I guess this ends the gun debate once and for allFollow

It is in the link I posted above, which by quoting I assumed you had read.

"In fact, guns kept in the home are 43 times more likely to be used to kill someone known to the family than to be used to kill in self-defense.[53]"

So my initial quote above was slightly wrong - instead of saving your life it is taking the life of another in self defense. The former is vastly harder to measure since we don't know what would have happened had the gun owner not employed the gun at all.

ref 53 is:

Kellermann AL, Reay DT Protection or peril? An analysis of firearm-related deaths in the home. N Engl J Med 1986; 314:1557-1560 [Abstract]

Thank you for posting some data to support your position. However, this does not address your prior claims that every time you look, looser gun control laws reduce crime (I'm paraphrasing).

I'm curious if you have NO data to support this or are abandoning that position in favor of this new one.

In regards to the link gbaji posted, that is the study is so misleading that the link I provided singles it out for refutation:

The widely publicized estimates of the number of defensive gun uses in the millions each year are not credible.51

With ref. 51 which I will link here:

http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.81.8588&rep=rep1&type=pdf

In short, that is why I qualified my reply with "To the best of our knowledge". It could be off substantially. Nonetheless, I read many articles, not from pro- or anti- gun sites, and post the best info here.

Tulip,



You know we passed this just to p*ss off liberal twats like yourself right?



Guns are legal. If the police want to sell these guns to raise revenue I say go for it. Better that way than more traffic light cameras tickets.





Edited, Apr 8th 2010 12:31pm by knoxxsouthy

They're a government entity. As they are the government there is no liberty for them.

We should just get condom manufacturers to do product demonstrations in our schools. Then the free market will solve our teen parenthood problems.

Didn't this thread start up about studies showing that areas with stiff gun control have higher rates of crime that those without?

How about This Harvard Study showing, once again, the same thing. When those of us opposed to gun control keep saying thinks like "Study after study shows that gun control doesn't work", we're not just making it up. I know you like to assume so, but every time we have this discussion you pretend for a couple pages that you have all the facts on your side, then I (or someone else) proceeds to post study after study, and reams of data showing that you are wrong. Then you just kinda shut up and slink off, only to repeat the same erroneous claims a few months later when the subject comes up again...


What's that funny definition of insanity again?

Gee... Could you stretch a bit more? Are you suggesting that gun control advocates limit the controls just to the suicidal and "murder prone"?

How about allowing the law abiding citizens to exercise their rights?

Edited, Apr 8th 2010 1:23pm by gbaji

So what? Are you seriously suggesting that one must rule out every single possible thing in the universe before a correlative pattern can be deemed to be likely causative? Didn't we have this argument just a few weeks ago? I think that when the statistics don't matter much whether it's a northern or southern state, or has tornadoes or hurricanes, or is in the bible belt, one can safely discount them as significant factors.

The one factor which consistently stands out is that in the US, in areas with loose gun control laws, there tends to be a lower rate of crime than in areas with strict gun control laws. That correlation runs across a gamut of other differences Joph. If you have a better alternative explanation, then by all means present it. But in the absence of said better reasons, it's reasonable to operate on the assumption that the gun control laws have to do with the crime rates.


At the end of the day, the entire argument for gun control laws rests on an assumption that crime will be reduced by passing the laws. It is beyond absurdity to then insist that we can't draw any causative relation between gun laws and crime when and only when those relations don't happen to support your side of the issue.


It's pretty simple really. The Constitution grants the right to keep and bear arms. If there is no causative relationship between gun control and crime, then we should err on the side of *not* infringing a constitutional right. And if we do accept the causative relationship, and it shows that less gun control produces less crime, then we have yet more reason *not* to infringe the 2nd amendment.


You lose either way Joph. You need to show a clear and definitive relationship between guns and crime which justifies the infringement of rights represented by the gun control laws you support. But not only can you not do that, all the evidence goes in the exact opposite direction. It's laughable...

I said that the correlation in the US between gun control laws and crime was consistent regardless of those factors. I didn't bring them up, I responded to posters (could have even been you) claiming that there were other factors that must be considered (just are you are still doing).

You cannot show that those other factors have a damn thing to do with it though, can you? So until you do, how about you stop talking about them as though they do? The burden of proof is not on me, Joph. It's on you. If you think those other things are more relevant than the gun control laws in effect, then show it, or shut up about it.

The study results cut across states which have wildly differing amounts of all of the things I listed Joph. I'm not sure what point you think you're making here.

Yes. I rattled off a whole list of things for which there is no evidence of a causative relation ship on crime rate more significant than the gun control laws in effect. I did this because posters were defending their position on gun control by speculating that other factors might be involved, for which they had no proof. I could have listed sunspots and alien abductions as well. And while I'm not aware of any studies specifically discounting a connection between those things and crime rates, the point, which you seem to consistently miss, is that barring evidence showing a relationship, there is no value to assuming there is.

If you think an of those factors are significant, then show that data. If you can't, then how about we accept that the things for which we do have data showing relevance should be acknowledge and acted on? I think that's what rational people do.



They *are* true. It is "true" that there is no statistically established and significant causative relationship between any of the things I listed and crime stats. You get that until someone shows such data, it is true that such data does not exist. Get it? You're free to speculate, but you're just guessing. We should not put guesses above fact. We do have studies showing a clear and significant causative relationship between gun control laws and crime rates. That's what's important, but for some reason you keep wanting to ignore that in favor of other possible explanations which might exist, but for which there is no data.


Do you see how that puts you firmly in the "nutter" category?

authoritive =/= authorative, and neither one = "authoritative"




Edited, Apr 8th 2010 6:25pm by trickybeck

Of course you did. You're being silly to deny it.