Talk:Overview of gun laws by nation/Archive 3

message: http://www.ryerson.ca/SAFER-Net/regions/Europe/
This page seems to detail the gun politics of many european countries not listed on wikipedia.  I think some people should make articles for these countries listed.
:Consider creating an account and leaping in to help. --Petercorless 03:20, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Gun Politics in other European countries

message: The Gun control article is a POV fork, which is highly undesireable as it repeats all the same material as what is here without providing the balance that is here.  Presenting but one side of the gun politics debate is not balanced.  I vote we merge it with the Gun politics article.  Yaf 12:44, 16 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Reviewed previous vote, and as there hasn't been a new vote to split Gun politics and Gun control once more, have re-merged the two articles.  Yaf 03:33, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Gun control article

message: This is one of the most blatantly one-sided articles I have ever seen in Wikipedia, using words like "fascist", "communist", "racist", to describe gun controls! I've added a NPOV tag.83.71.16.216 23:36, 7 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes...and the part "Security against tyranny and invasion" has some serious lack of NPOV and outright false information (contrary to myth, gun control was by no means meaningful part of Nazi political agenda). Iraqi and Afghan civilians had plenty of firearms - that did not protect them from tyranny and invasion, did it? --Mikoyan21 23:58, 8 March 2006 (UTC)

text: The obvious reply is that the arguments don't have to make sense to you.  Our mission in the encyclopedia article is to document the debate.  It is sufficient if some significant portion of participants in this social debate make those claims about "Security against tyranny and invasion".  The truth of those claims must be decided outside of Wikipedia.  But if you really do believe that portions of this article violate our rules for maintaining a neutral point of view, I strongly urge you to fix it yourself.  Then politely defend your edits here if someone challenges them.  Rossami (talk) 14:30, 17 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Security against tyranny"? Isn't that a bit of a euphemism for "breaking the law" and/or "rebellion"? It's theft of the opposite argument. You can't really argue that people should have guns so that they can shoot cops. Carbon Copy Man 06:52, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Actually, lots of people do make that argument.  In fact, at various points in his career, Thomas Jefferson was a vocal advocate of the position that the government could not be trusted and that an armed populace was the appropriate control to prevent the police from overreaching.  Yes, that is a direct advocation for "rebellion" which is always interpreted as "breaking the law" by those in power.   Again, whether you or I believe in those arguments is irrelevant.  Our purpose in this article is to document the debate.  Rossami (talk) 21:36, 21 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Assertions in this article are lacking citation. I am of the mind to move a general "bull pit" of for-and-against debate on the issues to a sort of "Talking Points" page, so that this can actually remain articular content. --Petercorless 11:54, 30 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: NPOV tag

message: :Removed the following addition added today, as the claims don't add up or agree with each other. As there were roughly 55,000 soldiers killed in Viet Nam, this equates to making the claim that 27,500 Americans die of gun shots each year. Perhaps. Yet, only 9,390 to  11,348 actually occurred according to the same inserted text.  What happened to the other 15,000+?  Looks like some talking points from several pro-gun control websites were perhaps copied, without checking the validity of the numbers.  The whole addition is suspect.  Can someone straighten out what is fact and what is fiction? 
::In 1996, 2 people were murdered by handguns in New Zealand, 15 in Japan, 106 in Canada, 213 in Germany, and 9,390 in the United States. [FBI Uniform Crime Report] "Gun Facts" Guns kept in the home for self-protection are 43 times more likely to kill a family member or friend than to kill in self-defense. [ Kellermann and Reay, N.E. Journal of Medicine] Every two years, more Americans die of gunshot than there were American soldiers killed during the entire Vietnam War [National Center for Health Statistics, Department of Defense Almanac]. In homes with guns, a member of the household is almost three times as likely to be the victim of a homicide compared to gun-free homes. Kellermann AL, Rivara FP, et al. "Gun ownership as a risk factor for homicide in the home." NEJM 329:15 (1993):1084-1091. • In 2001, firearms were used to murder 6 people in New Zealand, 56 in Japan, 96 in Great Britain, 168 in Canada, and 331 in Germany United Nations Office of Drugs and Crime, The Eighth United Nations Survey on Crime Trends and the Operations of Criminal Justice Systems (2001-2002). In comparison, firearms were used to murder 11,348 in the United States WISQARS, Injury Mortality Reports. In 2003, there were only 163 justifiable homicides by private citizens using handguns in the United States FBI Uniform Crime Report, 2003, table 2.16, p. 24. In the US, "Somewhere around 0.8 to 2.0 million violent crimes are deterred each year because of gun ownership and use by civilians. In addition, another 1.5 to 2.5 million crimes are stopped by armed civilians. There may be some overlap in these two categories because of the ways in which the data are collected, but there are almost certainly some two to four million fewer completed crimes each year as the result of civilian gun ownership." Lawrence Southwick, Jr., "Guns and Justifiable Homicide: Deterrence and Defense", St. Louis University Public Law Review, Gun Control Symposium, vol 18, no. 1, 1999: 217 
:There are no doubt some good points here, but they need to be consistent and documented and verified before they get inserted into the article. Yaf 16:27, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I removed them for the reasons stated previously; they are not internally consistent with each other.  This leads to a suspicion that they are not actually "fact".  Whether or not I like the "facts" is not the issue.  Whether or not they are true, and verifiable and substantiated, though, is at issue.  Especially when they don't agree with one another.  This makes it hard to believe such "facts". Also, please sign your comments in discussions with 4 tilde's.  Thanks, Yaf 23:54, 18 March 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Problems with the article

message: I'm checking on the disambiguation of links to Age of consent. This is one of the articles that links to it. In this section, fourth paragraph...
"There is further controversy about courts trying and sentencing these mostly "young men" as adults despite them not having reached the age of consent. A significant number of the aforementioned deaths occur through suicide."
Forgive my ignorance of this argument, does the argument refer to the age of consent for sexual activity, the age of majority, the age of criminal responsibility or some other age milestone? I'll leave it up to those who understand the material to possibly pipe-disambig the link. Cheers! --Monotonehell 08:34, 20 May 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Age of consent link 

message: This is one of the few discussions I've ever seen on this subject anywhere where everything from both sides is discussed, linked to, and explained while still remaining neutral!  I applaud your efforts to present information as it is, to let readers decide. Kudos! Sln3412 07:23, 12 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Great article!

message: The article purports to provide an overview of gun control but most of the text is US specific. Perhaps phrasing could be modified to clarify that many of the arguments and statistics are US specific? (or additional text could be provided for other countries?). For example, there is a section titled "domestic violence" and this feels to me (please correct me if I'm wrong) that it should actually be titled "domestic violence in the USA". --mgaved 14:31, 31 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Too US specific

message: The Gun law article is pretty weak and need some serious cleanup. Would it be more efficient to merge it into this article? GuyFromChicago 13:48, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree.  Merge them.  While "gun law" in theory could cover slightly different content such as the specifics of actual statutes passed and the differences between them, in practice that would be inconsistent with our treatment of other laws.  Generally when we get to specific statutes, we cover each one in a specific article, each titled to match the law.  (Truth in Lending Act is an example.)  To the extent that we want an umbrella article, this seems like the better title to me.  If we really get enough independent content to talk about gun laws passed, we can always split the article back apart then.  Rossami (talk) 15:54, 1 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Merge Gun law to here 

message: The syntax and sheer size of the lists of arguments for and against gun control, the near-absence of any numbers in the stats section, and the simple fact that only one source is cited in that section drove me to mark this page as needing a cleanup.
See Wikipedia:Avoid weasel words & Wikipedia:Citing sources.  Also, consider breaking unreadably long lists up into multiple lists, moving them to their own article, or, preferably, summarizing them and wiping redundant entries. MrZaiustalk 20:14, 6 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Cleanup request 

message: I have copied the paragraph about Japan here because I think I needs some work:
Firearms-rights advocates also point to the fact that Japan had a long history of weapons ownership that was strictly limited to only the elite and their Samurai bodyguards. Peasants, without any access to arms, were at the mercy of powerful warlords. This common view is factually incorrect as much of elites were unarmed after 10th century and this prompted the advancement of samurai into the ruling class. Even samurai eventually disdained the use of their weapons to the point that brandishing their katana in public, regardless of the reason, was considered a crime and punishable by up to death if actually used. Asano Naganori whose death penalty is the cause for the event of Forty-seven Ronin merely injured Kira Yoshihisa with a possible intention of killing him. This would be a prison sentence or less in modern Japan and shows a view of samurai on using their weapon. Peasants were never completely disarmed and carried weapons including firearms for hunting and other purposes. Even today, shotguns and rifles can be owned in Japan provided that the owner has no criminal record and registers his weapon.
Rveth has made some additions about the history of Japan which I think could help the article.  The history supporting the argument needs to be accurate.  
1. This is in a section explaining the "Balance of power" argument of the possession of arms.  I think the bulk of what was added doesn't pertain to the "Balance of Power" section because the article is discussion the possession of arms, not the brandishing of them.  For a modern day example possessing vs brandishing, in the US it is a right that people can possess and frequently may carry arms, yet brandishing without solid cause is a crime.  The Balance of Power argument is that because the people possess arms other powers (govt or criminals) are less inclined to abuse their position.  Brandishing on the part of the people is not necessary.
2.  Simply because an elite personally does not possess or carry arms does not mean that they do not have access to them or people who have them, like their bodyguards.  Name any of the top govt leaders in the world, they may not personally own arms, but their bodyguards do.  In a balance of power argument, if the peasant is not allowed access to the same weapons, the elite will have an advantage of power of them.  I think it would be safe to say that in the history of Japan (the world) the elite enjoyed a power advantage over the peasant by their access to arms which was then translated into economic, political, etc. power.
Rearden9 15:09, 15 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sounds like you know enough to start making a good edit. Try to put in something more specific about gun ownership, especially as it changed during the 19th–20th centuries. There definitely were peasant teppo units. For example Nobunaga's use of teppo amongst his ashigaru. --Petercorless 07:55, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Japan 

message: As a Detroiter and a pistol owner I was rather surprised to read in this article that Detroit has "has a virtual prohibition on private handguns". I googled this statement and found the source, but no information to back it up. Michigan requires pistol registration and a permit to carry, however I was unable to find any indication Detroit had restrictions of its own. This hardly represents a prohibition in my opinion.
I didn't want to edit the article because 1) I'm not 100% certain of the facts and 2) I'm rather new to Wikipedia and don't know how an issue like this should be addressed. If anyone has any further information on the subject it would be greatly appreciated.Lamcglynn 14:48, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: You appear to be correct; the "virtual prohibition" appears to be, in actuality, mandatory sentences for conviction on illegal weapons charges. That whole point in the article is, not to be too POV, crap; between your point re detroit, the added note re the bizarre averaging of unlike numbers to "prove a point", and the deliberate ignoring of the fact that the bigger cities would be expected to have a bigger percentage of the nation's everything, nothing in that line can be salvaged. Gzuckier 15:39, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Oops, I restored it because in fact, that list is cited from the NCPA, so it shouldn't be selectively quoted, instead I (or somebody) will have to somehow add an addendum regarding its crapitude, without being POV. Gzuckier 15:51, 26 October 2006 (UTC)

text: They'll probably hand out stickers for the barrel saying "Point away from face before use". Gzuckier 19:18, 26 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Detriot Pistol Ban? 

message: If gun politics worldwide isn't merged within the next week or so, it should probably be AfD'd - nothing particularly useful in there. riana_dzasta 12:25, 24 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge notice

message: Under the arguments for gun control I found this bit:
Guns are inherently evil.
Is there a reference for this? Because I've honestly never encountered pro-gun control literature that actually argues this. Granted, the rhetoric can be intense, but I've never seen this actually put forward as a position by gun control advocates.
ManicParroT 01:06, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: That's silly.  I've removed it.  Anyone who can include a source (per WP:RS to the statement is welcome to add it back.   John Broughton  |  Talk 02:29, 3 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Guns are evil? 

message: With not even twice as many anti-gun-control links as pro-gun-control links, this article is clearly biased towards the pro-gun-control position. Surely there must be several more nutbars with badly written blogs, and single issue, single member organizations with high-falutin' names that we can link to. Otherwise we should just delete all the pro-gun-control links to ensure NPOV.Gzuckier 16:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Needs more pro-gun external links 

message: How does
:In 2002, 1,202 women were killed by their intimate partners, accounting for 30% of all murders of women and of that 1,202, 58% were killed by intimate partners using guns. WISQARS, Injury Mortality Reports
:In 2002, 700 women were killed by intimates using guns compared to 175 men. Bureau of Justice Statistics, Homicide Trends in the U.S.: Intimate Homicide
support in any way the assertion
:Of particular note is that in many of the latter cases, the victim firing in self-defense is frequently a woman or youth victim of a more physically powerful abuser. In those situations gun rights advocates argue that the firearm arguably becomes an equalizer against the lethal and disabling force frequently exercised by the abusers.
?  
*700 women killed by guns in domestic shooting
*502 women killed not by guns in domestic shooting
*175 men killed by guns in domestic shooting
You might as well suggest that 
*10,000 deer killed in car/deer collisions
*10,000 deer killed by hunters
*100 people killed in car/deer collsions
therefore, the automobile serves as an equalizer for the deer to protect themselves against people.Gzuckier 17:23, 5 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  but seriously folks 

message: So far it's more like bullet points. I'll get a start on this sometime soon, wouldn't mind some help. -- Pauric (talk-contributions) 19:42, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: A Very Brief History of Gun Control - Pardon the expression -- a first shot at it? Submitted for your approval. --Petercorless 08:31, 29 December 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  We should make this into an article 

message: Article by Cam Edwards from townhall.com 
A Wolf in Sheep's Clothing from Gunowners.org 
Fake Hunting Group Endorses
'Camouflage Candidate' —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Rydra Wong (talk • contribs) 06:56, 1 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  AHSA is not a pro-gun rights organization. 

message: I snipped the words "(although invalid)" from the history section. It was an ironically contradictory argument that made the sentence read that all reasons -- both for gun rights or gun controls were invalid -- i.e., all parties arguments are invalid. A hopefully-benign snip. --Petercorless 20:34, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Something has to be valid

message: Might we might split off the list of gun control and gun rights groups to separate pages. They add a foot or so of visual space at the bottom of the article. We could simply have pages: Gun Ownership Advocacy Groups or Gun Control Advocacy Groups. Please vote on a) the merit of the idea and b) what you would wish to call such pages. Links to them would remain on this page in the "See also" section at the bottom. --Petercorless 07:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I would strongly recommend instead that we slash both lists back to a very few well-chosen representative groups.  A comprehensive list is 1) impossible to develop or maintain and 2) inappropriate to an encyclopedia article.  Hiding the lists in a separate page does nothing to address either of those two problems.  (By the way, voting is evil.  Rossami (talk) 01:05, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed: Separate pages for groups? 

message: If we might have many pages related to Gun Control and Gun Rights, might we make a Gun Politics Template to put at the side or bottom of related pages? --Petercorless 07:42, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Proposed: Gun Politics Template?

message: As the header says.  WAY out of control.  First of all, we should not have external links when internal links exist for the same purpose.  For instance, there's no reason to link directly to the NRA website when we have National Rifle Association (which itself, of course, should link to the NRA website and does).  I think we should eliminate all the external links in favor of internal links, which will help cut down on the number of them and will also be in line with WP:EL.  A good list of articles can be found in Template:USgunorgs, I think we should start there.  That's a bit US-centric, of course, so we should also include links to, for starters Schweizerischer Schützenverein, National Rifle Association of the United Kingdom, and Sporting Shooters Association of Australia plus any other similar articles.  So what external links should be left?  I can see the use of the [www.packing.org] link, but are there any others that serve a legitimate informational purpose?  Mangojuicetalk 19:22, 18 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Since it's been about 2 weeks and no one has raised any objections, I've gone ahead and done this change.  If there are any more interational groups with articles they should be added.  (Actually, if the list grows much more, we might want to fork out an article List of gun organizations.) Mangojuicetalk 15:45, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Thank you for pruning the list.  I think you did a great job.  I suspect that the list will grow again.  When it does, we should prune it again, not create another "list of" page.  (On the other hand, if there are that many gun organizations with Wikipedia articles, perhaps that could be made a category and a link to the category added to this page.)  Again, thanks.  Rossami (talk) 16:09, 1 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: External Links way out of control

message: There is a statement in the article that the large percentage of gun ownership in Iraq didn't stop genocide, but I was under the impression that the oppressed groups, namely the Kurds, weren't allowed to own guns, with the exception of those who are serving in the military under compulsion. Could someone look for some sources on this?--LWF 03:20, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That comment was removed from the article for exactly that reason.  It keeps being added by an anonymous editor who has refused so far to explain or defend the edit.  I have (again) reverted the edit.  Rossami (talk) 12:47, 9 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Alright, so in the future if I see it I'll remove it.--LWF 13:43, 9 February 2007 (UTC)

text: I have (again) removed the reference to the Iraqi situation because the citation offered is 1) not a reliable source and 2) does not support the claims actually being made.  Your argument above is better and might actually support the claim except that the Dujail Massacre wasn't "genocide" (which is what the edit claimed).   Your concerns about the DC claim are only relevant if you can show that the DC homicide rate fell during those first ten years when the national average rose (or at least fell at a lower rate).  The claim made in the current version is a differential claim.  Just saying that DC's rate fell in the first 10 years is a data point without a control. It fails to allow for the probability that many other factors simultaneously affect homicide rates.  Rossami (talk) 15:55, 11 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: It is funny that you ask for controls only from others but dare suggest ridiculous comparisons which lack any and all justification and are pure and utter junk statistics as "differential claims". --84.61.118.44 15:23, 10 March 2007 (UTC)

text: And they served them quite well, didn't they? Much like the guns the Shiites had, legal or not. The suggestion that firearms ownership would help defend against oppression or genocide is a pretty good sign of living 200 years in the past. While Iraq shows it's perfectly possible to take down a helicopter with them, the question is "Can you take down enough of them?"  The answer is "No". Much like in the Warsaw Ghetto, all firearms can do in this day and age is annoy a prospective or current oppressor enough to decide it's time to quit playing games and call in artillery, air force etc. until the rubble stops shooting back. When faced with an army, fleeing and getting a tank of your own is the much more reasonable solution as grabbing the shotgun from over the chimney and playing the defender of the helpless. --84.61.118.44 15:23, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Iraqi Gun Ownership 

message: The section with US statistics by the National Center for Policy Analysis should be removed. It embodies everything that can be done with statistics to distort and lie. Comparing states or cities solely on the level of gun legislation and crime or violence rates and ignoring -for example- rural/urban composition is dishonest. This is epitomized by comparing DC, a single city, to the national rate, which contains plenty of sparsely settled rural area. The section is an embarassement since it completely lacks controls for confounding factors and underscores why I think tanks shouldn't be treated as reliable sources. They present data with a specific agenda, to advocate specific points, not on a pure fact-finding basis. --84.61.118.44 15:16, 10 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  NCPA statistics 

message: Instead of focusing on the right to own guns, perhaps it's better to focus on bullet control. http://www.google.com/search?q=bullet+control&rls=com.microsoft:en-us&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&startIndex=&startPage=1 —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 141.213.198.142 (talk) 17:37, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Regulation on Bullet Possession 

message: Since this is the talk page, I feel that in this statement, I am not required to be NPOV. There seems to be such an enormous amount of NPOV rubbish included in the article that for something such as a research paper etc, this article has been rendered worthless by people arguing 'their' sides of the whole debate instead of trying to keep it Encyclopedic.
I have to concur, this is among the worst I have seen; it already starts with the assertion that gun politics is about whether a government "has valid authority to impose regulations on guns". A very POV and pro-gun way of framing the article. Other examples include the inane argument that if the United Kingdom, Canada, and Australia  would "...become totalitarian, however (and there are historical examples of democratic governments becoming totalitarian), their people would be unable to resist the new form of government in any way." Beyond far-fetched and besides, there are also ways of overthrowing governments that do not involve fire-arms, such as we have seen in Serbia, Georgia and the Ukraine quite recently. 146.50.209.116 01:30, 19 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Worthless article

message: Gun violence (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_violence) & Gun crime (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_crime) both need to be merged, firstly with each other, then perhaps with this article. Gun crime needs rewriting also, but the article Gun violence gives the data to do this. Unfortunately I don't have the time so perhaps someone could help do this? Thanks. Singhyuk 00:28, 21 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Request to merge in 2 articles

message: There needs to be an article Gun politics in Japan. FoxNews tonight reported that Japan has tightened its gun laws, as gang shootings are up, especially in light of the murder of Nagasaki's mayor, and that 2/3 of shootings last year were gang-related. Chris 08:38, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Japan