Gun Control; Does it really stop crime

Thanks for starting this debate, this is something pretty important to me and I would be glad to debate it with you. TL;DR: Gun control stops crime, evidenced by a scientific consensus. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Quotes (conclusions from papers, just for impact): "Rather than confer protection, guns kept in the home are associated with an increase in the risk of homicide by a family member or intimate acquaintance." (Kellermann et. al. 1993) "Having a gun at home is a risk factor for adults to be shot fatally (gun homicide) or commit suicide with a firearm." (Wiebe et. al. 2003) "Guns kept in homes are more likely to be involved in a fatal or nonfatal accidental shooting, criminal assault, or suicide attempt than to be used to injure or kill in self-defense." (Kellermann et. al. 1994) "Stricter gun laws, specifically those requiring universal background checks for firearm and ammunition purchase, are associated with lower state-level firearm-related pediatric mortality rates." (Patel et. al. 2017) _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Scientific papers: https://www.nejm.org... (Kellermann et. al.) SUMMARY: Guns in the home result in 1.6x homicide odds and 5.8x suicide odds, with guns that were kept loaded resulting in 2.7x homicide odds and 9.2x suicide odds. Keeping the gun for self-defense did not lower these odds. SUPPORTED BY: https://www.annemergmed.com...(03)00256-7/abstract?code=ymem-site (Wiebe et. al.) in 2003. Another Kellermann study in 1998 (after which the NRA called the CDC a "cesspool of junk science" and lobbied for the firing of its gun research staff) showed that for each legally justifiable shooting, there were four unintentional shootings, seven criminal homicides, and eleven suicides. AKA for each time that a gun "stopped crime", there were twenty-two times that it was used for crime. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov... Another study on a more specific group (children, for which guns are *gasp* the second-leading cause of death), showed that there was a strong correlation between stricter gun laws (assessed by a scale) and pedriatric mortality from guns. Much of this came from three distinct options, "universal background checks for firearm purchase, ammunition background checks, and identification requirement for purchasing firearms". https://www.annemergmed.com... is the graph https://www.annemergmed.com...(17)31114-9/fulltext?code=ymem-site is the abstract/conclusions. This is a mere 10% of the papers I've read saying that basically "moar guns = bad". A few outliers say there is no correlation. Look at the evidence and decide for yourself. _______________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Responding to your argument: "Crime will still be the same, but just with another type of weapon" Machine guns are universally banned in the U.S, and there are no gangs going around with Thompsons or BARs shooting everyone. Sure, crime kept going with other guns, but no longer with so much killing power (they were called "trench brooms" for sweeping soldiers out of trenches). No one's going to ban guns (at least not in the U.S.) but we CAN make sure that they don't get into the hands of criminals, minors, and mentally unstable people. Maybe they will try and come for me with a knife, or a bomb. Heck, I want to see a mass murderer try and kill dozens in minutes with a butter knife. Why are we making it so f*cking easy for someone to murder others? Yes, gun control stops crime! A final graph to drive home my point: https://www.statista.com..., a graph of murders by weapons. Firearms make up the top two categories. Respectfully, JSC