From: ataylor@nmsu.edu (Nosy)
Subject: Re: What Problem Is Supposed To Be Solved, Here? (Was: Dressed for Rape)
Organization: NMSU Computer Science
	<ATAYLOR.93Jan5133412@gauss.nmsu.edu> <9301061141.17@rmkhome.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 7 Jan 1993 20:37:42 GMT

<In article <9301061141.17@rmkhome.UUCP> rmk@rmkhome.UUCP (Rick Kelly) writes:
<   In article <ATAYLOR.93Jan5133412@gauss.nmsu.edu> ataylor@nmsu.edu (Nosy) writes:
<   >	Maybe she reads the newspapers and is aware that violent
<   >	attack isn't as rare in Massachusetts as it was 40 years
<   >	ago?

<   And according to the newspapers, specifically the Boston Globe and the
<   Middlesex News, the state attorney general's office has released statistics
<   that show that women are more in danger from being killed by husbands and
<   boyfriends than any other circumstance.  

	Such statistics are often cited by those who know little
	about the subject; this includes attorney generals and 
	police officers.

	"Proof" by "appeal to authority" is a well known fallacy;
	Kelly is demonstrating that fallacy.

<This statistic must be fairly
<accurate if the police chief's association of Massachusetts has publicly,
<in print, stated that they are willing to be lenient about giving gun
<permits to women who have domestic violence related court orders in effect.

	Why? It probably derives from an incorrect reading of
	the FBI Uniform Crime Statistics (UCR), which for the last
	10 years has reported that around 50% of persons murdered
	are killed by an "acquaintance", i.e. someone they know.

	However, "someone they know" includes gangland hits,
	old women being beaten for their Social Security checks
	by neighborhood thugs, shopkeepers being stuck up by
	neighborhood hoodlums and so forth....but the gun-
	grabbers brush the latter part under the rug and claim
	that "someone known by the victim" only means friends
	and relatives.
	
	See "Under the Gun" by Wright and Rossi for details.

	Suffice to say, it is hardly unusual or unheard of for
	police, government officials and even newspapers to
	promote out and out *lies* on the subject of firearms
	ownership. Kelly has simply reproduced one of the more
	common lies....

<>	Perhaps the police could arrest persons accused of committing
<>	criminal acts *after* the act has occurred?
<>
<>	Does this concept seem too radical for Kelly?

<It doesn't help murder victims very much.

	What would Kelly prefer? Should we lock up anyone who
	*might* kill? There is, or used to be, the concept
	that persons are *innocent* until they are *proven*
	guilty. Kelly doesn't seem to like that concept, however;
	perhaps Kelly is a volunteer in the "War on Drugs"?


<   >	So, to answer the question: you don't, because people
<   >	with criminal records generally do not buy their firearms
<   >	from licensed dealers, they obtain them by other means.

<   Because under most states laws they can't.

	Which is certainly a ringing endorsement for more laws,
	now isn't it?

	"Criminals don't obey the laws we have, we'd better pass
	 some more laws so those bad people will start obeying
	 the law".

	Right. More of the same failure, that's what we need.


<   ><   And if you believe the recently published statistics, you wife is in
<   ><   the greatest amount of danger from you, and my SO is in the greatest
<   ><   amount of danger from me.
<   >
<   >	Which statistics would those be, please, and where were they
<   >	published?

<   See above.

	Said statistics are most likely no more than a propagandistic
	misinterpretation of the UCR's for the specific goal of
	feeding the anti-gun message to the public yet again.

	They certainly aren't accurate, nor do they match up
	with studies performed by the FBI and criminologists.

<   >	"If it's in the newspaper, it must be true!"
<   >					----Dudley DoRight of the Mounties

<   Obviously, from your point of view, there are no murders or crimes, since
<   they publish news of them in the newspaper.
 
	Obviously from Kelly's point of view, if it isn't reported in
	a newspaper it didn't happen.

	
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