Legend writes:
Yet, you refuse or are unable to answer it! How can you limit guns without criminalising their possession/ownership?
What? Are you telling me that you can’t think of
[italics]any[/italics] way to limit guns without criminalizing their possession? You seriously can’t be honest with yourself and answer your own question?
The sad thing is that I laid out a clue for how you could do so and you couldn’t even take the time to comprehend what I wrote. You’re obviously being deliberately obtuse.
But, ok. Here is my quote regarding how a State might limit guns without criminalizing their possession that you couldn’t understand:
It’s akin to asking me how I am going to set speed limits without making it illegal for any speed.
Taking guns off the street, with buy-back programs such as Australia’s program; regulation of gun possession (which can run the gamut of criminalizing possession of automatic weapons or seriously restricting their possession to collectors who would submit to extensive background checks, to waiting periods and instructional requirements for those who desire to buy a gun), strong enforcement of laws regarding gun use and possession, etc.
There are laws and regulations on who can drive as well as how fast you can drive. Is it such a leap of the imagination to imagine a similar scenario for gun control? Give me a break!
Legend writes:
I'm claiming that gun laws, at least in the UK, haven't achieved their objective, which was to reduce gun crime. Even accounting for an increasing population, gun crime's still going up. Gun control laws have demonstrably failed.
Gun control laws only purpose isn’t to decrease gun crime. It is also designed to keep such crimes to a lower level, because it is harder for those types of crimes to be enacted. There is a reason that murders involving firearms in the United Kingdom is significantly lower than those States who don’t have such laws.
You also claimed that Gun control laws would increase the number of burglaries and by extension all crime:
Legend writes:
Most crime is opportunistic and the probability of resistance, especially armed, will deter most burglars or muggers.
If that was true, then why have burglaries decreased? If your argument was true then such crimes would keep rising over time and that plainly hasn’t happened. And yet I and possibly others have shown you statistics that crime has declined in States who have strong gun control laws. At least be honest about it.
Legend writes:
I'm attributing this to a number of other factors that affect burglary, like the drop in unemployment (last year excepted) and the rise in house alarms sales. The thing is you can't really make much of looking at any one's country's burglary rates, unless you take those other factors into consideration.
Factors such as employment are included. It makes sense that an increase in employment would decrease the crime rate and vice versa. Low employment is definitely factored into why crime increases. Do you actually READ the reports?
You are the one that is making the argument that burglaries would increase with strengthened gun control laws. So it seems you agree that there are other factors besides gun control laws that might effect burglary rates?
Legend writes:
I'm looking at two countries (Uk/Us) that have similar cultural values and socio-political structure and I see that in the US -where many people carry guns and have the right to use them in defense- there are proportionatelly much fewer burglaries than in the UK.
Why don’t you include Scotland? Australia? Canada?
BCS Survey writes:
The number of domestic burglaries in England and Wales as measured by the BCS showed no statistically significant change between 2005/06 and 2006/07. Since 1995 the number of domestic burglaries estimated by the BCS has fallen by 59 per cent from 1,770,000 to 726,000 in the 2006/07.
Why do you exclude Scotland? I would consider Scotland a much closer ‘fit’ to the United States as concerns your ‘Socio-political’ argument. And yet, even though they strengthened their gun control laws we see that gun crime decreased. Hmmm.
This was the first year since 1998 that a steep four-year increase in ‘gun crime’ in England and Wales came to an end (by contrast, in the same four-year period, Scotland saw a marked decline in ‘gun crime’).
Contrasting with trends in England and Wales, Scotland (Figure 2) saw a marked decline (of almost 80 per cent) in crime involving handguns in the five years after the Dunblane shootings and the Firearms (Amendment) No. 1 and No. 2 Acts of 1997. Crime involving shotguns fell sharply after 1994. Overall, there was a sustained fall in ‘gun crime’ in the ten years to 2001.
When you present your argument, do you ask yourself how the statistics were compiled? What effect does including ‘imitation handguns’ have on the statistics? Hmm.
The number of police recorded offences involving firearms fell by 17%
between 2007/08 and 2008/09. Firearm offences resulting in injury also fell
(down by 46% in 2008/09) due to a large reduction in the use of imitation
weapons (down 41%) and a corresponding fall in slight injuries. There was a
small rise in the use of shotguns and handguns (both up 2%).
BCS survey 2008/9
In 1988 handgun offences climbed steeply for five years, a trend coinciding with the appearance on the UK market of a number of realistic (often plastic) imitation handguns (Taylor and Hornsby, 2000; Squires, 2000). Handgun offences peaked in 1993 at around 4,200, falling back by almost a third over the next three years. In the immediate aftermath of the Dunblane shooting tragedy (13 March 1996), and while the British gun control debate raged, crime involving handguns fell further to 1998 (when the post-Dunblane handgun ban became law) before rising sharply in England and Wales (but not Scotland) for the next four years (see Figure 1).
the contribution of a wide range of ‘unorthodox’ firearms types (imitation handguns, converted imitation handguns, reactivated firearms, converted air pistols, BB gun/airsoft weapons, deactivated firearms, blank firers, converted and unconverted blank-firing starting pistols, CS gas and pepper sprays) to the ‘gun crime’ statistics has become increasingly apparent. For example, in 2006—2007, handguns, shotguns and rifles comprised 26 per cent of the firearms offences recorded by the police, suggesting that the remaining 74 per cent was comprised of the complex array of types mentioned above (Kaiza, 2008: 48). In one sense, this suggests a form of ‘weapon displacement’ occurring. None of the ‘alternative weapons’ mentioned were affected by the Firearms (Amendment) Acts of 1997, some remaining largely unregulated until the 2006 VCRA.
'Gun crime' A review of evidence and policy, Professor Peter Squires with Dr Roger Grimshaw and Enver Solomon (June 2008), Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, King's College London
Holy imitation weapons batman! All our opponent has is hyperbole!
We also see that because of changes in reporting procedures and standards, this can impact the number of crimes recorded and create statistical ‘increases’.
More specifically, the implementation of the National Crime Recording Standard (NCRS) by police forces on 1 April 2002 increased the number of crimes recorded in 2002—2003, and further ‘improvements’ in recording practices resulted in statistical increases in the following two years also. The Home Office states that it has not been possible to assess accurately the effect of this change on recorded firearms crimes but notes: (a) the change inflated the overall number of violence against the person and criminal damage offences (while having less effect on the number of robberies); and (b) many firearm offences are amongst the categories, such as criminal damage involving an airgun, that are most likely to have been affected by the NCRS (Coleman et al., 2007: 32).
If we dig deeper we see another ‘subtle’ reason for having strong gun control laws.
only 3 per cent of recorded gun crimes result in serious (or fatal) injuries.
However, the overall downward trend [of serious injuries from the use of firearms] may suggest a number of things, including, given that the majority of these injuries represent only slight injuries, the diminishing relative lethality of the illegal firearm stock in England and Wales or, for whatever reason, a growing reluctance of those using them to risk causing serious injuries or death.
It is worth noting at this point that firearm homicides only represent around half of all deaths caused by firearms. Home Office statistics show that there were 1872 deaths from firearms injuries in the UK in 2003 compared to only 81 firearms homicides in England and Wales in 2002—2003. In England and Wales in 2001, there were 111 suicides by firearms compared with 97 homicides in 2001—2002. Cukier and Sidel (2006) provide some international comparative data on firearms and suicide revealing that, in all
countries with reasonably reliable data, firearm suicides exceed firearm homicides
(Figure 6). They show that this strengthens the gun controllers’ argument that countries where firearms are more readily available to civilian populations have significantly higher rates of overall firearm-involved homicide (a pattern which is perhaps less obvious when suicides are excluded).
Figure 6: International firearm homicides and suicides Source: Cukier and Sidel, 2006
Deaths per 100,000 Homicide Suicide Accident
USA (2001) 3.98 5.92 0.36
Italy (1997) 0.81 1.1 0.07
Switzerland (1998) 0.50 5.8 0.10
Canada (2002) 0.4 2.0 0.04
Finland (2003) 0.35 4.45 0.10
Australia (2001) 0.24 1.34 0.10
France (2001) 0.21 3.4 0.49
England/Wales (2002)0.15 0.2 0.03
Gun control laws might be able to decrease the number of crimes committed with guns but there are other influences to those statistics. Unemployment and other social ills impact the crime rate. If people feel they have no other avenue to financial stability, one approach might be a criminal one.
The Jill Dando Institute review of research found that ‘gun crime appears highest in areas with far higher than average levels of deprivation and unemployment’ (Marshall, Webb and Tilley, 2005: 13).
In this context, the evidence of the Trident unit noted: ‘Much of Trident gun crime is,
unsurprisingly, linked to the poorer London Boroughs, areas of deprivation, high ethnic
minority population and high unemployment’ (HAC, 2007).
The researchers comment that the underlying explanation for this relationship is that
participants in illegal drug markets have no recourse to conventional risk management
strategies such as legally enforceable contracts, calling the police or purchasing insurance (ibid: 65)
'Gun crime' A review of evidence and policy, Professor Peter Squires with Dr Roger Grimshaw and Enver Solomon (June 2008), Centre for Crime and Justice Studies, King's College London
Legend writes:
without seeing the full report is difficult to judge this comment. Are they talking about burglaries committed under the influence? If yes, it's natural that the perpetrators wouldn't consider risk to themselves, as they wouldn't in any other aspect of their life if they're drunk or drugged up.
I fixed the links and provided references. Perhaps you could take the time to read them?
Legend writes:
However, these kind of burglaries only account for some of the figures. Rationally thinking burglars would be deterred by the possibility of armed resistance and Wright and Decker (1994) support this view.
Without being able to read their report your statement is plainly suspect, though I did provide YOU with an overview of the book by Amazon here:
DBlevins writes:
The authors, two criminologists and a social ecologist, contextualize the behavior within the street culture and conclude that most burglars burgle in order to support drugs or alcohol and rarely consider the risk or threat of sanctions.
While I can surely agree that without providing a link to the report you can’t provide it as evidence, I think you’re conclusion is suspect based on this overview. It says, ..most burglars burgle to support drugs or alcohol and RARELY CONSIDER THE RISK
DBlevins writes:
Our findings suggest that the use of violence against offenders could reduce crime, but the extent of such reduction remains opaque. Increasing crime's harm, and the knowledge of it, may have limited effects on offenders who believe they are immune to harmful consequences; these people may have "stickier" perceptions that require considerable contradiction before they change. Moreover, if these offenders believe that most crime victims will use violence, they may be more likely to use preemptive violence, thereby increasing victim costs.
Legend writes:
Again, without knowing the context of this quote it's difficult to comment. I presume that they're talking about crime in general not burglary specifically. If they're talking about burglary specifically then I seriously dispute the last sentence.
How can you dispute something you haven’t even taken the time to read! You’re being seriously disingenuous. You don’t know the context? I provided you with the reference and the tool I used to find it and you still can’t figure it out? My opinion of your reading comprehension is rapidly declining.
Let me help you out Danger and the Decision to Offend, Bill McCarthy, John Hagan, Social Forces. Chapel Hill: Mar 2005. Vol. 83, Iss. 3; pg. 1065, 32 pgs
Found using ProQuest.
Legend writes:
Police activity is already discouraged in Britain, so this is a moot point.
You’re projecting. Where is the reference to back that up besides your say-so?
Legend writes:
Gun crime in the UK has increased from approx 5.2 (thousands) in 1998 to approx 9.4 in 2006. That's a nearly 80% rise! Population in the same interval has risen from 58.5 milion to 60.5, a rise of 3.4%. So it's fair to say that the rise in gun crime is statistically significant. And that's despite continuous tightening of gun legislation to the point where ordinary citizens are prohibited from owning any type of firearm.
Did you just pick out what you thought would support your argument and disregard all else? The sad thing is that even doing that you failed to actually look into why gun crime statistics might have increased.
Edited by DBlevins, : No reason given.
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