cozumel

Another DH member requested me to start a poll on the probability of gun deaths being reduced or increasing if the law was changed. So I have obliged. Please don't turn this into a thread on the US system vs the world!!

I would like to see changes in the law - maybe something along the lines of:

All States must follow Federal law. IE Every State must apply and enforce the law in the exact same way.
All firearms sales (within every US state) would be prohibited without a valid permit.
Permits must be renewed annually.
The following conditions must be met before a permit can be issued.
All checks and assessments would be carried out by relevant State or Federal agencies.
All administrative costs would be paid by the Firearm Permit Applicant

1. Official proof of ID, address and all other permanent members of the household
2. Full written criminal checks on all household member with 'markers' being placed against anyone with history of violence.
3. Full written medical records on all household memeber with 'marker' being placed against anyone with a forensic history, current diagnosis or suspected diagnosis of an an enduring mental health illness.
4. If members of the household fall within the criteria of parts 1&2 then a permit will only be issued to the applicant once a home visit has been made by Federal Authorities to assess against a Risk Matrix System. If the household fails to pass the matrix then a firearms permit will not be issued to anyone who lives in that property.
5. The applicant must pay a Federal approved agency to install and maintain a secure storage area for all firearms and ammunition. A valid yearly inspection certificate must be supplied for renewal of a permit

__________________

mike2h

the 2 problems with your idea(s) that i have is that this country does not need another beuracracy. & 2nd the amount of money you are talking about people having to spend to have a gun will mean that only rich people & poor people(because laws will be passed to give them federal assistance)& of course criminals will have guns.
i agree that gun control should be standardised across the country. i also agree that people with diagnosed mental disorders should be placed on a database just like felons. a lot of this already in place & just needs to be standardised & implemeted.
every individual that purchases a handgun should be required to show proof of purchase of a gunsafe before recieving the handgun. there should be basic reqs for theses safes.
but having the government running around in peoples houses is not viable or desireable imo.
i also beleive that any person that purchases a handgun, or rifles/shotguns for that matter, & has children., should have to send those children to a gun safety course.

__________________

cozumel

Yup the costs could be a problem. But hell, I'm just trying to start a debate on what I think is massive problem.

I'm saying that this should only happen when a risk has been identified due to a history of violence or mental health within the household. This would allow a risk assessment and final decision on whether a permit should or should not be issued based on current level of risk.


That's a damned good idea

__________________

Falstaff

I carried a gun in highschool but I never used it, we all did, and I got it from my father, who carried one when he was in school. I would shoot bottles and such off of fence posts and plink cans. All of us in school respected the fact that we each had something besides pointed sticks to poke things with.
Gun Laws are a joke pure and simple. I remember when they tried to stop whiskey from being made or imported, etc etc.
Death from weapons is inevitable, it is up to our society and each other to put away our sword and pickup our plowshares.
In the world at large, big guns, big money and sugar and oil drive the world markets, I certainly dont think any law will make it guns safer or reduce the number of gun deaths.
Guns laws are a farce, and mental masturbation for liberals and socialists.

__________________

OmegaRED

Obviously there should be tighter gun control in America and it would result in less deaths. Guns should be respected more than they are, too many families own a gun legally and don't keep it safe from kids and results in a fatality. If there were extremely high fines for firearms ending up in the hands of unlicensed people I bet the gun owners would keep them locked up like family jewels. Also, people with histories of mental illness shouldn't be able to own guns.

__________________

coldfrontt

I think everyone should carry a gun. It might deter a lot of crap if you know the other person carries, and may know how to use it better than you.

__________________
[color=blue]TANSTAAFL![/color]

OmegaRED

NRA needs to have a gun massacre prevented by a bystander armed with a gun, surprised this hasn't happened yet.

__________________

cozumel

I find it quite interesting though. The right to bear arms is in the psyche of Americans and prohibition would not work (in the US). Anyone can buy a gun on the black market. Prohibition is satisfactory in other countries as their culture is a different one. Whenever there is a shooting in the US there is an argument about prohibition and everyone gets there back up. Buts its the wrong discussion imo. The real debate should be about what we are discussing here. imo a poll along these lines should be taken in every major US city.

__________________

Gabriel_Etranil

I find this humorous to say the least.

Motor vehicle deaths is a bigger problem then guns, you look at some statistics and car accident deaths always tower over guns deaths.

When a guy using a gun kills somebody in heinous act and immediately it's an attack towards guns, yet any time somebody plows a car into a crowd or similar nobody ever says that we should rethink our policies on vehicle control.

How many kids have gotten killed in a car accident by going joy riding after swiping their parents keys? I'd like to see that statistic compared with children killed by firearms.

How many crimes are commited with the use of a vehicle? Not one person would refer to a car as an the instument of the crime yet it is far more deadly than a firearm by far.

Firearms is not the worst problem around, if people want to kill people they can find other means to do so. I hate to bring 9/11 into this but those people were able to hijack some planes with boxcutters and we all know what happened with those 'vehicles' after that.

People are resourceful just be glad that these shootings(the Virginia Tech one) were just that shootings and he didn't do something like build a bomb and mail it every classroom or do something similar like arson(or an Oklahoma City recurrence). Then you probably would be calling for the regulation of education right now instead of guns. Let's just be thankful the only insident he decided to emulate was Columbine.

(I am in no way saying it was a good thing for him killing people, just that it could have been much worse if options were limited to him)

__________________
"I want to believe the voice in my head, but it lies"

coldfrontt

Yes, it could have been worse. We only have ourselves to blaim in creating a culture where we cannot defend ourselves against idiots waving a gun because we aren't allowed to carry them ourselves.

__________________
[color=blue]TANSTAAFL![/color]

kris23

if its tightened it MAY or may not go down, i mean if you prohibit the use of guns all together, then people will probably go with much more inhumane ways of killing each other that are relatively available, sharp pointy things, rope gasoline, pipe, and wrecking hammers people use to cut down walls. or a combination of the listed items......... a gas bomb propelled steak into the head of an annoying person, or a hammer and turning someone into a pile of mush,

guns just get the job done faster and more "painlessly"

__________________

Dowaco

Completely banning guns does not work. In Brazil, gun ownership is prohibited, yet the death rate (#/100,000) from guns is in the top three countries in the world. In China, people make their own guns if they cannot get them otherwise. In the US, banning guns is unconstitutional since gun ownership is one of the basic founding concepts of the nation.

Restricting guns is sensible. The last time I bought a gun, I had to have an FBI background check, was fingerprinted, and had to wait several months. Theoretically, children, ex-felons, and mentally impaired individuals should not have access, but this is very hard to do in real life. There are laws in place to restrict gun sales and to prevent the carrying of a concealed weapon, but outside of places like airports and courthouses (and some schools) it is not practical or desirable to search every citizen for contraband.

I voted: things are OK as is, and we need to actually enforce the laws that we already have.

We live in a "close the barn door after the horse runs away" world. Every time an unforeseen incident happens, the world focuses attention on the issue and over-reacts.

We have strict seat belt laws in the state I live in. Cops can stop and ticket you just for not wearing one as a passenger. The governor of the state was recently in an accident with his car driven by a state trooper doing over 90 mph in a 65 mph zone and was not wearing his belt. He is expected to recover from a broken femur and ribs. Can we call for improved seat belt laws? They don't get any tougher than they are now and the head of the state ignores them with a police officer sitting right next to him.

Government intrusion into our lives and even more unenforceable draconian laws will not stop people from getting killed. Something that does seem to correlate with lower crime is a good economy. So just lower taxes, cut government waste and crime will go down.

__________________
The above is my opinion and in no way reflects the views of this website.

Sandok

Here's a nifty site that does statisitcs based on anything you can choose out of the list. No bias, no nothing. It's simply gathers numbers and shows them.

NationMaster

The interesting thing is that out of the countries with offical numbers (published by the country or be independant groups), the US is ranked eight, so not too bad. Yet it's the first "First World" country to have such high gun murders per capita when the next "First World" country is all the way down in 17th is Portugal (and that's one of the poorer European countries, not counting Eastern Europe).

All the rest (before Portugal) are poor countries (or post-USSR) still in development. As for the "First World" countries, they all have tougher regulations and as a result, less gun murders in total. I think the numbers speak for themselves But oh well, its not my country and I really couldn't care less.

Dowaco

Yes, I found that site the other day. Interesting fodder for all sorts of discussions.

Other factoids from that site. The US has the highest percent of its population in prison (.7%). Making gun laws tougher will only add to that number.

Police per capita. The US is not even on the list of the top 50. The US is not a police state. Giving the police access to your home to "inspect" it is not something that will be embraced.

Switzerland, for example, has an ungodly high suicide rate. People can kill themselves or others with guns, drugs, pointy things, cars, you name it. Humans are very inventive.

Why do poor people get a pass for killing others and "rich" people are held to a higher moral standard?

__________________
The above is my opinion and in no way reflects the views of this website.

Sandok

Switzerland has a high suicide rate because of guns and they want to stop that. My goverment apparently wants to protect its people, if yours doesn't too bad.

But let's stay on topic, when it comes to guns, they do kill, it's a fact. A machine gun can kill more people than a rock and anyone who says otherwise is either delusional or just I dunno, crazy? Now whether the american population wants to remove guns, wants to change its laws and wants less gun murders/crime, that's another thing but numbers don't lie.

Zelig

I think we should have stricter vehicle controls. Either way, it's a separate issue from the gun debate.

Not if jail isn't a punishment. Progressive education and hefty fines wouldn't put anybody in jail.

__________________
--

Dowaco

lol, hefty fines. We should talk about punishments.

What we are trying to avoid is crime. Sometimes, guns are used by people committing a crime. A robbery, rape, kidnapping, or murder. Many times, the perpetrator kills himself rather than be apprehended. What penalty would be appropriate for using a gun in a murder-kidnapping? I would say the electric chair. Maybe that's why the gunman often kills himself after committing this crime.

Sentences for a felony committed with a gun are much stiffer than the same crime without a gun. Making stricter gun laws will not do anything to deter a criminal from using a gun because they already get harsh penalties when they are caught or they simply kill themselves and save everyone the trouble. Are you advocating the death penalty for using a gun? Because having a fine that a petty thief cannot pay anyway will not be effective. If he had any money, he would not be stealing at gunpoint.

I know its cliche, but more gun laws will only hamper the rights of law abiding citizens. People who use guns to commit crimes are committing crimes after all and we have laws against committing murder, rape, kidnapping and theft. We even make the penalties worse if they used a gun. What more do you want? If you are saying death penalty for using a gun in a crime, then I support that.

What you are saying is if a citizen applies for a permit for a .22, after he gets fingerprinted, has a background check and waits three weeks, he buys the gun and keeps it in a metal box with a trigger lock, but his senile grandfather moves in the next month and when the gun police inspect his house and find he failed to report a mentally impaired individual in his home then he should be heavily fined and sent to a mandatory class to learn gun safety and that will reduce the incidence of gun crime.

Meanwhile, the thug on the street gets a 38 special with no serial numbers, no fingerprints, no age or sanity check, no home inspection, no waiting. He will be using his weapon to commit a crime and nobody knows he has the gun until he uses it. How do you stop that guy with tough laws and harsh penalties?

__________________
The above is my opinion and in no way reflects the views of this website.

mike2h

switzerland has a high suicide rate becuase of guns? is there people going down the street, seeing a gun, & going 'oh my god i cant take it anymore' & killing themselves? guns dont cause suicide. & the same thing as far as suicidal murderers applies here to, if somebody really wants to killl themselves...
& dont get me wrong, if switzerland can make hadguns illegal, more power to them.
why do you keep going on about what the american government/population wants to do about removal of guns? it aint going to happen so quit whipping a dead horse.
whats needed is standardisation of laws & 1 central database that everybody checks. the exisiting laws(with some mods concerning mental health) are more than adequate.
what is really needed is social reform.

__________________

Sandok

Wow you seem to know my country better than me

The suicide rate is high because of guns, the Swiss goverment knows it, the Swiss people know and it nobody questions it because its a fact. Why is it that only Americans bring out the argument, "But if somebody wants to kill himself he can." Do you know how much tougher it is to kill by slashing your wrists for example? People usually have to try three-four times before making a semi-lethal cut. A gun is simple, trigger and end of story.

I said the US isn't going to because the people don't want it, mike, read my posts please. And where did I say we are going to make handguns illegal? We might impose tougher regulations but guns will never be outright banned in this country, so stop reading things that I haven't even mentioned.

cozumel

It is a funny old thing this. Personally I think that no-one should be allowed to possess a firearm except for law enforcement officers. However I also understand the right and freedom to choose is important so I can go with that even if I do think it is wrong.

I don't agree with seatbelt laws and that you have to wear a helmet on a bike and refuse to do either regardless of the fines I end up paying. I consider those laws an infringement on my personal liberties and takes away from my comfort in a car and my enjoyment on a bike. If I die enjoying these rights at least I was permitted to exercise my free will.

Where does this leave me in this debate? My example on seatbelts/helmets only effects my life and does not hurt or injure others whilst guns can kill anyone indiscriminately (including women, children etc)

Reluctantly I would say you can keep the legislation but tighten things up along the lines stated by mike2h. That would reduce the chances of people who pose a potentially high level of risk from being able to carry out outrages simlar to those recently. It may curtail the rights of a small minority (like anti-terrism legislation) but does make sense and hopefully would reduce the unecessary deaths that blight society.

__________________

mike2h

you have got to be kidding. you claim your government & your whole population thinks suicide is going to drastically decline if you make guns harder to get? i beleive that about you but not the rest. i can see a small decline, due to people killing themselves that werent really 100% but it is NOT going to stop anybody that really wants to die. & your wrist slashing thing is just pathetic. very few suicides are succesful from wrist slashing, this is almost always a cry for help rather than a full on suicide attempt. as far as you getting bent out of shape over me misreading your comments on switzerlands gun control, im sorry, but then again, i thought it was good thing & said as much if that is what they were actually doing. so chill.
maybe im missing something on your whole switzerland gun control/suicide thing. does everybody there own a gun? cause in my 13+ years of working in surgery i have seen 9 succedful suicide attempts come through(obviously they werent dead at scene) only 1 was with gun. now i got curious & called a freind whose dad runs the coroners office. i did this cause you got figure the succesful suicides we didnt see would be gun related. turns out this isnt true either, though it is higher than my 8-1. the highest was pills/alchohol, wich really does make sense(this was 2-3 years ago s othings might be skewed a little different now).
while better gun control laws are a good thing(to a point), it is the underlying issues that really matter. & im surte your government & most swiss realise this.
bty guns arent a guarantee either, people fk that one up fairly often. at least over here they do.

__________________

Sandok

It's a given fact, the less guns we have the lower the suicide rate becomes... This isn't America. Every criminologist here has made the link and there isn't any "argument" to be done, in this country, the astonishing suicide rate is because of the high number of guns.

And every man who is a Swiss passport holder and does the Army (thus everyone because it's obligatory) owns a gun. That's about 33% of all households. And these aren't handguns, but fully fledge Sigs.

Just for your info, since it's interesting, I'll tell you a bit about our gun regulations. Everyone who owns a gun must keep it in a locked safe / military briefcase with a code as to not let anyone else access it. Secondly, the bullets can never be stored in teh same area as the weapon, as to reduce "rages" of anger and such. And guess what, it works quite well given our murders per capita with firearms is quite low. I don't see why the US can't adopt such a system, because we haven't lost our rights and still own some damn powerful machine guns. And trust me, nobody here things that the guns aren't the cause of the suicides, it's a well known fact here ever since guns have been given to the population. Each and every reform, the number of soliders / gun armement has gone down over the years and surprisngly, from the moment the changes take place, so do the suicides. That's a direct correlation.

Zelig

Can you link anything for this?

I've googled it, and can only find links between gun ownership and firearm suicide, not suicide rates in general.

__________________
--

Dowaco

So why with all the illegal guns floating around in the gun toting US of A is the suicide rate so much lower than in Switzerland? I noticed you said "...in this country...' could it be that different countries have different cultures and you cannot superimpose values from one to the other? New Zealand has lots of suicides but not a lot of gun killings. What works for one country may not be right for another.

__________________
The above is my opinion and in no way reflects the views of this website.

mike2h

thx for the info sandok, was interesting. looks like you got some good laws in place for the storage of guns. i d be interested t oknow if the sig is the most common weapon used in theses suicides.
not to be rude, & maybe im wrong, but the amount if guns isnt the problem, though it does contibute to facillitation. your country has some underlying problem that leads to people WANTING to commit suicide. for whatever reason you & your country(at least according to you) seem to be ignoring this. reducing the amount of readily available guns will help some(but i think minimally). you have similar problems to us, guns all over & social issues. not saying they r the same but the parallel is there. unfortunaley looks like your country is dealing with its problem in a somewhat similar fashion as ours. & it aint going to work, at least in any way that really matters. hoping im wrong on both counts, but dont think so.
again, thx for the info.

__________________

mike2h

ty. good post. tried to say something similar in a post in another related thread but it did not come out nearly so well as you put it.
bty spent a few months in auckland many years ago. absolutley love nz. if i was going t olive in another non tropical country nz would be it.

__________________

Sandok

http://www.guncontrol.ca/Content/international.html

Scroll down to the Swizterland part and read, it explains a bit. If you want other links, I'd gladely give em but they are either in German or French

Nothing will ever be a 100% comparable but there is still such a thing as a good compraison (England and USA) and a bad comparaison (Iraq and USA).

If I remember well, the sig is the most used weapon in suicides but I'll have to look it up again.

As for reducing the amount of guns, you must know that a long time ago, over 60% of houses had guns and that has been reduced by half. Suicides were also greatly affected (not half but close enough). I won't lie that there isn't an underlying problem mostly in the form (for teenagers and such) of a very very very harsh and difficult education system (you are chosen at the age of 12 whether or not, for the rest of your life you'll be allowed to do Universtiy and all (that's in general, if you want tons of details, I can explain).

And thank you for saying there is a parrelel, you're the first person to finally agree with me Though I will say, our gun murder rate is about fourteen times lower than the US one, so there is still an important difference somewhere. Now where does it come from? Society or strict gun control? That's the question!

Zelig

Yes, that's one of the sites I googled. It only mentions gun suicide, not overall suicides. If guns are removed, and people start jumping off of bridges instead, the situation hasn't improved much.

Feel free to link up French sites, I'm a native French speaker.

__________________
--

Sandok

Glad to hear that

Here are some articles on general suicides and if ever, a goverment report too.

http://info.rsr.ch/fr/rsr.html?siteS...=1117030836000

http://www.lagruyere.ch/archives/200.../editorial.htm

http://www.stopsuicide.ch/sources/loiCH/RapportCF.pdf

Maddogg6

Yup - this is the sentiment of most cops I talk to...except, I hear communist as much as 'socialist'.
'They'll have to pry it from my cold dead hands' - is also very common to hear from a cop.

Currently, its not uncommon for 1st offenders to brandish a weapon during a otherwise petty robbery to get only fine+probation (for a felony). 4-6 months if 2nd offense... hell - thats a vacation for the hardened convicts (3 meals and TV woohoo, they never had it sooo good) BUT its devastating 'lesson' to learn for an honest person.
Our legal system is all about 'corrections' - right? its not a 'prison' - its a 'correctional facility'.

So you see - the punishments - for 'honest people' compared to 'criminals' - is either harsh enough (or too harsh even) or too soft. Thats the biggest problem. IMO

Proposed changes: (of illegal non-lethal gun use)
1st offense - big fine+probation
2nd offense - Big Fine + (real) 2 years minimum
Plus additional charges of course.... but, none of that 'off in 9 months with good behavior' crap either...

Whats the chances of an 'crook' making that same 'mistake' twice now??
Im pretty sure the honest guy will learn his lesson on 1st offense.

The US has NO shortages on 'laws' - the shortages are on enforcement and punishments, and thus many laws become 'optional' for law enforcement.
example is the turn signal law - I see it used more as a 'moral questionable' tactic for police to pull over cars just to 'snoop' (look for drugs/booze etc..) the police would otherwise have no just cause to pull over (and deal with racial accusations etc..)
So if you *think* a law will be enforced in an effective way - maybe - maybe not. No it depends on the individual - which introduces additional subjectivity - which opens the door for more dictatorship behavior.
Ie.. 'I will enforce this law on you, but not you' - cant say I love the idea about that - Actually Id rather live with the occasional Viginia Tech incidents - sorry if that sounds cold...

pro gun control: 'The gov't protects you, you don't need a gun'
anti-gun control: 'But how do I protect myself from the gov't?'
- remember, this is HOW the US was founded - escaping a gov't - and all their restrictive laws and controls. Which btw - we are slowly heading back toward with each restriction/law passed.

Communism, and rogue military/politicians - are NOT such a distant memory for me to entrust someone else for my personal protection 100%.

You may say: 'Communism/rogue military could never happen in the US'
- Yup - and thats thanks to our guns on the street.
Do (greedy) people really change that much that we should forget our history? No, and I won't.

Thousands (or millions) enslaved vs hundreds dead... to me the decision is simple, and its already been made by our forefathers in our constitution - and was demonstrated when our forefathers fought for and died to give us our now diminishing freedoms.