun control will do any good good. It has failed in other parts of the world and here in the U.S. and the statistics prove this. However, there is one thing that my opponent mentioned that seems to be throne up every time there is a discussion about gun control, school shootings. Let's look at 2 more facts: 1. Most schools are 100% gun free zones. 2.Over an eight year period, instates without “right to carry” laws, there were 15 school shootings; however, in states that allow citizens to carry guns, there was only one [14], I will now await my opponent's response. Thank you. Sources [1]http://www.fbi.gov...... [2]Index of Crime by State, FBI Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) for 2000, p. 79, Table5 [3]Under the Gun, Wright, Rossi, Daly, University of Massachusetts, 1981 [4]http://www.nij.gov...... [5]http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu...... [6]http://www.law.harvard.edu...... [7]http://www.thetimes.co.uk...... [8]http://www.dailymail.co.uk...... [9]http://www.aic.gov.au...... [10]http://www.aic.gov.au...... [11]http://www.sfdph.org...... [12]http://www.saf.org...... [13]http://jthomasniu.org...... [14]http://www.thevrwc.org...... [15]http://books.google.com... [16]http://books.google.com...