Would banning firearms lower murder and suicide rates?

[AAjax]

PDF of full study

A long read, but worth the time if this is a subject you have interest in.

In a nutshell it comes to the conclusion that banning firearms would have no appreciable effect in reducing murder and suicide rates.

"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. Nevertheless, the burden
of proof rests on the proponents of the more guns equal
more death and fewer guns equal less death mantra, especially
since they argue public policy ought to be based on
that mantra.149 To bear that burden would at the very least
require showing that a large number of nations with more
guns have more death and that nations that have imposed
stringent gun controls have achieved substantial reductions
in criminal violence (or suicide). But those correlations are
not observed when a large number of nations are compared
across the world."

Discuss,

 

[blackangst1]

Pretty much conclusive with other similar studies. Not much to discuss. In thoery banning guns would lower gun violence, but the facts are different.

/sits and waits for other cherry picked studies showing the opposite.

 

[Red Dawn]

There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

 

[Genx87]

So this backs up the plethora of other studies that support the same conclusion?

 

[sao123]

banning guns does not remove knifes.
/thread.

 

[BeauJangles]

I believe that if we could start from scratch and ban firearms from the get-go, then there would be a drop in the crime rate, but the truth is that most crimes are committed by people who don't have a right to carry firearms anyway and most of those firearms are purchased illegally.

I'm not advocating banning firearms even in that hypothetical situation, but I could see how it might work. Now, there's no point in trying.

 

[Atreus21]

Originally posted by: sao123
banning guns does not remove knifes.
/thread.

I don't know who you are, but the second quote in your sig is hilarious.

 

[WHAMPOM]

Ban bathrooms and stairs where most fatal home accidents happen?

 

[AAjax]

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents. But what what are a few children's lives when compared to the bicycle industry?

 

[OCGuy]

Why the hell did they need to do a study to figure this out? Just drive through DC @ 2 am on Saturday morning.

 

[bamacre]

Originally posted by: sao123
banning guns does not remove knifes.

Banning guns does not remove guns either.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: AAjax

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents. But what what are a few children's lives when compared to the bicycle industry?

Precisely, being able to own guns or bicycles takes precedent over a few unfortunate children as heartless as it may seem.

 

[Red Dawn]

Originally posted by: bamacre

Originally posted by: sao123
banning guns does not remove knifes.

Banning guns does not remove guns either.

Yep all it would due is increase the criminal population.

 

[b0mbrman]

Originally posted by: AAjax

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents. But what what are a few children's lives when compared to the bicycle industry?

How many bicycle-hours does the average kid go through per year? How many gun-hours? Which has a higher rate of accidents/hour?

I don't know either

 

[Moonbeam]

They'll have to pry my guns out of my cold dead.............. wait, did somebody not beat me to this thought?

 

[MotF Bane]

Redundant study is redundant.

 

[marincounty]

Originally posted by: AAjax

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents. But what what are a few children's lives when compared to the bicycle industry?

Bullshit. Unless you show some credible links you are a liar.

Text

698 bicyclists reportedly died on US roads in 2007.

In a typical year over 90 percent of cyclists killed on US roads die in crashes with motor vehicles.

Text
Nationwide for 2006, gun violence killed 3,218 American children and teens ages 19 and under, an increase of 6.3% from the nationwide 2005 total of 3,027 this means that in the U.S. an average of 9 young people are killed each day by guns.

(Numbers obtained from CDC National Center for Health Statistics mortality report online, 2009.)

 

[OCGuy]

Originally posted by: marincounty
[
Bullshit. Unless you show some credible links you are a liar.

Text

698 bicyclists reportedly died on US roads in 2007.

In a typical year over 90 percent of cyclists killed on US roads die in crashes with motor vehicles.

Text
Nationwide for 2006, gun violence killed 3,218 American children and teens ages 19 and under, an increase of 6.3% from the nationwide 2005 total of 3,027 this means that in the U.S. an average of 9 young people are killed each day by guns.

(Numbers obtained from CDC National Center for Health Statistics mortality report online, 2009.)

Ok, replace bikes with "cars."

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

How about accidental drownings vs. gun accidents?
http://www.anesi.com/accdeath.htm

 

[FaaR]

Originally posted by: AAjax
More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents.

This may well be true. However, bikes have useful purposes, as opposed to actually being designed to kill people.

...Unless you wish to argue, of course, that a great number of gun owners exclusively use the butts of their firearms to hammer in nails, for example...

Anyway, Harvard study may say no to lower murder rates without guns; pretty much entire continent of Europe says yes. There's scarcely a single western nation on this planet with a higher gun-related death/suicide rate than the united states. And that has absolutely NOTHING to do with the overall level of gun-crazedness of US culture? Then what's causing this deluge of gun-related shootings; gubmint mind control rays perhaps?

 

[MikeMike]

Originally posted by: FaaR

Originally posted by: AAjax
More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents.

This may well be true. However, bikes have useful purposes, as opposed to actually being designed to kill people.

...Unless you wish to argue, of course, that a great number of gun owners exclusively use the butts of their firearms to hammer in nails, for example...

Anyway, Harvard study may say no to lower murder rates without guns; pretty much entire continent of Europe says yes. There's scarcely a single western nation on this planet with a higher gun-related death/suicide rate than the united states. And that has absolutely NOTHING to do with the overall level of gun-crazedness of US culture? Then what's causing this deluge of gun-related shootings; gubmint mind control rays perhaps?

uh.. you know this thing called hunting? lots of people do it, it provides a necessary item, unlike a bike (you can walk)... so dont you dare tell me guns have no purposes.

 

[imported_inspire]

Originally posted by: FaaR

Originally posted by: AAjax
More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents.

This may well be true. However, bikes have useful purposes, as opposed to actually being designed to kill people.

...Unless you wish to argue, of course, that a great number of gun owners exclusively use the butts of their firearms to hammer in nails, for example...

Anyway, Harvard study may say no to lower murder rates without guns; pretty much entire continent of Europe says yes. There's scarcely a single western nation on this planet with a higher gun-related death/suicide rate than the united states. And that has absolutely NOTHING to do with the overall level of gun-crazedness of US culture? Then what's causing this deluge of gun-related shootings; gubmint mind control rays perhaps?

Correlation, I'd like you to meet some friends of mine - Causation, Confounding, and the ever so lovable stats-i-pulled-out-of-my-ass.

 

[Gonad the Barbarian]

Here's a link to pretty decent special on guns:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/9157...tic-america#s-p2-so-i0
There's a hipster slant to it, but despite that it shows pretty demonstrably that it's not guns that are the problem, but people (shockingly) that are the "gun" problem. Plus there's some neat hardware getting shown off.

And here's that 30 Days episode that I think someone mentioned earlier:
http://www.hulu.com/watch/2571...-gun-nation#s-p1-so-i0
Also worth watching.

 

[frostedflakes]

Originally posted by: marincounty

Originally posted by: AAjax

Originally posted by: Red Dawn
There are way too many in circulation to ban them. In addition most of the time those who use guns to commit premeditated crimes have illegal guns so they can't be back to the Perp.

As far as suicides are concerned, most aren't done by firearms and if a person wants to off himself there are plenty of ways to do it without a gun.

What would be lowered is accidental deaths by fire arms, especially amongst children but what's a few children's lives when it comes to the Second Amendment.

More children are killed in bicycle accidents than gun accidents. But what what are a few children's lives when compared to the bicycle industry?

Bullshit. Unless you show some credible links you are a liar.

Text

698 bicyclists reportedly died on US roads in 2007.

In a typical year over 90 percent of cyclists killed on US roads die in crashes with motor vehicles.

Text
Nationwide for 2006, gun violence killed 3,218 American children and teens ages 19 and under, an increase of 6.3% from the nationwide 2005 total of 3,027 this means that in the U.S. an average of 9 young people are killed each day by guns.

(Numbers obtained from CDC National Center for Health Statistics mortality report online, 2009.)

Note he said gun accidents, not gun violence. Your own link says only 154 children and teens die each year from unintentional shootings.

 

[Perknose]

OP, why do you claim this is a Harvard study? Neither author nor any of the other contributors are in any way associated with Harvard.

Just asking, is all. Did you pull it out of your ass, or what?

From the PDF:

WOULD BANNING FIREARMS REDUCE MURDER AND SUICIDE?
A REVIEW OF INTERNATIONAL AND SOME DOMESTIC EVIDENCE

DON B. KATES* AND GARY MAUSER**

* Don B. Kates (LL.B., Yale, 1966) is an American criminologist and constitutional
lawyer associated with the Pacific Research Institute, San Francisco. He may be contactedat dbkates@earthlink.net; 360-666-2688; 22608 N.E. 269th Ave., Battle Ground,
WA 98604.

** Gary Mauser (Ph.D., University of California, Irvine, 1970) is a Canadian criminologist
and university professor at Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC Canada.
He may be contacted at www.garymauser.net, mauser@sfu.ca, and 604-291-3652.

The Pacific Research Institute is a well known right wing organ.

The Pacific Research Institute (PRI) or officially the 'Pacific Research Institute for Public Policy', is a think tank founded in 1979 whose stated vision is the promotion of "the principles of individual freedom and personal responsibility. The Institute believes these principles are best encouraged through policies that emphasize a free economy, private initiative, and limited government." The institute is a 501(c)3 non-profit corporation, and had $4.9M in revenue in 2005. [1] The Pacific Research Institute has associated with other think-tanks like the American Enterprise Institute and the Cato Institute.

No Harvard found OP.