Crazed Rabbit vs. Waldinger [legality of handguns]

[Sigurd]

Crazy Rabbit's second rebuttal

The USA has also traditionally had a higher supply of handguns then those two countries.

Can you provide some evidence for this? The US has had a higher rate for many decades, even when gun ownership in Britain was not heavily regulated, as it is now.

That is incorrect. A closer look at the graph you provided will show a more complicated picture. Handgun ownership only began to have a significant increase in the 60s and from the early 60s until about 1973 total homicide and handgun homicide rose accordingly. The rise in homicide from the mid 80s until the early 90s can be attributed to the rise in popularity of crack cocaine. The subsequent decrease in homicide during the 1990s can actually be explained by the legalization of abortion 20 years earlier. Less poor and unwanted babies in the 70s means less violent 18-24 year olds (the statistically most violent age group) in the 1990s. So as you can see there are more important factors in the crime rate then the number of handguns available. Except, of course the increase homicide rate during the late 60s and early 70s which corresponds with the boom in handgun ownership.

What an interesting interpretation. So handgun ownership affects homicide levels when both are increasing, but has no effect when handgun ownership increases while homicides fall? I suppose saying anything else would be admitting that handguns really don’t increase crime. Why, though, do you have such faith a handgun ban will decrease crime?

Insufficient evidence does not mean that they don’t work. It means that the CDC doesn’t have the resources to make a conclusion about whether or not they work. I have insufficient evidence to determine whether or not you are a human. For all I know you could be a robot or you could in fact be a highly intelligent rabbit.

They researched multiple studies to come to the conclusion they reached. Yes, it doesn’t mean it doesn’t work, but it does mean you can not claim to have any evidence that handgun bans will work. Your entire premise rests on an illusion.

If shotguns were better than the criminals would have already switched to them.

The important point here is that criminals will simply use other weapons if they cannot procure handguns. This study shows that their switching to shotguns would result in even more deaths. Criminals, even without handguns, will always manage to get some weapon. A great flaw in your argument seems to be the idea that criminals only commit crime because they have handguns. Crime, of course, has been around for all of history and with all manner of weapons.

Even if you manage to take the handguns out of criminal hands, they will still arm themselves. But law abiding citizens will be at a much greater disadvantage. Like I said before, the victim is statistically less injured when they fight back with a weapon.

You were attempting to back up your assertion by giving it credibility through age. I was merely pointing out that old ideas aren’t always wise. I am arguing that making handguns illegal would lead to less case where self defense was even needed.

Unless you are attempting to argue against the idea of self defense, I don’t see why you need to devote time to such an effort. Or perhaps it is because your other arguments do not hold water.

How do you come to that conclusion, since murder and other violent crimes have dropped as handgun ownership has increased? The majority of states allow citizens to carry concealed weapons if they are not felons and obtain a permit, yet violence has not increased in those states, directly contrary to the claims of anti-gun organizations.

Yes, I admit that MLK was taking about protesting against the government. What do you think that Gandhi wanted those guns for? He would have wanted them to overthrow the British, not to defend himself from criminals. Besides, the nonviolent revolution that resulted partly because of the lack of guns resulted in many fewer deaths than if it was an insurgency with firearms.

Disarming a whole nation, as the British did, is a macrocosm of individual self defense, and as such violates that ‘first law of nature’ on a much greater scale. The nonviolent revolution was only possible because the British were reasonable; far different from the type of mentality that leads to invading a country or assaulting a person.

But the murder rate in Britain is much lower. I would rather be robbed than dead.

I think you’re missing the point of that paragraph; burglars are discouraged by the prospect of running into armed defense and so do not go into houses that are occupied nearly as often as criminals in Britain do. In fact, were the US to have a similar rate of ‘hot’ burglaries, there would be about 450,000 more burglaries per year where the victim was threatened or assaulted. Now simply apply the logic behind burglars not wanting to rob houses with armed residents to muggers and the like. Would they not wish to avoid robbing armed victims?

Perhaps that’s why criminals favor gun control:

"Gun control? It's the best thing you can do for crooks and gangsters. I want you to have nothing. If I'm a bad guy, I'm always gonna have a gun. Safety locks? You pull the trigger with a lock on and I'll pull the trigger. We'll see who wins." (Mobster Sammy "The Bull" Gravano, interviewed by Howard Blum.)

( http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdgbur.html )