From: nguyenpd@ntmtv.UUCP (Phat Nguyen)
Subject: A Japanese Student Kill in Lousiana (AKA Gun Control)
Originator: nguyenpd@nmtvs315
Reply-To: nguyenpd@ntmtv.UUCP (Phat Nguyen)
Organization: Northern Telecom Inc, Mountain View, CA
Distribution: usa
Date: Thu, 19 Nov 1992 20:32:37 GMT

In article <1992Nov13.230737.13329@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU> andy@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman) writes:
>> Nguyen is talking through his hat again, because the groups listed
>> haven't done the work he claims to be referring to.  That explains why
>> his results don't agree with the relevant work that has been done;
>> he's making it up.
>>
>> Nguyen's "profile", which he made up, does tell about his bigotry.

I find it quite funny when you say this.  It only shows your true
character.  Trying to guess other people's character based on your
character -- An old trick that doesn't work anymore.  Because
not everyone is dishonest as you are.

Am I making up the data?? or ARE YOU MAKING IT UP??  

Am I talking through my hat?? or ARE YOU TALKING THROUGH YOUR HAT??

Here are my sources:

(Note:  All articles below are quoted without prior written
permission of the publisher)

See table 2.38 on page 109 of Sourcebook, Criminal Justice
Statistics - 1986, published by U.S. Department of Justice,
Bureau of Justice Statistics.  The research is done by
the National Opinion Research Center and were made available
through the Roper Public Opinion Research Center.  Here is the
table that shows the relationship between owning gun and the
owner's education:

Question:  "Do you happen to have in your home (or garage)
any guns or revolvers?"

If yes, "Do any of these guns personally belong to you?"

(percent reporting owning guns)

National                1980     1982      1984        1985 
----------------------------------------------------------

Sex
Male                     52       48        46          50
Female                   11       14        11          12

Education
College                  25       26        24          26
High School              29       30        27          31
Grade School             36       29        28          32

Occupation
Professional/business    29       28        24          28
Clerical                 15       16        14          16
Manual                   35       34        32          36
Farmer                   69       73        81          73


The message is here clear:  The low percentage in Clerical
makes sense to me because women dominated in clerical fields.
Anyway the message here is clear: less education = more likely
to own guns.  

On page 106 of Sourcebook, Criminal Justice
Statistics - 1985, published by U.S. Department of Justice,
Bureau of Justice Statistics.  The research is done by 
The Gallup Report, Report No.237 (June 1985).  49 percent
of the people whose income is above $50,000 said that
they owned a gun whereas 54 percent whose income is
from $25,000 to $34,999 said yes.

See figure 2.11 on page 299 of Sourcebook, Criminal Justice
Statistics - 1979, published by U.S. Department of Justice,
Bureau of Justice Statistics.  The research is done by 
Cambridge Reports, Inc., "An Analysis of Public Attitudes
Toward Handgun Control."  Here is the table that 
shows the relationship between owning a gun and the owner's
reason for doing so:

Question:  Why did that person in your household buy a handgun
or pistol?  (The following question was asked only of
respondents with a handgun or pistol owner in the immediate
household)

(percent)

Protection:                      43%
Target Practice:                 9%
Hunting:                         8%
Employment:                      8%
Sport:                           6% 
Collecting:                      5%
Was a gift:                      5%
For fun:                         4%
Always had one:                  3%
Other:                           7%
Don't know:                      3%


Here we can see that most people buy guns for protection and
not for recreation for sure.

On page 80-97 in "Victimization and the Fear of Crime,"  Journal
of Research in Crime and Delinquency, James Garofalo found that
fear steadily increases as income decreases.  

On page 305 in "The Samurai, The Mountie, and the Cowboy,"
published by Prometheus Books, David Kopel -- an environmental
lawyer and technical consultant to the International Wound Ballistics
Association writes based on the studies:

....  The typical American firearms owner is a rural or smalltown 
Protestant male.

....  As a National Institute of Justice report explained, gun
values are best typed as rural rather than urban.

David Kopel's is further supported by:

1. James Wright, Peter Rossi, and Kathleen Daly, Under the Gun:
Weapons, Crime and Violence in America, Hawthorne, N.Y: Aldine,
1983, p.109.

2. Young, "The Protestant Heritage and the Sport of Gun Ownership,"
Journal of Scientific Study of Religion 28 (1989), p.307.

So, you say that a "rural and smalltown Protestant male"
are slightly "more educated" and "slightly more wealthy."  Am
I hard of hearing or what??  If you insist that a "rural and
small town Protestant male" is slightly more "educated" and 
slightly more "wealthy" than the average, then I have nothing
to say because statistical data point tell me a different
story.  From the statistics that I have obtained from the 
Bureau of Census and U.S Department of Education and U.S Department
of Health and Human Services.  Rural Americans are now a new 
underclass in America.  In 1990, they ranked almost at the bottom in
term of education and income.  They only surpassed inner-city
ghetto and recent immigrants from third world countries.
That is not a cause for celebration nor it is a cause for you
to hypothesize that they are slightly "more educated" and
slightly "more wealthy."  Go out there and do some research
instead of sitting in front of your computer and "hypothesize"
that: 

>> Since 50% of US households have guns, it is hard for gun owners to be
>> very different from US averages, but they are slightly more educated
>> than average and slightly more wealthy. 
>>

Your source is invalid because it doesn't answer the questions
that the readers want to know.  Who is Wright and what are HIS 
CREDENTIALS?  Who publishes the book?  And on what pages and
in what chapters did the author mention the arguments that you
present??  When you quote something, you have to give the readers
some kind of authenticity that come with it.  Otherwise this is
another classic case of trying to give oneself some sense of authority
by using another people's work without even saying what exactly does
the author say -- another type of plagiarism.  One vaguely referenced
book doesn't convince anyone.  

I have become quite skeptical when someone gives me some kind of 
arguments with the source that is vaguely referenced.  This gives no 
sense to the readers that the source is indeed valid because they 
cannot check it out themselves.  

>> He still hasn't figured out that disarming non-criminals has no social
>> value and has significant social costs (because disarming
>> non-criminals interferes with their self-defense).  Then again, he
>> also hasn't figured out that the economic value of guns to criminals
>> pretty much ensures that we can't disarm them through supply-side
>> measures.

>> Nguyen is talking through his hat again, because the groups listed

Your source simply doesn't convince anyone when you don't even
say what the author actually says in his book and it is not clearly
referenced.  This illustrates that you haven't done your homework right.
The sources that I use above are some of the 153 sources that
I have obtained while doing my research paper on gun control
back in my college days.  If I know that you like statistics this
much, I would use it in the beginning.  Even though it is by no means
complete, it is still better than -- your only one source -- which you 
don't even quote it right.

Do you want me to quote the gun control laws in New York and neigboring
states??   I have around 4 dozen sources on this.  All of them 
have been highlighted.  All I need is a volunteer typist.

By the way, I don't remember that Wright said that:

>> Since 50% of US households have guns, it is hard for gun owners to be
>> very different from US averages, but they are slightly more educated
>> than average and slightly more wealthy. 

even though I use quite a few of his works.  I believe that you are
making this up.

P.S.:  That's the end of the discussion.  I would rather spend my
lunch time doing something more useful than arguing with someone
who can offer nothing more than a falsely quoted and vaguely
referenced source to the readers.  To conclude this topic, I 
will quote Lindblom and Cohen's thoughts through James Lindgren
and Franklin E. ZimRing's words in [Encyclopedia of Crime and Justice,
page 837] which say "....  yet statistics do not answer most important
policy questions.  Common sense and ordinary reasoning are also 
necessary."  I am sadly sorry to say this; but it seems to me that 
YOU HAVE NONE of the statistics and the common sense.