Gun Control

Great stuff here TrueScotsman, I can't wait to get started with the rebuttals! So without further adieu... In your first point you have fairly stated your belief that ownership of guns do not make a nation safer and have corroborated these views with an AJMD study. I will use information from the same report along with another study recently done by Harvard journal of law & public policy to refute your findings. Taking your data at face value is compelling indeed, however, an examination the study's controls tell a completely different story. Since the study attempts to show a strong correlation between gun deaths and gun ownership it is important to understand how gun deaths are defined therein. As it turns out, it's done in a very misleading way! The report includes EVERY SINGLE type of death that can occur with firearms. This means police shootings & justifiable homicides are being painted in such a way as to lead one to believe they are an indication of less safety. The hypocrisy in this is so thick that I fear it tarnishes the reputation of the entire report, and yet this isn't even the only inconsistency! The report also includes suicides (which account for a 2/3's majority of yearly gun deaths in the US) but says nothing in regards to a suicidal person's tendency to kill themselves, regardless of accessibility to a gun. I have included a report that concludes there is no reason to believe a lack of guns correlates to a reduction in suicide. Incidentally, it also directly refutes the concept that more guns correlates to more murder. http://www.law.harvard.edu... Furthermore, your example is built upon an assumption (that you did not offer references for) that the gun deaths cited in this report are some how a better indicator of gun safety than general crime rates. In this assumption, it also fails to note total murder rates in each of these countries, which is of critical importance because who cares if a gun murder rate is low if you have a regular murder rate that's through the roof! Per your report, only 6 countries on your list have crime rates lower than the US and none of them have higher "mental illness burdens". So while the UK might have fewer gun deaths that's only achieved at the cost of a crime rate that's more than twice the US' and with 33% less crazies to deal with. If those factors are not of critical importance in a study regarding gun safety then I submit that you must offer specific evidence to bluster this view. Moving on to your 2nd point; That the woeful amount of gun deaths in this country offer further evidence towards the need for more gun control. To be fair, I think this is an extension along the same lines as the last point with a slightly more graphic, emotion invoking tone. So I will only expand on this slightly, perhaps, with some emotion of my own..... The FBI crime report below indicates violent crimes across the US are on a nearly uninterrupted decline through the past decade, all while gun laws have arguably only become more relaxed and gun makers have reported record sales. In the face of such evidence, particularly in a society with so many miscreants, It hardly seems possible that guns are the main cause of those deaths. More importantly though....Individual gun ownership is a proud tradition and a defined individual freedom in America. As Americans we acknowledge that our freedoms will often be abused by the corrupt and immoral leeches of our society. However, in this, we also understand the importance of those freedoms and the reasons they were so closely guarded by our forbears. If you do not believe there are millions of patriots that feel freedom is worth dying for, then I suggest, as comparison to your figure, you talley the total number of Americans that have fought and died in order to defend it. http://www.rightoncrime.com... Thanks, and back to you sir