Does Gun Control Prevent Gun Crime?

[Traditional_Ang]

Good question. And is precisely where most of them get guns.
That is where most of the guns found in the hands of criminals in states or cities have very strict guns laws come from. Yes, we could have a buy back program and perhaps many law abiding citizens would turn in their guns. The criminals won’t. And I doubt most gun owners who have obtained their weapon(s) legally will either.

Mary Bobo:

In Los Angeles, the Gang Members did turn in their old rusty revolvers so they could buy new Semi-Automatics (Which they bought illegally - They were felons and had no right to own or possess firearms) and drugs (which they sold on the streets). The ignorant politicians paid for the Gangs’ new firearms and had no idea that’s what they were doing.

The man who committed the atrocity had no right to own a gun under the Gun Control Act of 1968 and probably should have been thrown out of the school after staulking and terrorizing students during the past 2 years, and that information should have been accessible to the Central Database which was accessed for the Brady Background Check. The fact these weren’t done is inexcusable.

By creating “Gun-Free Zones”, we create areas where there are no sheepdogs and only sheep, and that the only thing that’s prevented worse slaughters from happening (Anyone hear about Beslan?) is the Basic decency of the American people and luck that we haven’t had terrorists attack our campuses.

When I used to be on a Middle East Forum, I used to interact with the man who led the Israeli commandoes who took back the Israeli Middle School that was taken over by Palestinian terrorists in the late 1970’s. It was his report that caused Israeli Teachers and other personnel to start carrying firearms to school and start training with them.

Since the Attack this Israeli Major (now General) had to deal with, no Israeli school has been attacked by anyone using a gun or any group of gunmen.

Newt Gringich suggested the same thing in this country - I was not suprised when I heard him mocked and misrepresented on a major network by a spokesman who claimed that he was suggesting arming students. As I’ve read a translation of the original report of the above incident, I know that wasn’t what Mr. Gingrich was suggesting.

Your Brother in Christ, Michael

 

[Brendan]

Mary Bobo:

In Los Angeles, the Gang Members did turn in their old rusty revolvers so they could buy new Semi-Automatics (Which they bought illegally - They were felons and had no right to own or possess firearms) and drugs (which they sold on the streets). The ignorant politicians paid for the Gangs’ new firearms and had no idea that’s what they were doing.

A friend of mine financed a new rifle this way. Michigan had a gun buyback program, so he went to a gun show, picked up two junk condition SKS’s for $80 each.

He ‘turned in’ these guns and got the ‘assault’ rifle rate of $200 each and used the money to by an new Weatherby.

I also traded in a muzzleloader with a cracked breach. By then the State of MI got a little wizer and was just giving out gift certificates to Walmart instead of straight cash. I donate my $200 certifice to the NRA Youth Shooting Sports foundation to buy ammo with

We need more gun backbacks, they give top dollar for junk guns I couldn’t give away

 

[MariaG]

Levi86,

Or, the Fact that Switzerland, where all able bodied males have been issued Military Assault Rifles (the real things - fully automatic rifles), and the rest of the citizens have Sub-machine Guns and Pistols, has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the world (and the lowest in Europe outside of the Vatican)?

And why does this fact get consistently ignored?

 

[mgrobertson79]

It has, its just taken some time (post #17), isn’t your president always saying “we cant put timetables on success”?

Our president is a bafoon.

Disarming citizens only emboldens criminals. They feel that most citizens will not be able to fight back and use whatever is at hand in their assault. Gun control is a tragic mistake and those who allow themselves to be mislead by the policy are complicit in the murders, rapes, robberies that would have been prevented otherwise. Sure not everyone carries here, but those that do legally are normal law abiding citizens.

Now this Cho character at VT was not legally in possession of a firearm and if the states records had been correct, he would not likely have had what he had.

 

[Black_Jaque]

Absolutely gun control reduce firearm offences.

That may be true. I think this was found to be true in the U.S. also. However, the key was that violent crime went up with gun control laws.

It’s a matter of perceived risk vs. actual risk.

People perceived that they are safe under gun control laws because gun related crimes go down. But in actuality they are more likely to be violently assaulted by a villain - just not with a gun.

What it boiled down to was that gun control laws only meant that criminals were more likely to take your money while you are around. Whereas without gun control laws the criminals took care to wait until you were gone before taking your money.

 

[Traditional_Ang]

Brothers & Sisters:

I believe that the primary problem with trying to control violent crime through Gun Control or Gun Bans is that we are trying to use a PHYSICAL SOLUTION to solve a SPIRITUAL PROBLEM. The source of the violence in us lies not in URBANIZATION, ACCESS TO GUNS, POVERTY or any of the other causes many like to cite when trying to confront the problem of violent crime and violent criminals. The problem is our evil and sinful nature, the evil that lies waiting in our hearts, waiting for an occasion to act out. Trying to keep Law Abiding Citizens from buying guns, or increasing spending on social programs, can’t even begin to deal with that, and long term incarceration of offenders, although it protects the innocent, is only a temnporary fix.

Men’s, and women’s, hearts have to be changed and transformed, and we all know of only one agency (or shall I say person) which can do that. Men’s hearts have to be changed so that they first marry the mothers of their babies, rather than leaving them with the stark choice of aborting their babies, giving their babies up for adoption, or trying to raise them on their own (usually on welfare), and then they have to be further changed so that they see each other as precious gifts to be preserved to the day of marriage.

And, all of our hearts have to be changed so that we see each other as brothers and sisters and ourselves as “our brothers’ keepers”. When that happens, by the Grace of God, Crime will virtually cease.

That won’t be accomplished by anything we’re discussing here, but only by preaching the Gospel of Jesus Christ and Teaching the Catholic Faith in all of its fullness to a broken and fallen humanity.

Your Brother in Christ, Michael

 

[vern_humphrey]

Quote:
Absolutely gun control reduce firearm offences.

That may be true. I think this was found to be true in the U.S. also. However, the key was that violent crime went up with gun control laws.

Actually, that isn’t true – gun control creates new classes of “firearms offenses.”

It’s a matter of perceived risk vs. actual risk.

People perceived that they are safe under gun control laws because gun related crimes go down. But in actuality they are more likely to be violently assaulted by a villain - just not with a gun.

What it boiled down to was that gun control laws only meant that criminals were more likely to take your money while you are around. Whereas without gun control laws the criminals took care to wait until you were gone before taking your money.

When someone can show me gun control has brought 32 people back to life, I’ll believe in gun control. Until then, I need the means to protect myself and my family.

 

[Sir_Knight]

For those of little faith …

Does gun control prevent gun crimes? The evidence actually suggest the opposite. In cities with gun bans, Chicago and Washington D.C. to name a few, violent crimes increased soon after strict gun bans were put in place.

In 1976, Washington, D.C. enacted one of the most restrictive gun control laws in the nation. Since then, the city’s murder rate has risen 134 percent while the national murder rate has dropped 2 percent. SOURCE: Dr. Gary Kleck, University of Florida using FBI Uniform Crime Statistics, 1997

the courts in the U.S. have decided on numerous occasions that law enforcement does not have a duty to protect, only a general duty to enforce the law.

The police force which, according to the US Supreme Court, does NOT have a duty to protect you? **References:

1. Warren v. District of Columbia, 444 A.2d 1 – “. . . a government and its agents are under no general duty to provide public services, such as police protection, to any particular individual citizen . . .”
2. On June 27 1999, in the case of Castle Rock v. Gonzales, the Supreme Court found that Jessica Gonzales did not have a constitutional right to police protection, even in the presence of a restraining order. By a vote of 7-to-2, the Supreme Court ruled that Gonzales has no right to sue her local police department for failing to protect her and her children from her estranged husband when he killed her three children.**

 

[MariaG]

…Switzerland, where all able bodied males have been issued Military Assault Rifles (the real things - fully automatic rifles), and the rest of the citizens have Sub-machine Guns and Pistols, has one of the lowest violent crime rates in the world (and the lowest in Europe outside of the Vatican)?

Is anyone who speaks up for Gun control have a comment on this or the other city that was quoted that requires all people to own a gun and has seen a drop in all crime?

Anyone at all?

 

[vern_humphrey]

Gun control advocates don’t need evidence – although they are not above manufacturing some. They also take the pecksniffian approach that somehow by asserting our rights to carry, we are trying to force them to carry.

 

[MariaG]

Gun control advocates don’t need evidence – although they are not above manufacturing some. They also take the pecksniffian approach that somehow by asserting our rights to carry, we are trying to force them to carry.

While I am a horrible speller, I have a very fairly large vocabulary base.

I have to say, I had never heard of the word pecksniffian and wondered if it were even a word. (I am not a fan of Dickens else I would like to think I would have immediately understood the reference even if I had never seen the word )

Much to my surpise, I find that not only is it a word, but it describes the situation very well in my humble opinion:clapping:

 

[vern_humphrey]

While I am a horrible speller, I have a very fairly large vocabulary base.

I have to say, I had never heard of the word pecksniffian and wondered if it were even a word. (I am not a fan of Dickens else I would like to think I would have immediately understood the reference even if I had never seen the word )

Much to my surpise, I find that not only is it a word, but it describes the situation very well in my humble opinion:clapping:

Thankew, thankew.:tiphat:

 

[Al_Masetti]

One of my pro-gun-control friends is an avid camper. And so I asked him what he would do if threatened by some passersby/ psycho-crazy killers, whilst out in the wilderness. He said he would unlimber his cell phone and call the state police. I said that if after two days or so, there was no police presence at his campsite, what would he then do?

He had no answer, apart from making some pre-paid funeral plans.

I suggested that waving around a shotgun might encourage the marauders to move along.

---

This is a major issue: to wit, who are the first-responders? Police? Or the victim and the victim’s immediate neighbors?

Police might not get there in time. In fact, it is highly likely that the police WILL NOT get there in time to arrest the miscreants.

In numerous disasters/crimes and other violent events, the “official” first responders did not arrive until it was too late and could only conduct a body count.

Often bureaucrats have taken violent exception to on-the-scene victims and their neighbors taking action. This has happened in case-after-case. Yet the bureaucrats have not actually DONE anything, except increase the number of pages in the manual of standard operating procedures. To bureaucrats, words count for as much as actual action.

 

[vern_humphrey]

One of my pro-gun-control friends is an avid camper. And so I asked him what he would do if threatened by some passersby/ psycho-crazy killers, whilst out in the wilderness. He said he would unlimber his cell phone and call the state police. I said that if after two days or so, there was no police presence at his campsite, what would he then do?

He had no answer, apart from making some pre-paid funeral plans.

I suggested that waving around a shotgun might encourage the marauders to move along.

I and my neighbors have been harassed by a pack of dogs – including several pit bulls (pit bulls are often kept by meth cookers here in the Ozarks.)

Last night, my neighbor called – he had been confined in his workshop by a pack of dogs. He had called the Sheriff from the shop and was told "handle it yourself.’ I went walking up to see if I could help him, and found him confonted by four large dogs. One of them attacked me.

How long could I wait until help arrived?

 

[Holly3278]

I feel that gun control actually helps control crime. I don’t feel that banning guns controls crime very well.

 

[Larry1700]

Originally Posted by Larry1700
We’ve all been talking about how guns play a role in crime reduction in Australia vs. America. Maybe this isn’t the thread for this question, but I think it is related.

Does Australia allow prayer in schools? How about the violent TV/movie/video game/music situation? Is abortion legal? I’d appreciate knowing this aspect of your situation vs. ours.

GraceAngel (or anyone from Australia):

It’s been a few days since I’ve logged on, but I didn’t see a reply to this question.

 

[Black_Jaque]

I feel that gun control actually helps control crime. I don’t feel that banning guns controls crime very well.

What do you mean by control then? Some people jest that gun control is hitting what you’re aiming at. If that’s the kind of control of your gun you’re referring to - I’d say your feelings are probably on the mark.

That’s nice that you have these feelings. What about your thoughts? Do you have any rational thoughts on the matter? Or should we govern based on how everyone feels about a matter?

 

[DL82]

The answer is ‘yes’, but that doesn’t mean we are any better off with gun control.

Look at Hong Kong - no guns AT ALL were allowed in or out of the port city during British rule, except the ones carried by the British army.

There were almost no shootings, yet nearly as many murders and as much gang crime as New York or Moscow - just done with blades instead of guns.

 

[Larry1700]

I think the answer for fewer crimes isn’t in gun control, it’s in self control.

 

[vern_humphrey]

I think the answer for fewer crimes isn’t in gun control, it’s in self control.

And when self control fails, as it did in Cho’s case, the rest of us must rely on self defense – as the Virginia Tech students were sadly unable to do.