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ghostrider
Joined: 27 Jun 2011
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 Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 12:14 am Post subject: |
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| visitorq wrote: |
| Spartacist wrote: |
| visitorq wrote: |
| People love to trot out statistics about the US having such a high gun crime rate, but almost universally fail to account for the actual reason WHY. It isn't because of culture or moral decay, it's simply because of the war on drugs. |
Are you saying there isn't a war on drugs in other countries? |
Not in Canada or the UK, or countries that regularly get compared the US as if they're some kind of utopias due to gun control. Other countries that have massive amounts of drug-related crime (as well as strict gun control) include Mexico, Brazil, Russia, and others. The constant is never gun control, rather it's typically drug prohibition that is to blame. Obviously the US attracts a lot more drug gangs than other countries like Canada, due to it being the largest market for drugs in the world, so this skews the violent crime rate up a great deal (something like 80% of violent crime in urban centers is gang related). But the US is actually quite a bit safer than countries like Mexico or Russia, even though it has much looser gun laws.
Note that most, if not all, of the darkest countries (having the most violent crime) have tighter gun control laws than the US. Clearly gun control is not a meaningful variable to use when assessing violent crime rates, and it must be that others factor are to blame (i.e. drug and/or gang-related crime).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate |
Banana republics may have stricter gun laws than the US but I question how easy it is to circumvent those laws due to government corruption. I used to live in a country where the police routinely ignored crime and most of their income came from bribes. I met someone from Russia a while ago who told me that Russia was a much safer place to be while the Soviet Union existed. Everything was strictly controlled and people could leave their doors unlocked at night. Crime has greatly increased since the fall of the Soviet Union and gun ownership has also gone up. |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 12:38 am Post subject: |
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| ghostrider wrote: |
| Banana republics may have stricter gun laws than the US but I question how easy it is to circumvent those laws due to government corruption. I used to live in a country where the police routinely ignored crime and most of their income came from bribes. I met someone from Russia a while ago who told me that Russia was a much safer place to be while the Soviet Union existed. Everything was strictly controlled and people could leave their doors unlocked at night. Crime has greatly increased since the fall of the Soviet Union and gun ownership has also gone up. |
Oh my god... Here you have it people: according to ghostrider, we'd all be better off if only things were more like the Soviet Union! Nevermind the fact that the Soviet government murdered tens of millions of its own people, and terrorized even more for nearly a century (who were totally defenseless to stop the atrocities due to being disarmed and helpless). Let's not use common sense - if ghostrider says it was safer in the Soviet Union, then it must be true 
Moreover, the idea that there isn't rampant corruption in the US is ridiculous. How many times has the CIA been caught smuggling drugs? How many bad cops have been in league with organized crime? How many banks launder drug money? The same crooked politicians who engage in all kinds of corruption, and continue to wage a "war on drugs" that ravages our society and fill our prisons to the brim with petty dope dealers (who then learn to become hardened criminals), want to take our guns away. Yeah, that really sounds "reasonable" - let's just place our trust in government and all our problems will be solved as usual! |
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ghostrider
Joined: 27 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 1:18 am Post subject: |
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| visitorq wrote: |
| ghostrider wrote: |
| Banana republics may have stricter gun laws than the US but I question how easy it is to circumvent those laws due to government corruption. I used to live in a country where the police routinely ignored crime and most of their income came from bribes. I met someone from Russia a while ago who told me that Russia was a much safer place to be while the Soviet Union existed. Everything was strictly controlled and people could leave their doors unlocked at night. Crime has greatly increased since the fall of the Soviet Union and gun ownership has also gone up. |
Oh my god... Here you have it people: according to ghostrider, we'd all be better off if only things were more like the Soviet Union! Nevermind the fact that the Soviet government murdered tens of millions of its own people, and terrorized even more for nearly a century (who were totally defenseless to stop the atrocities due to being disarmed and helpless). Let's not use common sense - if ghostrider says it was safer in the Soviet Union, then it must be true
Moreover, the idea that there isn't rampant corruption in the US is ridiculous. How many times has the CIA been caught smuggling drugs? How many bad cops have been in league with organized crime? How many banks launder drug money? The same crooked politicians who engage in all kinds of corruption, and continue to wage a "war on drugs" that ravages our society and fill our prisons to the brim with petty dope dealers (who then learn to become hardened criminals), want to take our guns away. Yeah, that really sounds "reasonable" - let's just place our trust in government and all our problems will be solved as usual! |
Don't bring up genocide if you don't want people bringing up slavery when the Second Amendment is being discussed. |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 1:52 am Post subject: |
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| ghostrider wrote: |
| Don't bring up genocide if you don't want people bringing up slavery when the Second Amendment is being discussed. |
What are you babbling about? The 2nd Amendment has nothing to do with slavery (quite the contrary). In fact, if the slaves had been armed they would've had a fighting chance to free themselves (since being armed is empowering). This is why the KKK was so adamant about disarming the blacks after they did became free (the same way you're so adamant about disarming the rest of us). Because disarmed populations are much, much easier to enslave.
As for genocide, yes, your beloved Soviet Union was one of the most murderous, atrocious states to ever curse the planet with its existence. The fact that you think this was a good thing that kept people "safe" says all we need to know about you and your agenda. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 2:02 am Post subject: |
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| comm wrote: |
I think we both know that Canada has a 'polite disagreement' with drugs. Whereas Mexico has something more like a drug apocalypse, and the U.S. has a drug war. |
Seems to be the trends for those countries and how they deal with issues 
-----------------
I'm curious about one theory espoused on here - that an armed house deters would-be robbers. And in turn, an unarmed house invites them in... so to speak.
If that were true, would we not see much higher rates of robberies and home invasions in those countries where home protection firearms are less common?
I mean, according to that theory, these homes are sitting ducks! |
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12ax7
Joined: 07 Nov 2009
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 2:22 am Post subject: |
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| Spartacist wrote: |
| visitorq wrote: |
| People love to trot out statistics about the US having such a high gun crime rate, but almost universally fail to account for the actual reason WHY. It isn't because of culture or moral decay, it's simply because of the war on drugs. |
Are you saying there isn't a war on drugs in other countries? |
Shhh, you're being too logical. He's going to ask you not to interact with him. |
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12ax7
Joined: 07 Nov 2009
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 2:32 am Post subject: |
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| visitorq wrote: |
| Spartacist wrote: |
| visitorq wrote: |
| People love to trot out statistics about the US having such a high gun crime rate, but almost universally fail to account for the actual reason WHY. It isn't because of culture or moral decay, it's simply because of the war on drugs. |
Are you saying there isn't a war on drugs in other countries? |
Not in Canada or the UK, or countries that regularly get compared the US as if they're some kind of utopias due to gun control. Other countries that have massive amounts of drug-related crime (as well as strict gun control) include Mexico, Brazil, Russia, and others. The constant is never gun control, rather it's typically drug prohibition that is to blame. Obviously the US attracts a lot more drug gangs than other countries like Canada, due to it being the largest market for drugs in the world, so this skews the violent crime rate up a great deal (something like 80% of violent crime in urban centers is gang related). But the US is actually quite a bit safer than countries like Mexico or Russia, even though it has much looser gun laws.
Note that most, if not all, of the darkest countries (having the most violent crime) have tighter gun control laws than the US. Clearly gun control is not a meaningful variable to use when assessing violent crime rates, and it must be that others factor are to blame (i.e. drug and/or gang-related crime).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_intentional_homicide_rate |
You're so misinformed, it's not even amusing anymore.
http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2012/11/06/scott-bernstein-laura-drake-in-canadas-war-on-drugs-aboriginals-are-the-biggest-victims/ |
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ghostrider
Joined: 27 Jun 2011
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 2:49 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
I'm curious about one theory espoused on here - that an armed house deters would-be robbers. And in turn, an unarmed house invites them in... so to speak.
If that were true, would we not see much higher rates of robberies and home invasions in those countries where home protection firearms are less common?
I mean, according to that theory, these homes are sitting ducks! |
Research reveals that armed homes actually attract burglars. This may be because a criminal is more motivated by the chance to steal a gun than deterred by the risk of being confronted by a gun owner.
"Cross-section analysis of the NCVS and panel-data analysis of the UCR yield similar findings: a 10 percent increase in our measure of gun ownership increases burglary rates by 3 to 7 percent.... We conclude that keeping a gun at home is unlikely to provide a positive externality in the form of burglary deterrence. If anything, residences in a neighborhood with high gun prevalence are at greater risk of being burglarized, hot and otherwise. There is an irony here: guns are often kept to protect the home, but the aggregate effect of individual decisions to keep guns at home may be an increase in the victimization rate."
http://home.uchicago.edu/~ludwigj/papers/Brookings-Burglary-Policing-Ch3-2003.pdf |
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comm
Joined: 22 Jun 2010
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 3:00 am Post subject: |
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| ghostrider wrote: |
| "Cross-section analysis of the NCVS and panel-data analysis of the UCR yield similar findings: a 10 percent increase in our measure of gun ownership increases burglary rates by 3 to 7 percent.... We conclude that keeping a gun at home is unlikely to provide a positive externality in the form of burglary deterrence. If anything, residences in a neighborhood with high gun prevalence are at greater risk of being burglarized, hot and otherwise. |
People living in neighborhoods with high crime rates often buy guns to protect themselves? That's not really surprising. I'd imagine that most of these armed homes don't have signs outside warning of such, meaning that they'll likely be burglarized at the same rate as other homes in the high-burglary area (which in turn is higher than the norm).
You may be missing the point here though. The Second Amendment isn't dependent on the statistical effect of guns on burglary. There's no statistic you can give me that will cause me to believe that I need less freedom. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 3:42 am Post subject: |
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| comm wrote: |
| You may be missing the point here though. The Second Amendment isn't dependent on the statistical effect of guns on burglary. There's no statistic you can give me that will cause me to believe that I need less freedom. |
I'm curious - do you consider Canadians, Australians, ext.... "less free" because of their different gun laws?
So to you, if I'm reading it correctly, it's about freedom... not home protection (necessarily). - Do you feel any US Prez (or candidate) has stood for the freedom you picture? |
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visitorq
Joined: 11 Jan 2008
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 3:56 am Post subject: |
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Just pitiful. There is no war on drugs in Canada. Your own source refers to it by another name (while putting 'war on drugs' in quotes to indicate that's not actually what it's called), but the real point is that overall drug crime in Canada is far lower than in the US. Canada is completely tame in comparison. The US, by contrast, has a long history of organized crime and famous gangsters going all the way back to Prohibition. There are no famous Canadian gangs or gangsters, because the only gangs in Canada are minor branches of established American gangs (like the Hells Angels, the Bloods and Crips, and the Mafia) and a few other foreign gangs. Quite frankly few people are interested in Canada for organized crime because it's such a tiny market. The US is where all the real money and action is at. |
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Captain Corea
Joined: 28 Feb 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 4:53 am Post subject: |
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But that argument can be said about Canada in almost every aspect - America-lite.
Drugs
Gangs
Wars
Rich ppl
Poor ppl
Part of this can be explained away because of population and density differences... but there's obviously more than that. They are very similar in their structures, yet there are differences. Differences in how they handle health and mental health care, drugs, wars... ect... we all know it.
Personally, I think it all started as the US was forming... quite a different tale than the slow, belaboured nationhood that Canada grew into.
To simply say it's a market size thing, or a population thing, maybe misses out on so much more. |
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12ax7
Joined: 07 Nov 2009
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 5:11 am Post subject: |
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| visitorq wrote: |
Just pitiful. There is no war on drugs in Canada. Your own source refers to it by another name (while putting 'war on drugs' in quotes to indicate that's not actually what it's called), but the real point is that overall drug crime in Canada is far lower than in the US. Canada is completely tame in comparison. The US, by contrast, has a long history of organized crime and famous gangsters going all the way back to Prohibition. There are no famous Canadian gangs or gangsters, because the only gangs in Canada are minor branches of established American gangs (like the Hells Angels, the Bloods and Crips, and the Mafia) and a few other foreign gangs. Quite frankly few people are interested in Canada for organized crime because it's such a tiny market. The US is where all the real money and action is at. |
You're naive.
No known gangsters? Just branches of US gangs?
Are you blindly nationalistic about your gangsters, too?
Either way, you're clearly oblivious of what goes on in Canada.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vito_Rizzuto#Boss_of_the_Sixth_Family
http://www.nationalpost.com/news/story.html?id=78bf4dea-ad71-4ecb-ba1d-d6c18fb311cf
And biker gangs in the US are tame in comparison to the ones we have in Canada. Sure, some are chapters of American gangs, but their members are notorious for their violence (so much so that a whole chapter was eliminated in the '80s because they attracted too much the attention of the cops).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lennoxville_massacre
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quebec_Biker_war
See, what you don't get is that gangs in Canada are powerful not only because of the local market but also because of the close proximity to the US. How do you think the cartels get their drugs into the US? Who do you think provided the whiskey that made American gangsters very, very wealthy during the prohibition?
If only the truth was as rosy as you paint it to be.
Last edited by 12ax7 on Thu Dec 27, 2012 5:21 am; edited 4 times in total |
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PatrickGHBusan
Joined: 24 Jun 2008
Location: Busan (1997-2008) Canada 2008 -
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 5:14 am Post subject: |
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| Captain Corea wrote: |
But that argument can be said about Canada in almost every aspect - America-lite.
Drugs
Gangs
Wars
Rich ppl
Poor ppl
Part of this can be explained away because of population and density differences... but there's obviously more than that. They are very similar in their structures, yet there are differences. Differences in how they handle health and mental health care, drugs, wars... ect... we all know it.
Personally, I think it all started as the US was forming... quite a different tale than the slow, belaboured nationhood that Canada grew into.
To simply say it's a market size thing, or a population thing, maybe misses out on so much more. |
Good point Capt but on the mental health issue, de-institutionalization in the late 1980s and early 1990s was quite similar to what the US did. Basically mental health care went from institutionalized care to in-patient cared who are issued with drugs and tossed out after a couple of days as it saves money. |
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Koharski
Mod Team
Joined: 20 Jul 2009
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| Posted: Thu Dec 27, 2012 6:30 am Post subject: |
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Once again, I will ask that the personal attacks cease. However I do not want to lock this thread because it is pure comedy some of the rationale passed on here!!!
Koharski |
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