Subject:
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Re: Handgun Death Rate
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Wed, 18 Jul 2001 15:32:22 GMT
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Viewed:
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502 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Bill Farkas writes:
> In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Bruce Schlickbernd writes:
> >
> > Kind of like the old west, eh? Oh wait, that was called the Wild West for a
> > reason.
> >
> > You'd even more people shooting each other for trivial reasons than they do
> > now. God only knows the carnage that would happen on the freeways.
> >
> > I mean in excess of the current car-nage. :-)
>
> Let's be realistic here: there is no *carnage*! I don't even agree that we
> have a "gun problem". The fact is - *less than* ONE PERCENT of firearms are
> used illegally! Doesn't sound like much of a problem to me.
I think you missed the path of the discussion - my comment was based on an
earlier one that said everything would be peaceful and wonderful if
*EVERYONE* walked around with a gun.
Now, as to your statement, I take it you have never had a gun pointed at you
(Smith and Wesson, .38 with a six inch barrel). Or, like my wife, who had a
cousin shot and killed.
Percentages are meaningless if there are 10 million handguns - 100,000 being
*reported* used illegally (think of all the morons firing live rounds on
July 4th) as a sizeable number.
>
> There are over 200 million guns in the hands of private citizens.
Egads! You don't think a million-odd guns used illegally is a problem!?!
> There are
> more than one million incidents of defensives uses of firearms to prevent
> violent crimes. 30,000 deaths, while regrettable, is hardly carnage -
> considering the largest percentage of those deaths are self inflicted. How
> many suicides are committed without guns? As I noted elsewhere, the "under
> 21" figure includes police shootings of juvenile offenders. So,
> realistically, the actual number is more like 15,000 gun deaths. 200 million
> guns and only 15,000 deaths - c'mon?!
Like I said, you missed the discussion thread, so none of the above applies
to my comments.
> > Bruce
>
>
> January 1997 "Journal of Legal Studies" showed that concealed-carry weapons
> permits reduced crime rates.
>
> Switzerland, New Zealand, Finland, and Israel have high gun-ownership rates
> and low crime rates.
Isreal has a low crime rate!?! The body count hits the front page on a
daily basis.
The purpose of these is not for anti-crime (well, not sure about New
Zealand) but for invasion preparation. All are small population countries
that turn out a large proportion for military duty, with the rather large
difference that they are trained and these are military weapons, not
handguns, and they are not walking about with them.
>
> The banning of guns in the UK was a direct reaction to the tragedy of
> Dunblane, the act of a deranged person, not a cool, calculating criminal.
I'm sorry, but I'm not familiar with what you are refering to - handguns in
the UK have been rare for a very long time.
> You don't need guns to kill lots of people anyway, take a look at Rwanda,
> 800,000 people hacked to death in 100 days, a figure unmatched even by the
> Nazis.
This misses the point entirely - you can't walk around with a sword as it
is, and in fact illustrates the opposite point (a deadly weapon is a deadly
weapon is a deadly weapon....).
Bruce
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Message has 2 Replies:
 | | Re: Handgun Death Rate
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| (...) I don't. Because "used illegally" is a misnomer. When I was a teen, I knew kids (several) who carried guns daily. Those were all guns used illegally. And none of them were a problem. The problem only comes from people committing other crimes (...) (23 years ago, 18-Jul-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
| | | Re: Handgun Death Rate
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| (...) You're right, I did miss most of the thread. A thousand pardons Sahib! But I did see that comment by Chris. I was reacting to the word carnage in my comments above. Although, I do think the world would be safer if more responsible citizens (...) (23 years ago, 19-Jul-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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Message is in Reply To:
| | Re: Handgun Death Rate
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| (...) Let's be realistic here: there is no *carnage*! I don't even agree that we have a "gun problem". The fact is - *less than* ONE PERCENT of firearms are used illegally! Doesn't sound like much of a problem to me. There are over 200 million guns (...) (23 years ago, 18-Jul-01, to lugnet.off-topic.debate)
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