Originally posted by Heretik
I'd be intersted to see the statistics for total homicides and assaults (per capita) side by side. Of course banning guns will reduce the number of gun murders, but what about total murders? I'd like to see the figures for assaults as well, since attempted homicide with a gun is probably more likely to succeed, weighting the US murder column unfairly.
In 2003, there were 14,408 victims of homicide in the US. In Britain in the same year, it was approximately 800. I say approximately because the Home Office gives a figure for 2002/03, but that period included the
hundreds of homicides committed by the serial killer Dr. Harold Shipman over a period spanning at least three decades.
So - there are about 18 times as many homicides in the US as in the UK, but allowing for the population discrepancy, the US homicide is about 3.6 times that of Britain, per capita. But... I doubt that we have thousands of accidental gun deaths, as in the US.
Ah, Mr Toad! An honest post from you at last!
I see that you have gone through the five phases of death in recognising that the US does indeed have a problem viz. firearms and homicides/accidental gun killings. The five phases are Anger, Denial, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance. You're at the Acceptance stage. Lazs too. You have both finally accepted that your system is different from ours. You have also accepted that a high mortality rate is an inevitable consequence of the American "Guns-4-All" policy protected by the 2nd Amendment.
I don't ask any more of you - as long as you are prepared to drop the silly "more guns = less crime" rhetoric, and accept that there will be many thousands of lives lost as a natural consequence of handing out guns like copies of "The Big Issue", we need argue no more.
I have never said that America should give up its guns - far too late to try that; a totally unworkable proposal.
But you only have to look at homicides,
patterns of homicide, and accidental deaths to realise that there is a
heavy price to be paid for your "freedoms".
And, in light of how things have turned out in America, the stance of many governments around the world with regard to prohibition of firearms makes total sense.
