Monday letters
Violence, assault weapons and the National Rifle Association in today’s letters to the editor.
Pick of the day: Responsible owner against gun control
I find it terribly ironic that in the Dec. 30 edition of The Roanoke Times, you publish an article on Chicago’s jaw-dropping murder statistics (“Gang violence skyrockets in Chicago in 2012″), then on the same day in your editorial (“The right limits on gun rights”) you somehow manage to speak for us gun owners and say we understand the need for more responsible controls.
Chicago has a near-total ban on firearms; look how well that has worked (just read your own article).
No, we responsible gun owners are rightly wary of any and all restrictions being placed on us for the unproven reassurance of public safety, as Chicago has amply demonstrated.
None of my guns has killed anyone in Chicago, Connecticut — or anyplace on Earth, for that matter. So why should I be restricted in my ownership of them in any way, shape or form?
BRIAN VELKOFF
ROANOKE
January 7, 2013 - 6:09 AM
Where is the “like” button?
“Gun Free Zones”, whether Chicago, schools, or anywhere else don’t work. But working on the real problems in our society just isn’t PC. It’s a lot easier to blame scary looking objects.
–
Les Aker
Springfield
Gun free zones don’t work, no. But gun-free countries seem to do okay.
2 – sure do.
AUSTRALIA: MORE VIOLENT CRIME DESPITE GUN BAN
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=17847
Harvard Study: Gun Control Is Counterproductive
http://theacru.org/acru/harvard_study_gun_control_is_counterproductive/
Nations with stringent anti-gun laws generally have substantially higher murder rates than those that do not. The study found that the nine European nations with the lowest rates of gun ownership (5,000 or fewer guns per 100,000 population) have a combined murder rate three times higher than that of the nine nations with the highest rates of gun ownership (at least 15,000 guns per 100,000 population).
For example, Norway has the highest rate of gun ownership in Western Europe, yet possesses the lowest murder rate. In contrast, Holland’s murder rate is nearly the worst, despite having the lowest gun ownership rate in Western Europe. Sweden and Denmark are two more examples of nations with high murder rates but few guns. As the study’s authors write in the report:
If the mantra “more guns equal more death and fewer guns equal less death” were true, broad cross-national comparisons should show that nations with higher gun ownership per capita consistently have more death. Nations with higher gun ownership rates, however, do not have higher murder or suicide rates than those with lower gun ownership. Indeed many high gun ownership nations have much lower murder rates. (p. 661)
Finally, and as if to prove the bumper sticker correct – that “gun don’t kill people, people do” – the study also shows that Russia’s murder rate is four times higher than the U.S. and more than 20 times higher than Norway. This, in a country that practically eradicated private gun ownership over the course of decades of totalitarian rule and police state methods of suppression. Needless to say, very few Russian murders involve guns.
The important thing to keep in mind is not the rate of deaths by gun – a statistic that anti-gun advocates are quick to recite – but the overall murder rate, regardless of means. The criminologists explain:
[P]er capita murder overall is only half as frequent in the United States as in several other nations where gun murder is rarer, but murder by strangling, stabbing, or beating is much more frequent. (p. 663 – emphases in original)
#2 – Really? Did you hear that on NPR?
http://www.humanevents.com/2012/12/15/gun-crime-soars-in-england-by-35-where-guns-are-banned/
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/5712573/UK-is-violent-crime-capital-of-Europe.html
Man that Harvard is one conflicted place apparently:
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/research/hicrc/firearms-research/guns-and-death/index.html
“1. Where there are more guns there is more homicide (literature review).
Our review of the academic literature found that a broad array of evidence indicates that gun availability is a risk factor for homicide, both in the United States and across high-income countries. Case-control studies, ecological time-series and cross-sectional studies indicate that in homes, cities, states and regions in the US, where there are more guns, both men and women are at higher risk for homicide, particularly firearm homicide.
2. Across high-income nations, more guns = more homicide.
3. Across states, more guns = more homicide
4. Across states, more guns = more homicide (2)”
IDK, I guess Harvard is the new Wiki?
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/research/hicrc/firearms-research/gun-threats-and-self-defense-gun-use/index.html
http://www.boston.com/news/education/2013/01/05/harvard-host-gun-violence-health-crisis-talk/TsUKX4Pm3nyz1fkTSbiK6J/story.html
As your own Harvard link admits: “This Article has reviewed a significant amount of evidence from a wide variety of international sources. Each individual portion of evidence is subject to cavil—at the very least the general objection that the persuasiveness of social scientific evidence cannot remotely approach the persuasiveness of
conclusions in the physical sciences.”
I am not sure what good any of this is. We are not talking about banning guns or limiting guns in any meaningful way. As the ban we did previously proved, this is only a meager stop gap that will catch precious few killers unarmed. I have to ask then, why this push back and defense of this weapon?
http://www.bushmaster.com/index.asp
I was simply responding to post number 2, Sandi. The evidence is inconclusive at best,.
@3 89Hoo, I started following some of those links backwards. The first one you provide, their sole citation is an Examiner.com blogger who’s article seems to be gone.
The second one has as one of it’s authors (original article from Harvard) has a guy from the Pacific Institute (or something – don’t have time to do it again). Those guys are real nut jobs. As near as I can tell from a short search, the second author on the Harvard study may be legitimate. But still, the research may be good. Being a nut job doesn’t mean one is always wrong. I’ve started looking at the study but it’s 42(?) pages long and probably won’t have time to do it justice.
I guess the point is, you may have to look for more respectable researchers.
8 – A communist who thinks disarming innocent citizens is a way to make them safe from criminals is calling someone a nutjob and questioning the credibility of sources?
That’s rich!
On a World Scale, Australia is listed as #6 in the top ten most peaceful nations, so I remain truly non-plussed at anyone trying to claim high violence for them.
http://247wallst.com/2012/06/15/the-most-and-least-peaceful-countries-in-the-world/2/
Well written letter and full of “common sense”. The anti-gun lobby has jumped all over the Sandy hook tragedy to push their own agenda. More gun control laws will have only a negative effect on violent crimes. Perhaps it would be more productive to work on providing protection for our children, rather than disarm those of us who do not murder. I challenge any parent to tell me that if their children were to be in danger, and the parent had access to a firearm, they would not use it to protect their kids.
#9 ‘Hoo, (generally my close paren, #zero key is baraking, I try to stay away from personal comments/obsevations…..yet given Scott’s POV, though I must say they are always polite & civil, I couldn’t agree more.
Where does “he” (anyone…think any “people’s” pressure, (revolution… might/will come from, with an unarmed citizenry?
The status quo wants nothing more than the status quo.
Hold the helicopter, etc., comments. Thanks.
And what Steve Rouse, if people are not anti-gun as much as anti-mass shootings? Why should we forget the gun part of the equation?
I can see that it will be impossible to have any meaningful gun control laws. There will be no meaningful mental health funding, research or care and there will sure as hell be no meaningful armed security in schools, so let’s all stop wasting each other’s time and most importantly, gun advocates, stop acting like the cost of your rights is not the carnage we must learn to live with. There does not seem to be any way to separate the two.