Atropos wrote:

This site shows some interesting trends. The US does have many times more homicides than the UK(in youth specifically), but Britain has more rapes, more assaults, more crime victims, and more drug crimes than the United States.
Can we agree that there is no perfect model for crime prevention in the world today?

I quietly wonder if the UK's higher assault rate is to a certain extent misleading. If casual violence in America is so widespread, it just might have reached a certain point where people just don't bother reporting comparatively minor- and I emphasise comparatively here- crimes because they know well in advance that the already swamped courts simply can't/won't help them. Someone gets hurt, they pick themselves up again and brush the dust off, consider their chances of getting anywhere in the legal system, ultimately decide that it's pointless, opt to just recover by themselves, and try to get on with living.

Obviously this is purely speculation on my part. However this sort of thing does happen in Australia. Most of the really high profile reports come from remote Aboriginal communities, but there are other places where this happens.

For myself, I don't have access to any information that isn't Googlable; my alma maters don't pay for database access for alumni.  My best understanding is that if you have access to academic journals, if your goal is to find evidence that gun control either deters or does not deter violent crime, you can easily find a peer-reviewed study that does just that.  And if your goal is to find fatal methodological errors in the other guy's peer-reviewed study, you can do that too.  Sociology is often fuzzy, especially on politically charged topics.

Fortunately, not everything is behind a paywall, and primary sources -- when they exist -- are usually public.  The FBI's Uniform Crime Reports are indispensable for research on crime in America.  More internationally, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime does good biennial surveys of member nations, which are available here.  As for local statutes, most (all?) states have an online statute book, though some are easier to search and others are harder.

But I don't know whether it's really true that an average person needs to know about a great deal about gun crime and gun control in order to improve the state of things.  You don't need to be an expert to feel pretty sure that civilians don't need to own assault weapons.  And anyway, isn't that why we have elected representatives?  I don't know a damn thing about, for example, waterway management; that's what I pay my Congressman for.

satyreyes wrote:

For myself, I don't have access to any information that isn't Googlable; my alma maters don't pay for database access for alumni.  My best understanding is that if you have access to academic journals, if your goal is to find evidence that gun control either deters or does not deter violent crime, you can easily find a peer-reviewed study that does just that.  And if your goal is to find fatal methodological errors in the other guy's peer-reviewed study, you can do that too.  Sociology is often fuzzy, especially on politically charged topics.

Fortunately, not everything is behind a paywall, and primary sources -- when they exist -- are usually public.  The FBI's Uniform Crime Reports are indispensable for research on crime in America.  More internationally, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime does good biennial surveys of member nations, which are available here.  As for local statutes, most (all?) states have an online statute book, though some are easier to search and others are harder.

But I don't know whether it's really true that an average person needs to know about a great deal about gun crime and gun control in order to improve the state of things.  You don't need to be an expert to feel pretty sure that civilians don't need to own assault weapons.  And anyway, isn't that why we have elected representatives?  I don't know a damn thing about, for example, waterway management; that's what I pay my Congressman for.

Well, there's the knowledge that assault weapons are not necessary, but there is also the knowledge, only gained (arguably) from academic resources, that we tried a Federal level assault weapons ban (for ten years) and it didn't work.  Violent crime lowered, but it couldn't be linked to the ban (had more to do with incarceration, aging out and the crack cocaine markets), most especially since the ban itself actually led to an increase in assault weapons in both legit and illegal markets.  You could argue this is because the ban had a butt-stupid grandfather clause built in and was easy to loophole, but you also have to consider that just as with handguns, there is already a massive inventory of assault weapons in the United States, and that assault weapons are used in a tiny amount of gun crime.  It doesn't seem to be the case when every mass shooting makes headlines.  Assault weapons bans are usually just done because they are straightforward sounding and politically appealing.  Conceal and carry laws are far more complex and differ from state to state, and changes to them can be harder for lawmakers to make happen.  Even when crime isn't a popular and topical political platform, most representatives only make the safest of choices regarding it, hence why it can be kind of stagnant.  No one wants to talk about the gun control policy that focuses on handguns, especially if it suits neither side of the typical heated debate, just like no one wants to ever dare suggest we cut back on prison and shit or offer college level education for inmates, despite all the research and experience showing that incarceration increases crime and nothing cuts down on recidivism quite like the ability to get a job.   

Do I actually care about the pain one would suffer not being allowed to own an assault weapon?  Not one bit.  But I do feel talk concerning assault weapons can sometimes lead to the public overlooking ways to effectively regulate the guns that do the most harm and break the connection between primary and secondary gun markets.   

But I only know any of this because of my college study*.  If criminal law and procedure is so hugely influenced by public opinion it's worth figuring out just what information the public has any reasonable access to and what is shaping its attitudes.



*Sources, a good portion of which I used EBSCO and JSTOR to gain access to.  Also ignore the quality of the citations, especially on the legislation.  APA and government documents aren't always sexy with each other.  That and my professors don't give a shit.  ....



Blumstein, A. (2006). The crime drop in America: an exploration of some recent crime trends. 
     Journal of Scandinavian Studies in Criminology & Crime Prevention, 17-35.
Gimpe, J.G, & Wolpert, R.M (1998). Self-Interest, symbolic politics, and public attitudes toward
     gun control.  Political Behavior, 20(3) 241-262.
H.R. 1022--110th Congress: Assault Weapons Ban and Law Enforcement Protection Act
     of 2007. In GovTrack.us (database of federal legislation). Retrieved October 20, 2012, from   
     http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/110/hr1022
H.R. 6257--110th Congress: Assault Weapons Ban Reauthorization Act of 2008. In
     GovTrack.us (database of federal legislation). Retrieved October 20, 2012, from
     http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/110/hr6257
H.R. 3355--103rd Congress: Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994.
     In GovTrack.us (database of federal legislation). Retrieved October 03, 2012, from   
     http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/103/hr3355
Koper, C. S., & Roth, J. A. (2001). The impact of the 1994 Federal Assault Weapon Ban on Gun
    violence outcomes: An assessment of multiple outcome measures and some lessons
    for policy evaluation. Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 17(1), 33.
Koper, C. S., & Roth, J. A. (2002). The impact of the 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban on                   
    gun markets: An assessment of short-term primary and secondary market effects.
    Journal of Quantitative Criminology, 18(3), 239-266.
Kwon, I. G., & Baack, D. W. (2005). The effectiveness of legislation controlling gun usage.     
    American Journal of Economics & Sociology, 64(2), 533-547.
Medoff, M. H., & Dennis, C. (1995). The impact of legislator and constituency ideology on
     voting on the assault weapons ban. Journal of Socio-Economics, 24(4), 585.
Moore, M. H. (1983). The bird in hand: A feasible strategy for gun control. Journal of Policy   
     Analysis and Management, 2(2), 185-195.
Singh, R. (n.d). Gun politics in America: Continuity and change. Parliamentary Affairs, 52(1),1.
Smith, T.W (2002).  Public opinion about gun policies. The Future of Children, 12(2) 154-163.
U.S Department of Justice –Federal Bureau of Investigation (2011).  Crime in the United States,
      2010.  Uniform Crime Report.

Last edited by OnlyInThisLight (12-26-2012 10:56:17 PM)

I'm mostly pretty liberal but I do think we have the right to bear arms. The trouble is the media only shows extremists and, well, people who look like they're from the boondocks.  Not all of us are idiots who believe anybody should have a gun. In fact, it's quite the opposite. Guns are tools, not toys, and anybody who is not capable of using it properly should not have one plain and simple. I do not trust myself with one due to my bipolar disorder. If God forbid I get off my medication and got hold of a weapon I can be dangerous. 

   It seems to me we're not conducting background checks well enough. Look at the young man who killed those poor people in Aurora, Colorado. There was obviously something wrong with him. We saw the warning signs but nobody did anything. I've said it before and I'll say it again. Guns don't kill people.  People kill people.

I really did not want to get involved in this thread, because I'm no American. Regardless...

Dazmi wrote:

If you ask me, just outlaw armed guns. Because whatever, I don't think it matters. Sorry that I can't offer a more compelling viewpoint, but it's as simple as that.

Atropos wrote:

^'xactly. If someone wants to kill people, there's not much the government can do in the way of legislation to stop them. It's the double-edged sword of human resilience. Therefore, the solution is not to attack the guns themselves, but to attack the causes behind violence.

I agree with both. It's funny, but I agree that there should be both a better control of guns and at the same time a solution in the origin as of why there is violence in the first place. Now, tightening control of guns shouldn't be banning them, but rather, have a control of the people who are going to buy them: say, if they have a criminal record, or have a mental condition, they shouldn't have guns, at least in my opinion. That won't stop them from doing anything, of course: any madman can take a knife and stab many people. Remember that incident in Akihabara: the man used a truck to hit a crowd, got out and then started stabbing people with a dagger, IIRC. Gun regulation in Japan didn't stop him from doing that. But imagine if he would have had, say, a semi-auto rifle or an Uzi from some shop neary: he would have killed many more people.


But that's just one aspect: there's also what I call the "cultural" aspect: people aren't educated well enough. People take others' lives for granted. It's not just humans on humans: there are thousands of cases of animal cruelty, for instance, all because there are either people too sick that think it's "fun" or "cool", or people who themselves suffered violence and are now "biting back" at others, and others who are just apathetic at other beings' suffering. That's not the weapons' problem. That's the people's problem. Or rather's, that's the problem of the sick mentality they have. If people were better educated, both at home and at school, about ethics and values, the problem might (I'm saying might, not will, mind you) be reduced.


I honestly don't know if I'm making much sense, so I'll resume it:

People need to be better educated to care about other people and be tolerant, but at the same time regulate weapons to reduce the incidents involving "crazies".


That's all I'll say about the issue. Like I said, I'm no American, so I'm only using the few tid-bits I get from CNN.

Riri-kins wrote:

There was a recent shooting at a college in my district yesterday.  At first we were scared it was a mass attack but it turned out to be an altercation between two men at the campus library.  It's unnerving to think it could have just as easily been my school.

Are you talking about the one that happened at Lone Star?