guns

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amicrazy

Well-Known Member
#2
i'm on the fence. i have gone to a shooting range many times, often with cuts down my arms. the guys behind the counter constantly try to sell me a gun. if i ever were to do it, i'd probably do it there and not bother to waste my money on a gun and mess up my house. if there wasn't any access to guns, i bet a lot more people would jump off buildings and bridges, which could endanger the public.

so i guess i think that they shouldn't ban guns. people will find some other effective way to kill themselves.
 

Issaccs

Well-Known Member
#4
Banning guns may well result in other methods of obtaining them, for example the black market.
Considering Britain's had a fairly consistent rise in Gun crime since 1997 you may well be right.

Besides, banning guns because someone might kill themselves doesn't solve anything, they're still suicidal and its ignoring the cause is more dangerous than having the guns in the first place.
 

JohnADreams

Well-Known Member
#5
Any way to up the survival rate for suicide attempts would be beneficial but you cant really remove something that's become such a strong part of US culture and held up as a part of their individual rights.
A lot of those who choose such a violent way to attempt suicide believe that there is no help out there for them, that they are just somehow broken and that's all they ever will be. I think it's more important to remove the idea that if you dont or cant live up to some artifical standard, then you're worthless and dont have a place in the world.
Considering Britain's had a fairly consistent rise in Gun crime since 1997 you may well be right.
It's been reduced by 13% by current statistics. Almost half of all firearm crime is related to air rifles, not lethal arms and there's also been less than 60 gun related homicides, which isnt bad for a country with population of 60 million. I dont think people realise that serious gun crime is so rare in the UK that if Cho from Virginia Tech lived here, he would have increase the firearm homicide rate by 50%.
 

bleach

Well-Known Member
#6
I don't think they should ban guns, but gun control laws, background checks and the like should be much stricter across the board.

In any case, banning one weapon is no substitute for effective crime control. Particularly since that weapon will still be distributed illegally without it.
 

Issaccs

Well-Known Member
#7
Any way to up the survival rate for suicide attempts would be beneficial but you cant really remove something that's become such a strong part of US culture and held up as a part of their individual rights.
A lot of those who choose such a violent way to attempt suicide believe that there is no help out there for them, that they are just somehow broken and that's all they ever will be. I think it's more important to remove the idea that if you dont or cant live up to some artifical standard, then you're worthless and dont have a place in the world.
It's been reduced by 13% by current statistics. Almost half of all firearm crime is related to air rifles, not lethal arms and there's also been less than 60 gun related homicides, which isnt bad for a country with population of 60 million. I dont think people realise that serious gun crime is so rare in the UK that if Cho from Virginia Tech lived here, he would have increase the firearm homicide rate by 50%.

Since the handgun ban in 1997 gun crime has increased from 12805 Total reported offences too 18489 in 2007, granted their was a drop last year but over the last ten we still have a 40% rise in gun crime.
 
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JohnADreams

Well-Known Member
#8
Since the handgun ban in 1997 gun crime has increased from 12805 Total reported offences too 18489 in 2007, granted their was a drop last year but over the last ten we still have a 40% rise in gun crime.
Sorry, I did mean it was reduced since last year, not over the last decade. I should have added that. Although, oddly enough 1996 had a higher rate of all types of gun crime than 1997 or 1998. If you want to just talk about handguns, then their rates have been dropping off since 2002 but I think it's better to look at the whole picture.

You can't ignore the fact that your statistic of 18489 incidents is bloated by air guns. They are not, to my knowlage, a part of any gun ban or control. After all, your gun crime graph does show gun crime sans air weapons to be below 10,000 and is in fact 9,650 from the Home Office source. The same source will tell you that firearms offenses of every sort account for 0.3% of all crime here. There's more important things to tackle in this country, very few of which made good tabliod headlines though, sadly. :dry:
 

Random

Well-Known Member
#9
If they ban guns, the suicidal won't have a 90% chance of killing themselves. Tell me what you think.
I think someone who's determined to do something will find a way. 90% or not. Legislation is no match for determination.
 

worlds edge

Well-Known Member
#11
I'm under the impression that there are countries with strict gun control laws (Japan, Finland, and Sweden all come to mind) that have very high suicide rates. Though I admit I haven't personally done the research on this, it doesn't seem like it would make much of a difference.
 

worlds edge

Well-Known Member
#12
Here's a link that supports my point: WHO Suicide Statistics

Austria, France, Canada, Sweden, Belgium, Japan, etc., all have a higher suicide rate than the US, and I believe all of them have far more restrictive gun control laws. (I'm confident Japan, Canada and Sweden do, and I'd be candidly surprised if the others did not.)
 

JohnADreams

Well-Known Member
#13
I dont think Switzerland has much gun control, I do know that they have a lot of firearms over there and also have a higher suicide rate than the US. If you look at the ownership rate of firearms rather than the international impression of gun control laws then; France, Finland, Canada, Norway, New Zealand count as both having a relatively high amount of firearms and a high suicide rate. The UK has lower rates on both suicide and gun ownership, as does Spain, Holland and Ireland.

I dont know enough about the cultures and laws of other nations, especially about 3rd world, the Middle East and former communist countries, to go into any real detail about this. It's never going to correlate either way though, since there is too much cutural diversity in the world to be able to come up with any honest data. You can take an emotionally crippling but gun free society like Japan and hold it up as proof against gun control and someone else can counter it with the US or Finland.
 

Shock

Well-Known Member
#14
the whole reason for a gun to exist is to kill, not protect as many others say. though i realise sometimes you must fight fire with fire. However, if guns were to disappear I believe people would still instinctly kill each other but perhaps with cruder, more painful, more debillitating methods. At the moment though I would still think getting rid of guns would be a major positive social step.
 

Issaccs

Well-Known Member
#15
the whole reason for a gun to exist is to kill, not protect as many others say. though i realise sometimes you must fight fire with fire. However, if guns were to disappear I believe people would still instinctly kill each other but perhaps with cruder, more painful, more debillitating methods. At the moment though I would still think getting rid of guns would be a major positive social step.
Why though.
 
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