Aces High Bulletin Board
General Forums => The O' Club => Topic started by: Gman on December 29, 2002, 12:44:02 PM
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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2609427.stm
A firearms amnesty is being planned for early in the New Year to try to reduce levels of gun crime.
Tougher new laws and a national database of guns will also be introduced in a bid to reduce levels of gun-related crime.
Figures due out next month are expected to reveal that record numbers of offences are being committed using guns.
Police forces want to launch a three-month amnesty early in 2003, similar to those which followed the Dunblane tragedy and Hungerford shooting.
National database
Many of the crimes committed involve replica guns which have been converted and which are used to settle disputes between rival drug dealers.
A ban on ownership of handguns was introduced in 1997 as a result of the Dunblane massacre, when Thomas Hamilton opened fire at a primary school leaving 16 children and their teacher dead.
But even since the ban, gun-related crimes have soured, with one study suggesting handgun usage had gone up by as much as 40% two years after the ban.
So serious is the situation in many of Britain's cities that chief constables want a three month amnesty early next year similar to those which followed the Hungerford shootings in 1987 and the Dunblane massacre.
After Dunblane more than 60,000 weapons were handed in.
The Home Office is considering a minimum five year sentence for anyone caught possessing a gun and setting up a national database and a new agency to trace illegally held weapons.
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What, you trust the BBC as a news source? C'mon now.
I do like the part where just having a 5 year sentence simply for gun possession though. Shows a lot of judgement and common sense. :D
In Jolly Olde how long do you get for burglarizing a house? Or a rape? Or sticking someone with a sharp instrument?
After they pass this, I bet you'd do more time for having a firearm than for sticking someone in the guts with your souvenir kukri.
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People with illegal firearms are commiting crimes with them. Why does anyone think they're going to care about them being made more illegal?
The only people who pay attention to gun laws are those who don't plan on commiting crimes with them.
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Strangely, the number of offences under the firearms act (ie posession of a REAL firearm) has fallen by 9% over the past year.
Nationwide about 80% of armed incidents the police are called to involved fake weapons
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/2293663.stm
Perhaps that's the reason?
Many of the crimes committed involve replica guns which have been converted and which are used to settle disputes between rival drug dealers.
From the same page Gman posted.
Gun control in Britain has affected the supply of guns. Criminals who want them are forced to modify replicas, which are often more dangerous to the user than his victim. Perhaps that's why they don't actually shoot many people?
In Jolly Olde how long do you get for burglarizing a house? Or a rape? Or sticking someone with a sharp instrument?
For burglary, not long, if any time at all. For rape, about 4 years served, with a typical sentence of about 7 years. Don't have a clue for stabbing, as it's not a seperate offence. It can come under ABH, GBN, attempted murder, etc. If you stab and kill someone, it's automatic life, elligible for parole in around 10 years or so, depending on circumstances.
People with illegal firearms are commiting crimes with them. Why does anyone think they're going to care about them being made more illegal?
Esactly. Passing tougher laws to punish criminals, who are usually facing years inside for the crime they are using the firearm for, isn't going to stop them. Passing laws that affect the supply, making it more dificult for the criminal to get a gun, will.
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You mean the criminals will stop using guns to terrorize innocent people because it's now gonna be seriously against the law to have handguns, as opposed to just slighly illegal... :rolleyes:
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You mean the criminals will stop using guns to terrorize innocent people because it's now gonna be seriously against the law to have handguns, as opposed to just slighly illegal...
No, it's always been against the law. They will stop using them because it's harder to get hold of them
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"But even since the ban, gun-related crimes have soured, with one study suggesting handgun usage had gone up by as much as 40% two years after the ban. "
Yep they just cant get their hands on them. I mean its against the law to have them so not even criminals can acquire them..
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Many of the crimes committed involve replica guns which have been converted and which are used to settle disputes between rival drug dealers
Nationwide about 80% of armed incidents the police are called to involved fake weapons
A "handgun" in Britain is anything that looks like a handgun, or is claimed to be a handgun.
A man was sentenced for an "armed robbery" where he used a banana.
Actual firearms act offences (ie posession of an illegal firearm) are down 9%.
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Funny they'd even bother with the new restrictions since it's all "no problemo".
Wonder what the stats will show in the next 1-2-3 years.
I suspect just about all the industrialized countries will show an uptick and I think it's probably related to the economy.
We'll see though. We can argue about more stats.. oh, goody!
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I think the real point here is that it's not the ban that works but the penalty. If you had a life in prison sentance for commiting a crime with a firearm or stealing one... you could allow firearms to be sold at the grocery store and when your home was burglarized.... everything would be gone except your firearms. The really stupid and dangerous criminals would of course still use guns but then that would be an excellent excuse to take em out of circulation... forever.
LOL.... the gun ban didn't work so they are imposing a mandatory sentance of 5 years in prison for anyone... even someone who would otherwise spend his entire life crime free... In essence... they are creating criminals. Like they didn't have enough allready.
LOL... if you can't play nicely with your toys then we will have to take em away from you.. Aren't you just a little embarassed? Or are you beyond that?
lazs
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They will stop using them because it's harder to get hold of them
you must be kidding right?
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Wlfgng, they actually believe stuff like that. Judging from another thread, they even believe their politicians will use their tax money in exactly the way they promised during the campaign.
It's a mystery.
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laz, i dont normally agree with you, but that was very well put
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I think the real point here is that it's not the ban that works but the penalty. If you had a life in prison sentance for commiting a crime with a firearm or stealing one... you could allow firearms to be sold at the grocery store and when your home was burglarized.... everything would be gone except your firearms.
Here's a radical idea. Make it illegal to murder people. Then you can still play with your guns, and criminals will be too frightened to kill people, because they'll go to prison. Can't believe it's never been tried before.
LOL.... the gun ban didn't work so they are imposing a mandatory sentance of 5 years in prison for anyone... even someone who would otherwise spend his entire life crime free... In essence... they are creating criminals. Like they didn't have enough allready.
Gun control in Britain has worked. We have more crime than you, because our politicians won't put enough effort in to fighting crime, but we have much lower murder rates, and much lower gun crime.
The crime epidemic in Britain consists of burglary, mugging and car crime. To tackle it, they should send burgulars muggers and car thieves to prison. They don't because there are lots of them, and it costs too much to send them to prison.
Rather than admit they aren't prepared o take the necessary measures against crime, they come up with ever stiffer sentences for more serious crime, because they know there are very few such crimes, and they don't have to build extra prisons to hold the criminals who get longer sentences.
In other words, they get to look tough on crime, whilst not actually doing anything.
you must be kidding right?
Ask yourself why there are stories about all the illegal guns in Britain, but almost nobody gets shot, very few guns are recovered, and the police say 80% of "guns" are fake, and drug dealers run around with air pistols converted to fire 22 rimfire.
Sounds like the laws have restricted supply pretty well.
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Gman - finally getting back to you, 7 months later - LOL.
The amnesty went ahead, and 17,000 guns were netted, along with 403,000 rounds of ammunition.
Different governments view gun ownership in different ways. Americans are free to own guns, and many do so responsibly - but many are used in gangland and mafia hits. Some people argue that guns prevent many crimes from happening, but the fact that a gun is needed to prevent a crime suggests that guns are being used to commit crimes. Some Americans argue for arming everyone as a deterrent against burglaries etc., and that might work up to a point.
But the British government's stance is based on the following facts: - For a shooting to take place, a gun has to be present.
- The more guns present in a society, the more people are going to be killed by guns.
The second fact is borne out by the stats. Thousands in America killed each year by handguns alone, compared to fewer than 100 each year in Britain - the actual tally is usually around 60.
Some might say that it's not the guns' fault that so many people are killed - guns don't kill people, only people kill people - and all that crap. They might then seek to shift the blame for the stats away from the guns themselves, and on to certain ethnic and socio-economic groups (read poor black ghettos where gangs and drugs are rife). Thing is, we too have poor black ghettos where gangs and drugs are rife - but we don't have thousands of gun murders each year. No guns = no shootings. Of course there are some guns, which is why we have some shootings...
...but we do not have the bloodbath that America has, with 300,000 people killed by firearms in the last 25 years. We WOULD have something like that if we had a free-for-all policy on guns. OK, so many of those shootings would be between rival gangs. The fact is that we've already got more than enough crime. The British public does not want to read about gun murders by the thousands year after year. 60 each year is bad enough.
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You might have something closer to that if you had more than 10 people living on that island, too.
Not that stats can be skewed or anything.
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58 million actually. You do the maths and see what the result is.
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Thank you, Dowding. What Fatty said bears out what I said in an earlier post. Many Americans (though by no means all) have no clue about the world beyond the county they live in.
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Actually, what Fatty's post bears out is that the UK has a much smaller population than the US. Sorry you were too thick to understand that. Or perhaps you don't understand American culture enough to know he didn't literally think only 10 people live in the UK.
Current US Pop: ~291,548,559
SOB
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Evidently you were not aware I am British, Beet One E. Does your statement still apply or does that suddenly make it witty?
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And Beet1e, you have no clue about America. You think the little time you may have spent here and what you read makes you an expert? You think you are more worldy than "many" Americans? What an arrogant thing to say. How would you know? Stop pretending to know what "many" Americans have a clue about, you have no way of knowing that.
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I agree actually. Perhaps he should have said 'some'? 'Many' is a very specific generality.
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Originally posted by Fatty
You might have something closer to that if you had more than 10 people living on that island, too.
Not that stats can be skewed or anything.
OK, so what was the point of these statements, in light of the outbursts that followed?
Steve - I spent 3 years living in America in the 80s, and as a result of being married to an American, made annual trips back to her home town of Chicago, followed by a visit of our own somewhere else in the US. In fact 2002 was the first year I didn't set foot in the US since 1977. Worked for an American company for a year 1996/97, and part of that year was spent working from their Denver office - well, Golden actually. So it's ended up that there are only nine states left that I haven't seen. Whatever you say, I feel that "you don't have a clue about America" is a bit of an overstatement. I met plenty of people who never left their home state, and even those who didn't realise that European countries had their own currency - not the US dollar - lol. A lot of yanks are ok, but some are kind of blinkered.
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Blinkered? hehehe I like that one.
Well, any country is going to have it's ignorant masses, certainly we have our share. Since we have more bodies, we probably have more yokels than the brits. My point is really, that we Americans aren't nearly as block headed as some euro's seem to think. Yes, many of us tend to put things in more "black and white" than Euro folks seem to do, but that doesn't mean we're uninformed.
As far as foreign currency... I can, almost...almost understand why some folks wouldn't consider it.. I mean most international trading is done on the dollar, correct? Of course, maybe these people were paying attention in school...maybe you were hanging out at Cabrini Green. Beet1e, we have our share of blissfully ignorant folk, but I do not think to the degree that you surmised.
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"I met plenty of people who never left their home state, and even those who didn't realise that European countries had their own currency - not the US dollar - lol."
So, then, you'd say that this would represent the average citizen of the United States? If not, what's your point? There are idiots everywhere, and they are not limited to the US. As for not travelling, I personlly don't know anyone who has not travelled out of their home state ... that is, people I know beyond mere acquaintances. Most of my friends, myself included, have been to other countries, but I would bet not nearly as many different countries as Europeans - but then, that's more a function of geographic location than anything else.
You may have a "clue" about America, but that's about it. Visiting here is quite a bit different than growing up here and living here. So, if someone who has and does live here thinks a statement you make about the US is clueless, then it probably is. Regardless of how much of an expert you think you are on our country and society.
SOB
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The point of the statements was to highlight the simplification in the statistics you used. I had no idea it would be required to spell it out.
As for ignorant posturing, visiting a few parks and then assuming to understand the gun issue in the United States about sums it up. I haven't seen anyone here draw conclusions about the intelligence of the average brit based on your comments though.
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Originally posted by Fatty
As for ignorant posturing, visiting a few parks and then assuming to understand the gun issue in the United States about sums it up.
I don't think you read my posts. Visiting a few parks? I LIVED there for three years is what I said. Not understanding the gun issue? Still does not compute. Annual gun death tally in the UK: about 60. Annual gun death tally in the US: Many thousands. What more is there to understand? Simple maths is all.
SOB. Yep, when I was working for that US company, they tried to schedule a visit by about 30 of their employees to Britain. Kind of last minute - it had to be aborted when it was found that fewer than half had passports. So they reversed it. Later that year (1996) 106 of us went over to the US for several months. We all had passports. Thank you for conceding that I have a clue about America. I doubt that you'll ever know Europe as well as I know America, so I'll stick my neck out and say that you don't have a clue about Europe. And you're a bit of a dickhead to boot.
Steve - oddly enough, I did some work at Monkey Ward - right opposite Cabrini Green. I remember the day that a stray bullet was found in a tenth floor window - lol. And Mayor Jane Byrne having to move into CG when the crime got really bad - 11 gun murders in 9 weeks - lol - a pittance, rival drug gangs - yada yada...
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I read your posts, and I still see no evidence that you are any more familiar with the United States than someone who sat down and watched a few Spike Lee films.
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Its beetle day, Punt!
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I'm sorry for pointing out your ignorance Beet1e, but really I couldn't point it out if you didn't flaunt it. All of your European co-workers had passports and few of their American counterparts didn't? Amazing! Could it be that we don't need a passport to legally enter the countries bordering the US (Canada & Mexico)? Why yes, yes it could be! We DON'T need passports to enter Canada & Mexico, nor do we need passports to visit the many states of the US with a broad diversity in culture and lifestyle.
Also, I would like to confirm that I do not now, nor will I likely ever know as much about Europe as you or anyone else born and living over there. Whether I'll ever know more about Europe then you do about the US, I really don't care, as I don't ever plan on educating Europeans about them and their respective countries and cultures. You see, they live where they live and probably know a whole hell of a lot more about where they live than I ever will, but I already said that - maybe if I repeat it enough tho', you'll understand. Or perhaps not.
SOB
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Originally posted by Nashwan
snip
The crime epidemic in Britain consists of burglary, mugging and car crime. To tackle it, they should send burgulars muggers and car thieves to prison.
Or, perhaps, allow honest citizens the right to be armed and defend their lives and property?
culero (what a concept!)
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Or, perhaps, allow honest citizens the right to be armed and defend their lives and property?
How do you make guns easily available to honest people, without criminals getting hold of them as well?
Pass a law saying they can't have them? They're criminals, they break laws.
If I can freely buy a gun, so can a criminal. If you have background checks, the criminal can get a friend to buy one, or I can buy guns and make money by selling them to people who can't buy them through legit channels.
British gun laws tackle supply.
It always seems bizarre to me that Americans seem to think making it illegal for criminals to have guns will work, when by their very nature criminals ignore the laws anyway.
If you don't target supply, criminals will use guns.
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Originally posted by Nashwan
If you don't target supply, criminals will use guns.
How many people die each year because bad drivers can get cars as easily as good drivers?
Would you restrict the rights of good drivers in order to control the bad drivers?
culero
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Originally posted by Nashwan
It always seems bizarre to me that Americans seem to think making it illegal for criminals to have guns will work, when by their very nature criminals ignore the laws anyway.
I don't think that. Does that mean I'm not American?
SOB
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How many people die each year because bad drivers can get cars as easily as good drivers?
Would you restrict the rights of good drivers in order to control the bad drivers?
Yes. I'd have mandatory registration of cars, so they can be easy to trace if used in crime/accident.
I'd require any change of ownership of a car to be registered, so if one is used in a crime/accident, you can't just say "Oh, I sold/lost it last week"
I'd require all drivers to pass a test to show they are fit to drive a car.
Britain does all that for cars and guns, I believe America also does the same for cars.
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SOB - way off topic. This thread was started by Gman to discuss the forthcoming gun amnesty in Britain. That has now happened, and at 10:39am yesterday, I wrote my first post in this thread to comment on the results of that amnesty, and on our government policy controlling firearms. Nashwan has added some useful input.
So then Steve takes the thread off topic by turning into a "knowledge of the US" pissing contest. And like the good sheep that you are, you followed by getting into a discussion of growing up in the US versus visiting. All very much off topic.
No-one needs to have grown up/lived in OR visited the US to understand that there are many thousands of firearms related homicides every year - 300,000 in the last 25 years - any more than one would have to have lived in Iraq to know that Saddam was a brutal dictator. Governments provide stats. There's nothing more to it. I don't need US citizenship to understand stats, thank you very much. In my initial post in this thread, the only time I referred to the US was to touch on points made by American gun owners in other discussions - like the fact that many of the homicides are gang/drug related.
So I don't know what your problem is.
SOB, you are like a hypodermic needle. You're very sharp, but you're also a big salamander.
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With the time you'd spent on this topic alone I'd think you'd know that firearm legislation is a state matter. Taking that into account, a more accurate statistic would be to compare the dozen or so total homicides (firearm related or not) in one of the most gun lax states like Wyoming and compare that to UK.
Given your interpretation of statistics UK should get rid of gun control altogether, but most of us know there is more to it than that and haven't told you how to handle your crime.
Next you'll tell us we should be using interstate rail for travel because it works in UK, ignoring a ten-fold population density discrepancy.
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Originally posted by beet1e
And you're a bit of a dickhead to boot.
Hmmm...isn't there a sticky at the top of the O'Club about this...
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Originally posted by beet1e
SOB, you are like a hypodermic needle. You're very sharp, but you're also a big salamander.
And this........
Unless this is what passes for witty retorts in UK.
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Originally posted by Stringer
And this........
Unless this is what passes for witty retorts in UK.
Indeed - kind of like the dental "jokes" against the UK that get trotted out here. I don't see you complaining about those. And I have taken worse insults on this BBS than anything you can quote of me - I don't see you rallying to my defence on that either.
Fatty. I have never said that the US should abolish gun ownership. Never. I may have drawn attention to homicide stats in light of the firearms free-for-all that exists in the US, and pointed out what I believe to be the folly of such a policy.
Anyway, you're still not getting it. I repeat - my initial post in this thread was to comment on the UK firearms amnesty. I might have mentioned observations about the US that have been brought to my attention by others, but that is all.
As for Wyoming, it wouldn't be surprising if it had a low gun crime rate. I don't have bang up to date data, but my 1998 Rand McNally US road atlas indicates that Wyoming has a population of around 455,000 (smallest population of any state in the US) and that no WY city has a population bigger than 100,000. I've passed through Cheyenne, overnighted at Rock Springs on I-80, and did a load of hiking in the Tetons based at Jackson. Didn't see any evidence of any drug/gang no-go areas/ghettos in my travels. I felt safe there, even without a gun. :) Taking that into account, a more accurate statistic would be to compare the dozen or so total homicides (firearm related or not) in one of the most gun lax states like Wyoming and compare that to UK.
Erm, no... because as Dowding has pointed out, the UK has a population of 58 million - more than 125 times the number of people living in Wyoming, in a land area that is actually smaller. So much for your accurate comparisons. :D
If WY has a dozen murders a year, then the murder rate per 100,000 population (the stat that governments use) is actually higher than that of the UK. Suck on that for a while. :D:D
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Gee Beet1e, I hadn't considered our tete-e-tete a pissing contest.... interesting.
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Originally posted by Steve
Gee Beet1e, I hadn't considered our tete-e-tete a pissing contest.... interesting.
I think you mean "tête à tête" - check with straffo!
But OK. We digressed into a knowledge of the US discussion. Not necessary.
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Originally posted by beet1e
Thank you, Dowding. What Fatty said bears out what I said in an earlier post. Many Americans (though by no means all) have no clue about the world beyond the county they live in.
Well, actually, this is what dragged us off topic but who's counting? By pointing out your ignorance, I've obviously upset you, and for that I apologize. When it's flaunted, I just can't resist the temptation to point it out...that's one of my failings. I'll try to stick to the topic from now on.
SOB
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SOB - it's OK. I don't even know how we got started, but it doesn't matter now. :)