You are a fukwit, Dameon if you beleive those statistics.
You are also a fukwit for linking startistics that are obviosly false to anyone who has studied them & knows about Australia.
Do all you Americans take things at face value.
Now lets look at these NRA claims that fukwits like you who know nothing about Australia keep quoting.
Ist, I'll knock back each claim (well almost each of them) & then I'll explain why anyone who knows anything about Oz would know those figures are wrong, even if they had no idea what the figures truely were.
Claim 1. "In the State of Victoria alone, Homicides with firearms are up 300% ".
Ha ha,the World Health Organisation has just given the capital of Victoria, Melbourne (75% of Victoria's population) the title of 'Safest City in the Southern Hemisphere'.In fact in the two years before the new gun laws became operative the average homicide rate per 100,000 population in Victoria was 1.25. In 1998 the homicide rate per 100,000 population in Victoria fell to 1.01. In both cases it was the lowest of the six Australian states.
Claim 2. Homicides jumped 3.2%.
In 1998, compared to the average of the two years prior to new gun laws becoming operative, gun homicides fell by 35%. Murder from all causes was down by 11.5%.
Claim 3. Assaults were up 17%.
The assault rate increased on average 9.5% per annum in the two years before the new gun laws became operative. It was only 6% increase in the 1998, the 1st year after the laws came into effect.
Claim 4. Unlawful entries are up 8%
I cannot find any figures on 'unlawful entries' on the ABS site, so I'll have to give that one a miss.
Claim 5. Kidnappings are up 38 %
I could find no infos on kidnappings either, but kidnappings are so rare in Australia you'd just need one extra kidnapping in a year & it would mean an increase of 38% or something.
Claim 6. Manslaughter is up 32 %
No info their either. Also violent death statistics are virtually always noted as 'homicides' or 'suicides', they do not split them are into catagories such as 'manslaughter' as a full homicide trial, including all the preecedures before it can take 2 years or more. So such catagorised statistics could only be tabulated at least 2 to 3 years after the event.
Claim 6. Armed Robberies are up 73%
The rate of increase in robbery averaged 20% per annum in the two years prior to the new gun laws becoming operative, it fell to an increase of 10% in 1998.
Now lets look at a graph
Australia Gun Deaths - Total
...................1988.....1989....1990....1991....1992....1993...1994....1995...1996....1997....1998
Accident........30.......19.........30........29.........24........18........20........15.......30........19.........21
Suicide.........521.....451.......488.....510.......490......435.....420......388.....382......330.....234
Assault.........124.....80..........79........84.........96........64.......79........67.......104......79........57
Legal.Int.........4........7............4...........6..........14..........3........7..........6...........0..........7.........7
Unknown......17......15.........15...........5............7...........6........0..........3...........5.........2..........8
Totals...........696.....572......617......634........631......526.....526......479......521.....437......327
Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics
Now the reason why those statistics you quoted are obviously false to anyone who knows anything about Australia.
The simple fact is that Australia is the most urbanised nation in the world with over 90% of the population living in 3 metropolatin areas (Melbourne/Geelong, Sydney/Newcastle/Wollongong & the Brisbane/GoldCoast/Towoomba/SunshineCoast are) as such ah heck Australians ever owned guns in the 1st place, consequently theose laws had no effect what so ever in Australia ouitside of the sparsly populated rural areas.
Also because handguns have always been banned in Australia (well in living memory) for everyone (except police, the military & security people) handguns have never been a deterrant to crime here. To anyone weho knows Australia, the thought that all of a sudden criminals are going to start robbing more houses & more people will get murdered becaues the 'govt took the guns away is laughable', because crminals have never had to worry their potential victims owning guns anyway.
Those laws (only) banned semi-automatic rifles & repeat firing shotguns, of which 95% resided in rural areas. Also for many many years its been compulsary to store firearms unloaded & if possible disabled in a steelsafe the weld-bolted to concrete, & the ammu had to always be locked up elseware. Consequently civil owned firearms have never been a deterant to crimes in Australia since the bloody Boer War. So the concept of criminals all of a sudden feeling free to go out & robb & pillage since those laws came into eefect 2 years ago is patently ridiculous.
IMAO, those knee-jerk 'over the top' gun laws they introduced after that 'recessive' stole an Armalite & blastered 30 people away in Tasmania, have made buggerall difference to gun crime rates in Australia (see it doesnt just happen in the US, it happens elseware to, but useally about every 5 years, rather than on some lunar month shedule).
You have to remember there's only about 80 firearm deaths a year in Oz (going by some chart I saw on the 'Australian Sporting Shooters Association' website a while ago that was reportedly using 'Australian Bureau of Statistics' info) so its hard to work out any short term effects as even if just one armed holdup went wrong it could mean a 5% change in the annual figures. Even long term I don't think those laws would make more than a buggerall effect on firearm related crimes, because as everyone knows criminals don't comply with laws (even though most criminals don't have guns anyway - most I know would sell any gun they had for their next hit). However as far as accidents & compulsive/impulsives acts are concerned there may be a small downward trend. You'll have to get back to me in about 20 years & I'll let you know.
I Personally think those laws went way over the top, they basically banned all semi-automatic rifles & all 'repeat firing' shotties (pumpies & semi-autos). Gez, they even went & banned, bloody .22 rimfire semi-autos, even though just about every cocky (what farmers are called down under) on the land owns one. At least the govt was paying above the odds for all weapons handed in, I got $200 for a old SKS I 'inherited' (someone who owed me money gave it to me instead). Personally I think it was a huge waste of tax payers money - the govt buying about a million firearms then just smelting them down.
To be perfectly honest when all this was going on & the prime-minister got all the state premiers together, I didn't think they would actually ever get arround to agreeing to anything, & I didn't beleive it at first, how could they be so bloody silly.
Spending bloody millions in tax payers money to buy back everyones guns then melting them down, talk about over the top. Its as if all the polies were after the womens vote - because one thing I noticed was that the anti-gun lobby spokespersons were all women.
It was also arrogance in the extreme as the vast majority of Australians live in 4 urban areas arround Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne & Canberra, & here they were forcing draconian laws over those Australians that lived in the regional areas that covered the rest of the country.
What got me was the way it was presented as a fate complee (or whatever it's called) with the Prime-Minister & the opposition leader & all the state premiers & state opposition leaders coming out & saying the've made this agreement & its a done deal. & they got away with it because some bloody 'recessive' with an Armalite went & blasted away 30 people.
It really makes one cynical about 2 party politics.
Really all that's been done is that the've turned ordinary people into criminals (a bit like the drug laws) & means that there are more guns than ever on the black market.
Yet crime rates are more or less the same as the've ever been - slightly rising in total, but decreasing slightly once population is factored in (per-capita). Really it'd take 20 years for them to really tell if those laws made any difference & even then you couldnt be sure.
As you ban see I didn't support those laws. But I do feel that most Americans who keep guns for self defence, do it mainly because they have tickets on themselves & there own self importance & are thus paranoid they need a gun for self defence. When really they are only at risk from other people, who also have guns for self defence too. Really about the only people who truelly need firearms for self defence are people in law enforment/security & drug dealers. Afterall they are about the only people who are at risk of geting held up regully - most of the drug dealers I know have been held up at least once, useally by toecutters (Oz talk for standover merchants) or by crooked police. As far as everyday people are concerned the odds are like about 1000 to 1 that they'l be held up just once (let alone more that that) in their lifetime.
Because the fact is even most crminals don't actually own firearms. Just do a survey of people who have decent rap sheets - the vast majority are the type of people, that if ever they came a cross a firearm, they'd sell it before the day is out, just so they could get an extra hit. Really, even the vast majority of people who break into houses, have no intent in comiting actual bodily harm on residents, they just want to grab your VCR (& any money or jewellery lying arround) to flog for drug money. If you were actually at home when one of these scrotes climbed through your window, all you'd have to do is turn on your bedside light & they be out the door & running down the street as far as their abused bodies will take 'em.
Just go hang arround a coroners court for a few days & you'd realise that the vast majority of firearm incidents don't even involve 'recidivist criminals' (I wouldn't describe someone with 1 or 2 charges over a lifetime, as a 'criminal'). They actually involve average normal everyday people & are either accidents or impulsive/compulsive acts such as domestics & what not cause by drunkenous, simple jealousy or just by someone losing it. Hence we have that much maligned statistic, that says that if an American keeps a gun for self defence its 23 times more like that gun will kill a friend or relative, that it will ever be needed to deter a intruder (even if its really only half that its still an atrocious statistic).
& even though I'm saying all this, I'm against gun control, because 1, I have an old .22 in the back of the cupboard; 2, I'm planning on buying an old revolver a mate of mine is selling (even though handguns are banned in NSW & its illegal to keep firearms for self defence, one does not need a license to buy a firearm made before 1901 that fires ammunition that's not normally commercially avaliable); & 3, the world is vastly over populated, so the more silly people that kill each other, the better the enviroment will be in the future. Anyway its like evolution in action, aye.
You are also a fukwit for linking startistics that are obviosly false to anyone who has studied them & knows about Australia.
Do all you Americans take things at face value.
Now lets look at these NRA claims that fukwits like you who know nothing about Australia keep quoting.
Ist, I'll knock back each claim (well almost each of them) & then I'll explain why anyone who knows anything about Oz would know those figures are wrong, even if they had no idea what the figures truely were.
Claim 1. "In the State of Victoria alone, Homicides with firearms are up 300% ".
Ha ha,the World Health Organisation has just given the capital of Victoria, Melbourne (75% of Victoria's population) the title of 'Safest City in the Southern Hemisphere'.In fact in the two years before the new gun laws became operative the average homicide rate per 100,000 population in Victoria was 1.25. In 1998 the homicide rate per 100,000 population in Victoria fell to 1.01. In both cases it was the lowest of the six Australian states.
Claim 2. Homicides jumped 3.2%.
In 1998, compared to the average of the two years prior to new gun laws becoming operative, gun homicides fell by 35%. Murder from all causes was down by 11.5%.
Claim 3. Assaults were up 17%.
The assault rate increased on average 9.5% per annum in the two years before the new gun laws became operative. It was only 6% increase in the 1998, the 1st year after the laws came into effect.
Claim 4. Unlawful entries are up 8%
I cannot find any figures on 'unlawful entries' on the ABS site, so I'll have to give that one a miss.
Claim 5. Kidnappings are up 38 %
I could find no infos on kidnappings either, but kidnappings are so rare in Australia you'd just need one extra kidnapping in a year & it would mean an increase of 38% or something.
Claim 6. Manslaughter is up 32 %
No info their either. Also violent death statistics are virtually always noted as 'homicides' or 'suicides', they do not split them are into catagories such as 'manslaughter' as a full homicide trial, including all the preecedures before it can take 2 years or more. So such catagorised statistics could only be tabulated at least 2 to 3 years after the event.
Claim 6. Armed Robberies are up 73%
The rate of increase in robbery averaged 20% per annum in the two years prior to the new gun laws becoming operative, it fell to an increase of 10% in 1998.
Now lets look at a graph
Australia Gun Deaths - Total
...................1988.....1989....1990....1991....1992....1993...1994....1995...1996....1997....1998
Accident........30.......19.........30........29.........24........18........20........15.......30........19.........21
Suicide.........521.....451.......488.....510.......490......435.....420......388.....382......330.....234
Assault.........124.....80..........79........84.........96........64.......79........67.......104......79........57
Legal.Int.........4........7............4...........6..........14..........3........7..........6...........0..........7.........7
Unknown......17......15.........15...........5............7...........6........0..........3...........5.........2..........8
Totals...........696.....572......617......634........631......526.....526......479......521.....437......327
Source: Australian Bureau of Statistics
Now the reason why those statistics you quoted are obviously false to anyone who knows anything about Australia.
The simple fact is that Australia is the most urbanised nation in the world with over 90% of the population living in 3 metropolatin areas (Melbourne/Geelong, Sydney/Newcastle/Wollongong & the Brisbane/GoldCoast/Towoomba/SunshineCoast are) as such ah heck Australians ever owned guns in the 1st place, consequently theose laws had no effect what so ever in Australia ouitside of the sparsly populated rural areas.
Also because handguns have always been banned in Australia (well in living memory) for everyone (except police, the military & security people) handguns have never been a deterrant to crime here. To anyone weho knows Australia, the thought that all of a sudden criminals are going to start robbing more houses & more people will get murdered becaues the 'govt took the guns away is laughable', because crminals have never had to worry their potential victims owning guns anyway.
Those laws (only) banned semi-automatic rifles & repeat firing shotguns, of which 95% resided in rural areas. Also for many many years its been compulsary to store firearms unloaded & if possible disabled in a steelsafe the weld-bolted to concrete, & the ammu had to always be locked up elseware. Consequently civil owned firearms have never been a deterant to crimes in Australia since the bloody Boer War. So the concept of criminals all of a sudden feeling free to go out & robb & pillage since those laws came into eefect 2 years ago is patently ridiculous.
IMAO, those knee-jerk 'over the top' gun laws they introduced after that 'recessive' stole an Armalite & blastered 30 people away in Tasmania, have made buggerall difference to gun crime rates in Australia (see it doesnt just happen in the US, it happens elseware to, but useally about every 5 years, rather than on some lunar month shedule).
You have to remember there's only about 80 firearm deaths a year in Oz (going by some chart I saw on the 'Australian Sporting Shooters Association' website a while ago that was reportedly using 'Australian Bureau of Statistics' info) so its hard to work out any short term effects as even if just one armed holdup went wrong it could mean a 5% change in the annual figures. Even long term I don't think those laws would make more than a buggerall effect on firearm related crimes, because as everyone knows criminals don't comply with laws (even though most criminals don't have guns anyway - most I know would sell any gun they had for their next hit). However as far as accidents & compulsive/impulsives acts are concerned there may be a small downward trend. You'll have to get back to me in about 20 years & I'll let you know.
I Personally think those laws went way over the top, they basically banned all semi-automatic rifles & all 'repeat firing' shotties (pumpies & semi-autos). Gez, they even went & banned, bloody .22 rimfire semi-autos, even though just about every cocky (what farmers are called down under) on the land owns one. At least the govt was paying above the odds for all weapons handed in, I got $200 for a old SKS I 'inherited' (someone who owed me money gave it to me instead). Personally I think it was a huge waste of tax payers money - the govt buying about a million firearms then just smelting them down.
To be perfectly honest when all this was going on & the prime-minister got all the state premiers together, I didn't think they would actually ever get arround to agreeing to anything, & I didn't beleive it at first, how could they be so bloody silly.
Spending bloody millions in tax payers money to buy back everyones guns then melting them down, talk about over the top. Its as if all the polies were after the womens vote - because one thing I noticed was that the anti-gun lobby spokespersons were all women.
It was also arrogance in the extreme as the vast majority of Australians live in 4 urban areas arround Sydney, Brisbane, Melbourne & Canberra, & here they were forcing draconian laws over those Australians that lived in the regional areas that covered the rest of the country.
What got me was the way it was presented as a fate complee (or whatever it's called) with the Prime-Minister & the opposition leader & all the state premiers & state opposition leaders coming out & saying the've made this agreement & its a done deal. & they got away with it because some bloody 'recessive' with an Armalite went & blasted away 30 people.
It really makes one cynical about 2 party politics.
Really all that's been done is that the've turned ordinary people into criminals (a bit like the drug laws) & means that there are more guns than ever on the black market.
Yet crime rates are more or less the same as the've ever been - slightly rising in total, but decreasing slightly once population is factored in (per-capita). Really it'd take 20 years for them to really tell if those laws made any difference & even then you couldnt be sure.
As you ban see I didn't support those laws. But I do feel that most Americans who keep guns for self defence, do it mainly because they have tickets on themselves & there own self importance & are thus paranoid they need a gun for self defence. When really they are only at risk from other people, who also have guns for self defence too. Really about the only people who truelly need firearms for self defence are people in law enforment/security & drug dealers. Afterall they are about the only people who are at risk of geting held up regully - most of the drug dealers I know have been held up at least once, useally by toecutters (Oz talk for standover merchants) or by crooked police. As far as everyday people are concerned the odds are like about 1000 to 1 that they'l be held up just once (let alone more that that) in their lifetime.
Because the fact is even most crminals don't actually own firearms. Just do a survey of people who have decent rap sheets - the vast majority are the type of people, that if ever they came a cross a firearm, they'd sell it before the day is out, just so they could get an extra hit. Really, even the vast majority of people who break into houses, have no intent in comiting actual bodily harm on residents, they just want to grab your VCR (& any money or jewellery lying arround) to flog for drug money. If you were actually at home when one of these scrotes climbed through your window, all you'd have to do is turn on your bedside light & they be out the door & running down the street as far as their abused bodies will take 'em.
Just go hang arround a coroners court for a few days & you'd realise that the vast majority of firearm incidents don't even involve 'recidivist criminals' (I wouldn't describe someone with 1 or 2 charges over a lifetime, as a 'criminal'). They actually involve average normal everyday people & are either accidents or impulsive/compulsive acts such as domestics & what not cause by drunkenous, simple jealousy or just by someone losing it. Hence we have that much maligned statistic, that says that if an American keeps a gun for self defence its 23 times more like that gun will kill a friend or relative, that it will ever be needed to deter a intruder (even if its really only half that its still an atrocious statistic).
& even though I'm saying all this, I'm against gun control, because 1, I have an old .22 in the back of the cupboard; 2, I'm planning on buying an old revolver a mate of mine is selling (even though handguns are banned in NSW & its illegal to keep firearms for self defence, one does not need a license to buy a firearm made before 1901 that fires ammunition that's not normally commercially avaliable); & 3, the world is vastly over populated, so the more silly people that kill each other, the better the enviroment will be in the future. Anyway its like evolution in action, aye.
