Think more guns equals less violence? Think again.

originally posted by: CB328

I would claim the biggest issue Chicago has is a gang problem. It's the culture there that brings about crime and violence

So then it stands to reason that places with less crime are due to the lack of that culture- not because of guns as people here always try to claim. You can't have it both ways.

And I didn't say I don't want anyone to have guns but the police, that's not what I said at all. I said the states should be able to regulate who can have them.

LOL,

Kennesaw, GA

In the past 25 years there have been less murders than you can count on one hand"... "After the law went into effect in 1982, crime against persons plummeted 74 percent compared to 1981, and fell another 45 percent in 1983 compared to 1982.


rense.com...

KENNESAW, Ga - Several Kennesaw officials attribute a drop in crime in the city over the past two decades to a law that requires residents to have a gun in the house.

In 1982, the Kennesaw City Council unanimously passed a law requiring heads of households to own at least one firearm with ammunition.

The ordinance states the gun law is needed to "protect the safety, security and general welfare of the city and its inhabitants."

Then-councilman J.O. Stephenson said after the ordinance was passed, everyone "went crazy."

"People all over the country said there would be shootings in the street and violence in homes," he said. "Of course, that wasn't the case."

In fact, according to Stephenson, it caused the crime rate in the city to plunge.

Kennesaw Historical Society president Robert Jones said following the law's passage, the crime rate dropped 89 percent in the city, compared to the modest 10 percent drop statewide.

"It did drop after it was passed," he said. "After it initially dropped, it has stayed at the same low level for the past 16 years."

Mayor Leonard Church was not in office when the law was passed, but he said he is a staunch supporter of it.

"You can't argue with the fact that Kennesaw has the lowest crime rate of any city our size in the country," said Church, who owns a denture-making company in Kennesaw.

The author of the ordinance, local attorney Fred Bentley Sr., attributes at least some of the decrease in crime to the bill.

"I am definitely in favor of what we did," he said. "It may not be totally responsible for the decrease, [but] it is a part."

Although he is pleased with the outcome, Bentley said he was originally opposed to drafting the law.

"I didn't think it could be written in a constitutional fashion," he said. "Obviously, it was constitutional, because the American Civil Liberties Union challenged it in court and we won."

Jones said the ACLU challenged the law in a federal court just after it was passed. In response, the city added a clause adding conscientious objectors to the list of those exempt.

Although the law is now being credited with a drop in crime, Jones said that was not the law's original purpose. He also pointed out that Kennesaw did not have a big problem with crime before.

"The crime rate wasn't that high to start with. It was 11 burglaries per 1,000 residents in 1981," he said.

According to the Kennesaw Police Department, the city's most recent crime statistics show 243 property crimes per 100,000 residents in 1998, or .243 per 1,000.

The city's crime rate continues to be far below other metro Atlanta city's with similar populations, like Decatur. In 1998, Decatur recorded 4,049 property crimes per 100,000 residents.

Jones said one motivation for the council passing the ordinance had to do with publicity.

"It was done in response to a law passed by Morton Grove, Ill., outlawing gun ownership within the city limits," he said. "Several council members were upset Morton Grove had gotten a lot of attention with their ordinance so they decided to top them.

"They figured the gun ownership ordinance would knock that city right off the front pages. They were right."

Jones said the ensuing publicity surrounding the law has given Kennesaw worldwide name recognition.

"I have been to Australia and Europe and when I tell people I am from Kennesaw they recognize the name as the place that requires everyone to own a gun," he said.

But Stephenson said the issue was not publicity-driven but issue-driven.

"We believed in the right of people to own guns," he said.

Jones said he has sold 550 copies of a 1994 book about the first-of-its-kind law, "The Law Heard 'Round the World."

He said the law in its final form has many loopholes, so not everyone is required to own a gun.

"There are many outs," he said. "When you look at it, almost anyone could fit into one of the exempted groups."

Kennesaw Police Chief Dwaine Wilson said no one has ever been prosecuted under the ordinance.

Among those exempt are residents "who conscientiously oppose maintaining firearms as a result of beliefs or religious doctrine." Others exempt include the physically and mentally disabled, paupers and those convicted of a felony.

The law contains no clause addressing punishment for violating the law. If convicted, City Clerk Diane Coker said punishment would be determined by the general penalty clause of the Kennesaw Code Ordinance - probably a fine of about $100.

Jones said the unusual law has not deterred anyone from moving to Kennesaw.

"Our population has increased just like everyone's in Georgia in the past 20 years," he said. "The law really hasn't done any harm to the city's growth."

The city's population in 1998 was recorded at 14,493 - a sharp increase over the 8,936 residents recorded in the 1990 census.

Cobb Chamber of Commerce president Bill Cooper said odd laws are typically not counted as strike against a city when a business is looking to relocate.

"These laws don't have laws don't have an impact on a company's decision to move to Cobb County," Cooper said.

"Many communities have strange laws that are out of date. Businesses look at many factors when relocating, such as quality of life, education, infrastructure and available workforce."

Bentley said the law actually may have helped business development.

"Kennesaw is home to more manufacturing businesses than any other Cobb city," he said. "Companies have said they want to be located in conservative areas."

originally posted by: M5xaz
a reply to: CB328

Chicago is a "gun free zone", ruled by Democrats.
How's that working out ?

It seems to be going pretty good, Illinois has over double the population density of Texas yet a lower rate of gun murders per 100,000. Obviously its because they have a lower rate of gun ownership.

Texas has a lower murder rate, and a lower murder rate by guns than Michigan.

Yeah, Michigan's got a slightly higher murder rate than Texas. But Michigan also has a higher population density and a 38.4% gun ownership rate, where as Texas only has a 35% gun ownership rate.

US gun crime by state

I don't particularly think less guns=less violence. But more regulations=more safety.

originally posted by: Agit8dChop
then we realaised, this ego driven nonsense of owning firearms for protection was total horse sh*t.
so we banned them.

No, you didn't ban them actually. There was a gun buy back program in 96-97 yes. There were ~ 3.2 million guns in private hands prior to the massacre. After the buy back program, that only reduced the number to 2.2 million firearms. Shortly after the buyback program, people started obtaining them again and numbers are at around 3 million so right around where they were before the massacre. Furthermore, while you may not have had any mass killings since then, your homicide rates didn't actually begin to decline until 2004, a full 8 years after the Port Arthur massacre. It seems the Aussies didn't care how they got their freak on as long as they got a little blood on their hands. In addition to that little factoid, robberies, sexual assaults and other violent crimes actually increased after the gun buy back program for several years. You had a larger drop in homicide rates in the 1070's than you did after 1997. Between 1997 and 2011 your population increased by 20% but your firearms ownership increased by 45%. Not quite the gun ban you're portraying is it?

Just a couple of other interesting items of note... after 1997, "unintentional shooting deaths" INCREASED. While looking into this, I found it interesting that until a coroner makes a determination of suicide, those shootings are classified as unintentional. I'm not saying that coroners were classifying suicides purposely as unintentional shootings to skew stats but it is an interesting coincidence. As previously noted, mass shootings ceased after Port Arthur in Australia and yes, there were certain classes of firearms banned under the new law. However, there is an interesting analogy to be found in your neighbor, New Zealand. They are still armed to the teeth with all of the weapons no longer available in Australia and they too have had no mass killings in the same period of time. Your assertions that your nearly 20 year old firearms laws are responsible for lower crime rates and a Norman Rockwell appearing idyllic life just don't pan out. Your violent crimes are still prevalent, your murder rates are following a trend that began in 1969, you are still raping your women at a higher rate per capita than Americans are... it's just not the picture you tried to paint.


johnrlott.tripod.com...
www.smh.com.au...

who would have thought, reducing the amount of guns available stopped the amount of gun deaths?

But you're drawing a false equivalency. In fact, you don't actually have fewer guns in Australia than you did in 1996-97 prior to the buy back program. Current firearms numbers are roughly the same as before the Port Arthur Massacre and you still have gun deaths.

all you people stating the obvious ''guns don't kill people, people kill people'' should try a different tact.
That ignorant line that even a 5yr old can see through doesn't mean crap.

Does that mean that in Australia where there is a higher percentage of rapes and sexual assaults per capita, that the men aren't raping the women, just their penises are?

Psychotic Americans are using guns to massacre dozens of people at a time. you wouldn't be able to do that if you didn't have such easily accessible guns.

A little overly melodramatic there no? America doesn't have the market cornered in mental illness and as I show above, idyllic Australia just doesn't exist except for in your mind.

You'll never stop criminals having guns, they're criminals. That's why the police have guns.

I'm not sure where you live(rural or urban setting) but depending on the police isn't a realistic option for everyone. In fact, the US Supreme Court has ruled that the police have no obligation whatsoever to protect you so if you call them and your entire family is murdered because they take their sweet time getting there or stop for coffee first, that's A OK legally. There are nearly as many people living in my state as there are in your entire country just to offer a little perspective. I might not have big old deserts but what we lack in sand we more than make up for in inaccessible forest.

Why cant you admit you just like having firearms because it makes you feel tough and you don't want to lose your toys.

Why not admit you're talking out the side of your mouth? For example, where I live is pretty rural, the average response time for the police is in excess of 20 minutes. The last time I had to call the police it took them 23 minutes to arrive at my home and that was after receiving a report of intruders in a house with 3 young children. Were I not armed, things could have turned out quite differently. When I confronted the guy who was halfway through the window I kindly insisted he just finish his entry, have a seat on the floor and wait unless he thought he could run faster than 2500 FPS. His friend out in the car called my new friends cell phone after 10 minutes to see what was taking so long and I let him know he had the option of waiting out front for a ride to his new accommodations or if he preferred he could go home and change clothes first but either way someone would be along to fetch him eventually. Apparently he thought I was kidding and couldn't grasp the fact that the caller ID identified him and that after he left, his friend was all to happy to throw him under the bus in an attempt to get a better deal from the DA. Just because you live in some idealized fantasy land doesn't mean the rest of the world operates within the confines of said fantasy. There are real world applications and needs for self defense and relying on law enforcement isn't an option for everyone.

a reply to: peter vlar

So basically what you are saying is you have no faith in the police for protection,the society you live in is scary and you feel the need to be armed to the teeth for your own safety...am i even close ?

originally posted by: hopenotfeariswhatweneed
a reply to: peter vlar

So basically what you are saying is you have no faith in the police for protection,the society you live in is scary and you feel the need to be armed to the teeth for your own safety...am i even close ?

In the US, the police are not here too protect you. The police are here to enforce code and laws. The will come and make a report after a crime has been committed however mostly (unless they stumble upon it) they do not protect anyone anymore.

originally posted by: CB328
Gruesome weekend for Chicago leaves city, police chief reeling

God! Can we get beyond these types of posts, while we are at it the whole abortion and gay issue is getting old too...

What does this or Texas have to do with legal gun ownership? Well unless the OPs message is gun control only control law abiding citizens.

Take, for example, the death of 7-year-old Amari Brown. McCarthy said the boy was the unintended victim of a bullet meant for his father, a ranking gang member.

The lesson here is DON'T BE A RANKING GANG MEMBER IF YOU WANT YOUR KIDS NOT TO BE KILLED TOO.

originally posted by: Xtrozero

originally posted by: CB328
Gruesome weekend for Chicago leaves city, police chief reeling

God! Can we get beyond these types of posts, while we are at it the whole abortion and gay issue is getting old too...

What does this or Texas have to do with legal gun ownership? Well unless the OPs message is gun control only control law abiding citizens.

Take, for example, the death of 7-year-old Amari Brown. McCarthy said the boy was the unintended victim of a bullet meant for his father, a ranking gang member.

The lesson here is DON'T BE A RANKING GANG MEMBER IF YOU WANT YOUR KIDS NOT TO BE KILLED TOO.

Well c'mon now, we all know that gang members always buy and register their firearms in full compliance with the law; that's why there are no fully automatic weapons in gang violence.

Give your prohibitionist arguments up folks! They never work.

originally posted by: notmyrealname
Well c'mon now, we all know that gang members always buy and register their firearms in full compliance with the law; that's why there are no fully automatic weapons in gang violence.

Give your prohibitionist arguments up folks! They never work.

Yea the bad guys will say ah hell I can't own a gun now....

a reply to: hopenotfeariswhatweneed

No. Not even close. I'm saying I would rather have access to a weapons platform I'm trained on and comfortable with than trust mine and my children's lives to strangers that take nearly half an hour to arrive so they can do paperwork and file a report.its better to have the tool at hand and not need it than to need it and not have it available. My first job out of high school was dodging bullets with the 10th mountain division so taking another persons life isn't something I take very lightly nor am I "armed to the teeth" as you say. Different weapons are like any other tool. They each have a specific function. Some are for sporting purposes, some are for protecting my home and others put food on the table if need be. There's no fear component in the equation though.

a reply to: Peter vlar

Fair enough thx for the reply....

It is difficult for those of us whom do not live in a rampant gun culture to understand the mentality of gun owners in the U.S .....

a reply to: Elementalist

WTF - just WTF ?????????????????????????

If the government don't want Americans having guns, stop equipping the police and security like their military.

are you REALLY suggesting that a reduction in police militarisation will lead to a lower demand for civilian firearm ownership ?????????????????????

is so explain

if not - explain

a reply to: LionOfGOD

According to obiwamba that kind of thing only happens here in the US.

a reply to: hopenotfeariswhatweneed

The second amendment is to allow for a well armed militia to protect against enemies of liberty, including government run amok. The court battles have taken that ideal and involved the aspects of personal protection and hunting.

The police have a physical presence which deters crime to some degree but for the most part the job of police is to investigate after the fact. Not a very comforting thought to the potential victim. They do their best but they cant be everywhere all the time.

Of course it makes sense that if criminals did not have access to guns violent crime involving firearms would decrease. The problem is how do you take guns away from criminals without taking away the rights of law abiding citizens? Criminals break the law. That is why we call them criminals. If you passed a hundred laws today banning all types of firearms the only people who would obey those laws, by definition, are the law abiding citizens. They are not the ones shooting each other in the streets because their drug deal went bad or someone wore the wrong color baseball cap. Those are the criminals. Therefore, legislation is not the answer. Chicago is proof of that.

Guns have been around for a very long time but this lack of respect for human life is relatively new. People will always find a weapon to use if their desire is to kill. You cant outlaw every potential weapon because everything is a potential weapon to someone. What we need to address are the people pulling the trigger. Until we do that we will continue to suffer these attacks by those who would do us harm for personal gain, politics, or sadly just for the attention.

originally posted by: CB328
So first we had the big biker shootout in Texas where a large number of armed people was absolutely no deterrent to gun violence killing many people. Now Chicago had yet another murder spree in spite of the fact that their gun ban was overturned a few years ago prompting gun fanatics to decree that gun violence would be a thing of the past. You know, because supposedly a lot of people having guns magically prevents all violence from ocurring. Apparently not.

Gruesome weekend for Chicago leaves city, police chief reeling

www.cnn.com...

Riiight. Because those people were legal gun owners that qualified for legal purchase and didn't have them before. This is Chicago with criminals killing criminals even when there was a complete gun ban.

originally posted by: Subaeruginosa

originally posted by: M5xaz
a reply to: CB328

Chicago is a "gun free zone", ruled by Democrats.
How's that working out ?

It seems to be going pretty good, Illinois has over double the population density of Texas yet a lower rate of gun murders per 100,000. Obviously its because they have a lower rate of gun ownership.

Yeah, but he said 'Chicago', not the entire state of Illinois. As with most states, the urban areas (in this case, Chicago) tend to skew the data on homicides sharply upward. As it turns out, Chicago, with some of the toughest gun laws in the country, has a homicide rate (15.2 per 100,000 in 2013) that usually runs about three times the national average and usually a little less than three times that of the entire state. Throw Chicago out of it, and Illinois' homicide rate for the rest of the state drops from 5.5 per 100,000 in 2013 to about 3.0. That looks like a disaster to me.

originally posted by: babybunnies
It's simple logic - less guns = less gun violence.

In the 1980's, Margaret Thatcher had a complete gun recall in the UK after a school shooting.

There's not been one since.

There is a DIRECT correlation with countries that have strict gun control and low gun crime.

Places like Japan, UK, and several others where there are strict gun controls have some of the lowest gun crime rates in the world.

Places like USA, Mexico, Venezuela where there are few gun controls have the highest gun crime rates in the world.

if you have a gun in the house, you're at least 6 times more likely to have it used on YOU during commission of a crime than you are to use it to defend yourself.

The NRA has managed to successfully convince the easily brainwashed masses that this is not the case.

With gun control, just like many other things that are causes of the far right wing, you have to be totally devoid of seeing the basic facts of things going on around you right in front of your face to believe much of what they're telling you.

The second you say "hey, wait a minute, that doesn't seem right", you're ostracized from the group and ridiculed, so no one speaks out because of fear of ridicule.

Just like religions that banish people who question their place, anyone who questions the right wing brainwashing is put out to pasture, and separated immediately from the rest of the flock.

But that's incorrect. Mexico and Venezuela have some of the strictest gun control laws in the western hemisphere and some of the largest most brutal crimes.

The Swiss and the Czech Republic have almost USA levels of gun laws and ownership and crime much less than that of the UK.

You don't even have your facts straight.

originally posted by: beezzer
a reply to: CB328

You're right OP.

Guns are bad.

How do we get rid of them?

Call men with guns--oh, wait.

originally posted by: NavyDoc
But that's incorrect. Mexico and Venezuela have some of the strictest gun control laws in the western hemisphere and some of the largest most brutal crimes.

The Swiss and the Czech Republic have almost USA levels of gun laws and ownership and crime much less than that of the UK.

You don't even have your facts straight.

Canadian gun laws aren't particularly strict, either, and most of what's available in the US is also available there. Hell, I didn't realize this until a few weeks ago, but apparently they don't even restrict magazine capacity on rimfire rifles; you can buy a 110 round drum magazine for your 10/22 right off the Cabelas Canada website. They've also got a fair number of guns and gun owners, and most estimates put the number of privately held firearms around 10 million. And yet, the Canadian homicide rate usually runs about 1.5 per 100,000.

And just to add something, there's really no reason to compare the US to other societies. The simple fact is, not all areas of the US are created equally when it comes to homicides. Most of them are occurring in the urban centers, which make up only a very small portion of the geographic area of the country. The vast majority of the country has a homicide rate that's not too far off that of Western Europe. Its that the urban centers are skewing the overall numbers sharply upward.

a reply to: Agit8dChop

Except gun control in Australia didn't work. Mass shootings were also rare before and we see several mass killings since:

August 1992–May 1999 Snowtown, South Australia 12 unknown attack by John Bunting, Robert Wagner, and James Vlassakis, a total of 12 bodies were found in acid filled barrels and rainwater tanks
Childers Palace Backpackers fire 23 June 2000 Childers, Queensland 15 unknown Arson attack by Robert Paul Long, which killed 15 international backpackers
Monash University Shooting 21 October 2002 Melbourne, Victoria 2 5 A shooting spree by Huan Yun Xiang, a student at Monash University
Churchill Fire 7 February 2009 Churchill, Victoria 10 unknown Arson attack by Brendan Sokaluk that killed 10 people, during the Black Saturday bushfires period
Lin family murders 18 July 2009 North Epping, New South Wales 5 unknown Blunt instrument attack by Lian Bin "Robert" Xie, which killed 5 members of the Lin family
Quakers Hill Nursing Home Fire 18 November 2011 Sydney, NSW 11 20 Arson attack by Roger Kingsley Dean, a nurse, which killed 11 people
Hunt family murders 9 September 2014 Lockhart, New South Wales 5 0 Murder-suicide shooting spree by Geoff Hunt who killed his wife and three children before turning the gun on himself
Cairns child killings 19 December 2014 Cairns, Queensland 8 1-self inflicted (perpetrator) Stabbing attack. 8 children aged 18 months to 15 years killed. 37 year old woman also found injured. The woman was later charged with the murder of the children, 7 of whom were hers, plus her niece.[8]

Also don't forget the most recent: The "Sydney Siege" at the Lindt cafe. Gunman, gun murders, and hostage crisis all rolled into one.

According to the Ballina Shire Advocate

“over 9,000 guns have been taken off New South Wales (NSW) streets and 3352 people have charged” during previous operations in the last 12 months alone.

NSW police commissioner Andrew Scipione explained: “There is no single source of gun violence… guns have fallen into the hands of organized crime, outlaw motorcycle gangs, mid-level crime groups and petty thieves and the lines are often blurred.”

Unveiling a new plan to address "out of control gun violence" does not sound like the laws worked does it?

My friends in Australia think their gun controls laws are useless crap because, well, quite frankly they are.