paul@phs.UUCP (01/02/85)
Re: murder by different weapons in different countries:
I haven't been following the handgun business in net.politics much
(indeed, I haven't been following net.politics much at all, lately),
so the following may be redundant in parts. Sorry if this is so.
An interesting article about gun control is one by D.B. Kates, Jr.
(1981. Gun control: Can it work? National Review 33 (9): 540-542.)
Among other points touched upon by this article is the cultural
factor:
"...prohibitionists abruptly stopped referring to England
in 1971 with the appearance from Cambridge University of
the first in-depth study of that country's handgun-permit
law. This Cambridge study attributes England's comparatively
low violence wholly to cultural factors, pointing out that
until 1920 England had far fewer gun controls than most
American states. Yet England had far less violence then than
did those states or than England now has. Those who blame
greater handgun availability for our greater rates of
handgun homicide ignore the fact that rates of murder with
knives or without any weapon (i.e., with hands and feet)
are also far lower in England. The study's author has asked
rhetorically whether it is claimed that knives are less
available in England than in the U.S. or that the English have
fewer hands and feet than Americans..."
"European comparisons would be incomplete without mention of
Switzerland, where violence rates are very low though every
man of military age is required to own a handgun or fully
automatic rifle. Israeli violence is similarly low, though
the populace is even more intensively armed. The comparison
to handgun-banning Japan's low homicide rate is plainly
inappropriate because of our totally different culture and
heritage and our substantial ethnic heterogeneity. (The only
valid comparison reinforces the irrelevancy of gun bans: it
is that Japanese-Americans, with full access to handguns, have
a slightly lower homicide rate than their gunless counterparts
in Japan.) An appropriate comparison to Japan might be Taiwan.
Despite even more stringent anti-hangun laws, it has a homicide
rate greater than ours and four times greater than Japan's."
There is more meat in this article, which I leave to the interested
reader. It is apparent that this author seems to have been looking
at somewhat different statistics than have been cited on the net
lately, though clearly some of the confusion arises from data on
incidence vs. rate, etc. No numbers in this brief article; however,
he is also the author of a book which might be informative ("Restricting
Handguns: The Liberal Skeptics Speak Out") and another book in the
works was mentioned.
For now, let me close by citing Kates's own description of
himself, for the benefit of those who feel inclined to disregard
any article appearing in National Review as being necessarily
politically biased: "First, far from representing the 'gun lobby,'
I am a liberal criminologist with a background in civil-rights
law, and a teacher of constitutional and criminal law and criminal
procedure. Unlike those who typically oppose gun bans, I did not
grow up with guns. I am happy to say that neither I nor the rest
of my family has ever hunted. Nor am I going to espouse the Second
Amendment right to keep and bear arms, or argue that people should
own handguns for protection. Assuming that gun owners are completely
wrong on those issues, two more basic questions remain. 1). Can we
disarm the millions who believe that they have both constitutional
right and urgent necessity for a handgun to protect their families?
2) Do the likely benefits of trying to disarm them outweigh the
likely costs?"
Regards, Paul Dolber @ DUMC (...duke!phs!paul).pal@crystal.UUCP (01/03/85)
> [From Paul Dolber] > Re: murder by different weapons in different countries: > [...] > > An interesting article about gun control is one by D.B. Kates, Jr. > (1981. Gun control: Can it work? National Review 33 (9): 540-542.) > Among other points touched upon by this article is the cultural > factor: > > ".... Those who blame > greater handgun availability for our greater rates of > handgun homicide ignore the fact that rates of murder with > knives or without any weapon (i.e., with hands and feet) > are also far lower in England. The study's author has asked > rhetorically whether it is claimed that knives are less > available in England than in the U.S. or that the English have > fewer hands and feet than Americans..." This is as blatant a distortion of fact as I have seen, and I've seen a few. Of course the knife murder rate is lower in Britain. *All* murder rates are lower in Britain. But the firearm death rate is lower *EVEN TAKING INTO ACCOUNT THE OVERALL LOWER MURDER RATE*. Whereas 65% of US homicides are committed with guns, only about 10% of those in Britain are. *Effective* restriction of handgun availability *will* reduce the gun death rate. The obvious counter is to ask whether the *overall* homicide rate will change, or whether those who would have been killed with guns will now be killed with knives (or fists, or..). The analyses I have seen (see my posting <386@crystal.UUCP> for details, show that gun attacks are 4-6 times as likely to be fatal as are knife attacks, and about 10 times as lethal as fist attacks. > > "European comparisons would be incomplete without mention of > Switzerland, where violence rates are very low though every > man of military age is required to own a handgun or fully > automatic rifle. Israeli violence is similarly low, though Again, not the whole truth. As mentioned previously on the net, the ammunition for the Swiss weapons has to be stored in sealed boxes, which are subject to inspection. To turn the question around, does anybody have figures (Katz seems to have an aversion to them, and not without reason) for the percentage of gun homicides in Switzerland? Perhaps Switzerland *does* have higher proportion of gun deaths than other European countries. If guns were not available, more of the victims would have survived, and the overall homicide rate would be lower still. I will concede that cultural differences make valid comparisons difficult. Comparisons like those made by Katz are highly simplified and just plain misleading. The books I have read (references available on request, or see some of my earlier postings) seem to converge to the statement that guns "Probably have no effect on overall crime rates, but do increase the severity of crimes committed, and change their distribution" I cannot speak for NRA members, but I would rather have my hubcaps stolen than be shot. Anil Pal U. of Wisconsin-Madison
jhull@spp2.UUCP (01/09/85)
In article <389@crystal.UUCP> pal@crystal.UUCP writes: >I cannot speak for NRA members, but I would rather have my hubcaps stolen than >be shot. >Anil Pal I speak for (one) NRA member. I would rather have my hubcaps stolen than be shot. And I still won't give up my guns. -- Blessed Be, Jeff Hull ihnp4!trwrb!trwspp!spp2!jhull 13817 Yukon Ave. Hawthorne, CA 90250