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Date Posted: 09:29:36 04/11/03 Fri
Author: Gwydion
Author Host/IP: NoHost / 129.130.179.37
Subject: Re: I don't know
In reply to: Kharn 's message, "I don't know" on 09:19:48 04/11/03 Fri

>It's COMPLETELY unfair to even start comparing
>Britain and US murder rates simply because the US
>doesn't count one tenth of its gun deaths as murders,
>the rest are self defence or accidents, which in
>Britain would have counted as murder.

Are you sure about that? The article said the exact opposite.

"The murder rates of the U.S. and U.K. are also affected by differences in the way each counts homicides. The FBI asks police to list every homicide as murder, even if the case isn’t subsequently prosecuted or proceeds on a lesser charge, making the U.S. numbers as high as possible. By contrast, the English police "massage down" the homicide statistics, tracking each case through the courts and removing it if it is reduced to a lesser charge or determined to be an accident or self-defense, making the English numbers as low as possible."

>Also, it's not
>like there weren't a lot of things happening besides
>the restriction in gun laws during 1997-2001, such as
>immigration problem and England still has quite a lot
>of povery problems.

That's a good point. In fact, the article even admits that murder rates began increasing in 1991, six years before the '97 ban. Crime is primarily a social issue, although I think there's good evidence to indicate that gun ownership can be a deterrant.

>One thing's obvious, though; what happened to England
>there is EXACTLY what would happen to the US if you
>abolished guns right now, so you shouldn't, but that
>doesn't mean you can just apply the same gun laws to,
>for instance, European countries. It's not as simple
>as that.

That's probably true. I still believe that gun ownership on a large scale could work in Europe, but I haven't seen a good model to provide evidence for that hypothesis yet.

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