The Great Gun Control Debate

[R.O.S]

Yay, my turn to add to the never ending thread. This I copied from a post I did a while back on my car forum.

I do believe that every mentally stable, and responsible individual (has no criminal record) has the RIGHT to have a firearm. I also believe that firearms do not kill people, the TRUE source of crime is lack of education, poverty, and no sense of community, that in part pushes to people kiling people. I don't blind myself also that a educated and wealthy person is incapable of killing, I just mean that if anyone wants the roots of MOST crimes this is them. 

My Evidence: My opinions do not go without much research. Let me state the following to engrave my ideas. The nation that will push my idea forward is the Swiss Confederation (Switzerland). With a population of 7.5 million, it is a nation that is divided by culture and language (French and German). It is a nation where catholics and protestants are the major religions (about 40% each, it has an athiest community of about 9). So with all these divisions... should switzerland not see some ethnic/religious tensions... the answer is NO. Unemployment is very low, as is poverty. The education level is very high. So what make switzerland so popular? Well, the swiss militia system that able bodied males (this includes mental state( and people with no criminal record are subdued to 22 years of service... officers have longer terms. So normally they get 15 weeks of training, and every two years 3 weeks of of training (PAID woohoo). So still why is this nation so important to my argument, well, each person in the militia is given a M-57 assualt rifle and 24 rounds of ammunition, and they HAVE to keep it in their home, for national protection.

So with all these guns (not pistols, but assualt rifles) crime should be extremely high..................WRONG. Gun homocide is lower then in CANADA, altough suicide is high, buts that is a whole different issue. Crimes are also very low, most are done by foreigners (thief tourists. Do not think I believe that violence hear in Canada is foreigners, I am an immigrant). No wonder crime is low, you wouldn't want to rob a house that has a assualt rifle lock and loaded.

In Canada, we have around 29% of households with registered guns... the USA around 36. We are not that behind our friends in the south, but somehow the USA manages to exceed our gun homocide by a lot. When I mean a lot, look at the statistics (this are stats that I collected around a two years ago for a paper, they may have changed)

Canada Homocide with gun .6 per 100, 000.
USA Homocide with gun 6.24 per 100,000

But again this comes to my three valuable rules, that if these factors exist, then crime will exist, whether or not a firearm is present.
- poverty
- lack of education
- no sense of community

People kill people, and to minimize this the three areas explained are most likely the roots of such actions, but not always.

Thanks for reading. 

 

[Greymatters]

- There are so many gun owners who have their heads up their arse about this...

Unfortunately there are just as many 'anti-gun' types with the same problem...

 

[Snaketnk]

In Canada, we have around 29% of households with registered guns... the USA around 36. We are not that behind our friends in the south, but somehow the USA manages to exceed our gun homocide by a lot. When I mean a lot, look at the statistics (this are stats that I collected around a two years ago for a paper, they may have changed)

Canada Homocide with gun .6 per 100, 000.
USA Homocide with gun 6.24 per 100,000

I understand you did the research a couple of years ago, but regardless, would you happen to have your sources? This a compelling figure I'd like to bring up at some point in the future.

 

[redleafjumper]

For the information of the firearms folks on this thread, National Firearms Association President David A. Tomlinson passed away Tuesday evening after a short illness.  Dave was in the army in the 1950's and also in the RCAF as a junior officer.  Here are some of the comments about Dave from NFA officials. 

Redleafjumper

Here is a copy of the information put out by the NFA VP Communications, Blair Hagen.  As you can imagine we are all shocked by Dave's passing and our sympathies are very much with the Tomlinson family,

The true measure of Dave's legacy will be the strength of the organization that now mourns his passing and restructures to meet the challenges that remain. While Dave and I had our disagreements over the years, we shared some victories and I have always respected his vigour, commitment, and ornery stubbornness in his defence of Canadian firearm owners.



Sheldon Clare

BC Branch NFA



NFA David A Tomlinson Has Passed


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

David A Tomlinson, President of the National Firearms Association, passed away in Edmonton on the evening of September 18, 2007 after a short illness.

It goes without saying that David Tomlinson had a deep impact on firearms politics and legislation in Canada, beginning in the 1970's with the FARO group, through the first incarnation of National Firearms Association in 1978, and from 1984 to present as President and Legal Advisor to the National Firearms Association of Canada.

David Tomlinson was one of the few Canadians to foresee the ever increasing agenda of civil disarmament, identify it, and warn the Canadian firearms community of its implications. In the early days of this struggle, Dave was routinely marginalized and dismissed for his views. Gradually though, and especially after the Liberal gun bill of 1995 - Bill C68, Dave's views had become accepted as fact. They had finally become mainstream thought in the firearms community of Canada.

Dave Tomlinson's investment in study and analysis of government firearms control laws and the political system revolutionized the way the Canadian firearms community approached the courts and legislatures in Ottawa, and all across Canada.

David Tomlinson's unique analysis challenged all of us to "think outside of the box" in regards to the legal and political challenges that faced us. He showed that there was another way, a light at the end of the tunnel, an alternative to the specter of a political and cultural end to the firearms community and the Canadian traditions of hunting and targets sports, the effective means of self defense, and the ownership of firearms in Canada.

Dave's massive legal library on precedent and guidance on defences against unwarranted Firearms Act charges was routinely placed at the disposal of the firearms community, as was Dave himself. His selfless assistance to those who have run afoul of our punitive, misdirected and broken firearms laws was done not only to benefit individuals, but the entire firearms community of Canada as a whole in the pursuit of natural justice for firearms owners.

That massive legal library remains as Dave's legacy, and will continue to be put at the disposal of the firearms community, even though Dave can no longer be.

When the horrors of "Universal Registration" and the Chretien/Allan Rock Liberal agenda on gun control were visited on us during the dark days of 1994/1995, the fear and alarm that manifested itself in the firearms community was quite understandable. This was a day few thought would ever come, and all knew the implications if the firearms community simply accepted it as inevitable or irresistible. A great fear encompassed many, but not Dave Tomlinson.

Dave had happily predicted that if the Liberals or any government actually went through with the idea of "universal registration" the resulting costs and bureaucracy would be so immense that a national scandal on the scale seldom seen in Canada would result. He predicted that any such scheme could not be delivered on time, on target or on budget. He was to be proven right.

After the C68 Firearms Act was passed by Parliament in 1995, Dave threw himself into picking it apart and analyzing every aspect of its convoluted and poorly drafted regulations. From this day, it was Dave Tomlinson and the National Firearms Association's firm mandate to wreck it from the inside and the outside, in the courts, in the legislatures, and in the court of public opinion. By showing the firearms community the ways it could be effectively resisted, undermined and finally stopped.

It now appears that Dave may have achieved just exactly that. The Liberal Firearms Act is widely recognized as a failure, it has been thoroughly marginalized politically with only it's authors and the gun control lobby still championing it, and it is due for replacement by the present Conservative government when it is politically possible to do so.

Dave developed an alternative to the failed gun control agenda's of the past. Based on the "Sportsman's Principles" of the FARO group of the 1970's, Dave developed the National Firearms Association's "Practical Firearms Control System. A system that takes the power of the bureaucracy over legitimate, law abiding firearms owners, and instead invests that power for training and vetting new firearms owners in the firearms community of Canada itself, where it belongs.

Dave's road map for defeating this most heinous piece of legislation gave many hope for the future. I think it did the same for you.

Today, I celebrate the life of Dave Tomlinson, and we all can stand assured that as we go forward in replacing the Firearms Act and reclaiming our rights, that it is Dave Tomlinson's wisdom, guidance and vision which has in a very great way brought us to this point, and which will continue to serve us as we advance in the future.


David A. Tomlinson
National President
National Firearms Association of Canada

We will not see another like him.    :'(



Blair Hagen

National VP Communications

NFA

 

[retiredgrunt45]

In Canada, we have around 29% of households with registered guns... the USA around 36. We are not that behind our friends in the south, but somehow the USA manages to exceed our gun homicide by a lot. When I mean a lot, look at the statistics (this are stats that I collected around a two years ago for a paper, they may have changed)

Canada Homicide with gun .6 per 100, 000.
USA Homicide with gun 6.24 per 100,000

If these figures are accurate, do the math.

36% of 300,000,000 US. is 108,000,000 registered firearms
29% of  33,000,000 CAN. is  9,570,000 registered firearms.

The US are far ahead of us in gun ownership. When you look at the population difference, there are 85% more firearms in the US as there are in Canada.

And if you look on average per capita, that's a lot of guns in Canada for our population, but no where near as many as in the US, were over a 1/4 of the population has a registered firearm, not to mention all the illegal ones floating around, that adds up to an awfull lot of guns.

 

[Rowshambow]

yes, but what kind of guns? In the states most people can own assault rifles etc....in canada it would mostly be long rifles! it would be inyeresting to see how many long rifles are in the US, compared to Canada?

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Actually not that many own "assault rifles" an assault rifle is a automatic firearm firing an intermediate cartridge. An SKSD may "look" like an assault rifle but it is not. In fact a Lee Enfield fires a bullet more powerful than the SKS or AK-47, funny how they never get called a "sniper rifle". As for Machine guns and such most of those for sale start at $7,000-10,000 and quickly go up to $25,000-75,000 for the cool stuff. You have to rob the bank first before you can get one.

Just as in Canada, firearm homicides are in clusters, and those clusters do not correspond with areas of high legal ownership. In fact Chicago and Washington have very strict laws and very high homicide rates.

http://chicago.about.com/cs/governmen1/a/2003_murders.htm

 

[KevinB]

yes, but what kind of guns? In the states most people can own assault rifles etc....in canada it would mostly be long rifles! it would be inyeresting to see how many long rifles are in the US, compared to Canada?

:

As Colin pointed out - most "assault rifles" as you call them actually fall into your "long gun" catagory.

  An old M16A1 goes for around 15k - and upwards of 25 for excellent condition...  People who collect this stuff are not criminals.

 

[Loachman]

If these figures are accurate, do the math.

36% of 300,000,000 US. is 108,000,000 registered firearms
29% of  33,000,000 CAN. is   9,570,000 registered firearms.

The US are far ahead of us in gun ownership. When you look at the population difference, there are 85% more firearms in the US as there are in Canada.

And if you look on average per capita, that's a lot of guns in Canada for our population, but no where near as many as in the US, were over a 1/4 of the population has a registered firearm, not to mention all the illegal ones floating around, that adds up to an awfull lot of guns.

He was talking about households, not people.

And there is no national firearms registry or anything like it in the US. Some municipalities, notably New York, maintain one. Lawful ownership should not be confused with registration.

Earlier estimates of legal firearms ownership in Canada vary from 5,000,0000 to 7,000,000 owners with 15,000,000 to 21,000,000 firearms. A couple of Lieberal-sponsored badly-flawed telephone surveys hugely low-balled this, and they maintained the inaccuracy intentionally because it made compliance appear far better than it really was. The flaw behind the surveys was simple: if you were a firearms owner and a complete stranger called you and asked if you owned any firearms and how many, and further inquired about your storage habits etcetera, what would you say? The majority refused to answer, because they didn't want anybody, especially a rightfully-distrusted government or potential criminals, knowing what they had and where they kept it/them.

The higher firearms numbers were based upon import/export records and the ratio of restricted to nonrestricted sales, which had historically hovered around 20:1. There were over 1,000,000 entries in the old restricted weapons registry, which indicates that a further 20,000,000 nonrestricted firearms were in private hands.

There is not so great a difference in US and Canadian ownership numbers as many would believe.

The US has a higher homicide rate than Canada, even with firearms-related homicides removed. There are a number of historical factors behind this, as well as the more recent inner-city gang phenomena that fortunately has not quite caught on here to the same degree.

Firearm-related as well as overall homicide rates are not homogenous across the US, either, but vary widely by jurisdiction. They tend to be higher in cities, the natural habitat of youth gangs, and lower in rural areas. Cities, especially the larger ones, tend to restrict legal firearms ownership as well, which further increases their violent crime rates; those jurisdictions with the least impediment to lawful firearms access, ownership, and carry enjoy significantly lower rates than those cities that constantly compete for Murder Capital of the US. Some of those states, such as North Dakota and Vermont, have lower murder rates than their neighbouring Canadian provinces.

 

[retiredgrunt45]

OK, households, they still have much more than we do.

 

[a_majoor]

More fun with numbers:

http://mesopotamiawest.blogspot.com/2007/09/crime-myths-and-facts.html

Crime, Myths and Facts

Canada's national crime rate for violent crime last year was 951 per 100,000 people. It was the same the previous year. Is that good or bad? Let's check how Canada compares to that violent, gun-toting country next door, the United States. America's national crime rate for violent crime in 2004 was 465.5 offenses per 100,000 people, less than half as much.

Who would have guessed given all the smoke thrown over this issue by former Prime Minister Paul Martin, Toronto Mayor David Miller and BC Solicitor General John Les, among others? They left me -- and most other Canadians -- with the impression the American system was a failure, that violent crime was rampant south of the border due to lax gun laws and an excessive reliance on incarceration.

In fact, it's the Canadian system that's a failure. We have a dangerous, violent country on our hands and nobody wants to talk about it. Maybe we should.

Maybe we should ask a Liberal -- any will do, they're all responsible -- just exactly how the long gun registry, the handgun registry, the Firearms act, the Firearms bureaucracy, the gun 'amnestys', the police photo-ops, the firearms prohibition orders, the demonizing of firearm owners by the Coalition for Gun Control; maybe we should ask them what that was all about given that none of it works. Or rather that it works in reverse; more gun control, more violent crime.

In fact, the whole anti-gun thing is a massive intellectual fraud perpetrated on the public by a small group of fearful and misguided women's rights advocates and their opportunistic Liberal and NDP political followers.

I'll have more to say on this later tomorrow, something similar but different from this article on NewsMax. I'll talk about symbolism vs reality. I'll mention immigration (yes, Islam rears its head once again). I'll discuss the ongoing epidemic of home invasions across the country. I'll talk about your personal responsibility to yourself and your family.

If you'd like something else to read in the meantime, check this speech bu the Honourable Iona Campagnolo, Lieutenant Governor of BC on the occasion of 'The National Day of Commemoration and Action on Violence Against Women." Ask yourself when you get to the reference on "tragedies of vicious powerlessness" exactly why the women involved were powerless.

Sleep tight.

 

[TCBF]

If these figures are accurate, do the math.

36% of 300,000,000 US. is 108,000,000 registered firearms
29% of  33,000,000 CAN. is   9,570,000 registered firearms.

The US are far ahead of us in gun ownership. When you look at the population difference, there are 85% more firearms in the US as there are in Canada.

And if you look on average per capita, that's a lot of guns in Canada for our population, but no where near as many as in the US, were over a 1/4 of the population has a registered firearm, not to mention all the illegal ones floating around, that adds up to an awfull lot of guns.

- if per capita ownership of firearms was any cause for crime, Switzerland would be the most violent place on Earth.

- But it isn't - in fact, in Switzerland, every able bodied male under fifty is a Reservist and keeps his AUTOMATIC rifle at home with his first line ammunitoion.  Amazingly, it is a very law abiding country.

- You state " has a registered firearm, not to mention all the illegal ones floating around, that adds up to an awfull lot of guns." thus insinuating that an unregistered gun is an illegal gun in the US.  You have a lot to learn.  Even in Canada, few guns required registration until 1999. 

- If you remove the statistical anomalies of the drug ridden urban ghettos in the major US cities, American and Canadian homicide rates are comparable.

 

[Fishbone Jones]

Speaks to the whole political approach to the matter

 

[Rowshambow]

I didn't mean to be condescending or anything like that, what I meant was I wondered if there are any actual facts to show what percentages of the guns are long rifles (i.e. shotguns, hunting rifle, and assault rifles) and what percentages are pistols. I know in Canada a collector can have an assault rifle, but in the States you can use them to hunt. So even though they might have a higher percentage of assault rifles, we in Canada (with our supposed harder laws) have more higher gun crime stats with the more common hunting rifle, or shot gun. I am not against guns, I would love to be able to buy a pistol, The only beef I have, is being able to carry a concealed pistol around! That is all I don't agree with!

 

[redleafjumper]

Probably the most comprehensive study of Canadian firearms ownership was the 1976 Stenning and Moyer survey:

Stenning, Philip C., and Sharon Moyer.  Firearms Ownership and Use in Canada: A report of Survey Findings, 1976.  Toronto: Centre of Criminology, University of Toronto, 1981.

While the information is certainly dated, it has a number of very interesting results.  Table 12 on page 28 of the 215 page report is most revealing. It shows (27) “…that approximately 1 in 12 Canadians own at least one shotgun, 1 in 9 Canadian own at least one rifle, and that only 1% of all Canadians report owning handguns." 

Table 12 Estimated Firearms Owners in Canada, by Types of Weapons Owned, 1976 (rounded to 000’s)

                #             % of Total  Gun Owners                % of Total Population
                                                                                                      


Owns one or more shotgun(s) 1,362,000 55.3   8.1

Owns one or more rifle(s) 1,870,000 76.0 11.1

Owns one or more handgun(s)                    164,000   6.7   1.0

Owns one or more other firearm(s)       24,000   1.0   0.1

Total       2,462,000           14.6

Now if one is to consider this information based on current population and make a few assumptions (which is all that they would be without a modern equivalent survey), One may come up with some interesting figures based on the population of Canada as at the last census.  The main assumption could be that the figures remain constant in terms of percentage of population.  It should be realized that since the changes to the law from the 1970s to present it appears that more people report owning handguns than were indicated in the survey which discarded some results which appeared to skew some averages.

The report indicated that British Columbia and particularly Vancouver had high rates of ownership when compared with the rest of the country (56).  The interesting fact pointed out is that in 1976 about 1 in 7 ( 14.6%) Canadians over the age of 16 owned a firearm.  If extrapolated to the current population of 33,390,147 or so(which again is an assumption), then there are some 4,770,021 firearms owners in Canada.  It is possible that some of the data is incomplete as at the time there was some publicity regarding new firearm laws and there were no doubt some people who were not truthful in responding to the survey. How many firearms would this mean?  In 1976 it meant approximately 16,914,000 (Table 14, page 32) firearms of all types in the country.  How many does it mean now?  Probably a similar ratio (again an assumption) would be useful.   Firearms are very durable and with imports and exports considered, there are not likely fewer than 21,000,000.  This is far less than have been registered in the country’s newest version of the firearm registration program. 

Food for thought.

Cheers,

 

[redleafjumper]

One little change, the last line should read "...This is far more than have been registered in the..." , rather than:

This is far fewer than have been registered in the country’s newest version of the firearm registration program. 

Cheers,

 

[rw4th]

If these figures are accurate, do the math.

36% of 300,000,000 US. is 108,000,000 registered firearms
29% of  33,000,000 CAN. is  9,570,000 registered firearms.

The US are far ahead of us in gun ownership. When you look at the population difference, there are 85% more firearms in the US as there are in Canada.

And if you look on average per capita, that's a lot of guns in Canada for our population, but no where near as many as in the US, were over a 1/4 of the population has a registered firearm, not to mention all the illegal ones floating around, that adds up to an awfull lot of guns.

1/4 is 25%, both 29 and 36 are numbers that are greater then 25.

 

[rw4th]

The only beef I have, is being able to carry a concealed pistol around! That is all I don't agree with!

Please explain to rest of us the process you used to come to the conclusion that this is a bad thing.

 

[KevinB]

I didn't mean to be condescending or anything like that, what I meant was I wondered if there are any actual facts to show what percentages of the guns are long rifles (i.e. shotguns, hunting rifle, and assault rifles) and what percentages are pistols. I know in Canada a collector can have an assault rifle, but in the States you can use them to hunt. So even though they might have a higher percentage of assault rifles, we in Canada (with our supposed harder laws) have more higher gun crime stats with the more common hunting rifle, or shot gun. I am not against guns, I would love to be able to buy a pistol, The only beef I have, is being able to carry a concealed pistol around! That is all I don't agree with!

Your sadly missing a lot of facts.

In the US the 1934 National Firearms Act created a legal catagory of NFA weapons, to wit, SBR's (Short barrel rifles with a barrel length of less than 16"), SBS's (Short Barrel Shotguns), Destructive Devices (Explosives and firearms with a bore larger than 10ga.), AOW's (Any Other Weapon - bizzare, but basically some devices that where abstractly added - pengun's, pistol grip short shotguns, etc.),  Machine Guns (select fire weapons), and Silencers (Suppressors or other devices that mask or alter the report of the round being fired)
  The 1968 and 1986 Gun Control Acts added more caveats and restrictions (no new foreign machine guns in 1968, as well as an amnesty for previosuly unregistred machine guns etc., and the 1986 act made no new machineguns availabel for the public).  The fee for the above is $200 and finger printing and signature of a Chief of a Law Enforcement Agency in your area (only $5 for AOW's). 

To date the ONLY registered machinegun used in a crime in the US was a deranged policeman who shot his ex-wife.

Secondly as for concealed firearms -- why not? Statistically law abiding gun owners are much greater adherants to law and order.  Criminals will carry concealed anyway.



 

 

[rw4th]

Secondly as for concealed firearms -- why not? Statistically law abiding gun owners are much greater adherants to law and order.  Criminals will carry concealed anyway.

I predict his argument will revolve around people "not needing" to and shades of "feeling safe" with no supporting evidence besides "common sense".