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[Reelya]

The UK figures probably don't mean much because UK was never a huge gun culture.

Take a look at the firearm deaths per 100,000 people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

USA is 10 per 100,000. UK is 0.23 per 100,000 people. That's 1/40th the rate in the UK

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Firearms_policy_in_the_United_Kingdom

In the UK, 2.4% of homicides are by guns: about 60 gun shootings per year. In the USA, 11000 homicides are by guns, out of about 12000 homicides. Clearly, saying that the handgun ban in the UK "failed" to reduce the homicide rate is a red herring. Of course it wouldn't have a big effect. Almost all homicides in the USA involve guns, almost none do in the UK. And that was the same before and after the bans.

[Erkki]

And to turn that statistic on its head: that right there is a clear demonstration that the ownership of guns does nothing to prevent violent crime either.

precisely.

Should that really be a basis for restrictions? "Our statistics shows that these are ineffective so you are banned from acquiring them".

Besides, there are many uses for a gun other self defense.

PS. Apparently the Orlando shooter bought his rifle just a week or so before the attack. Here: http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/orlando-nightclub-massacre/dealer-who-sold-orlando-massacre-guns-i-don-t-make-n591456

[Erkki]

The UK figures probably don't mean much because UK was never a huge gun culture.

Take a look at the firearm deaths per 100,000 people.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

USA is 10 per 100,000. UK is 0.23 per 100,000 people. The average rate of firearm deaths in UK is 1/40th of the USA. Gun violence was a much smaller proportion of the total violence in the UK, therefore any effects of the gun ban would also be relatively small compared to a culture with more guns (USA and Australia, which evolved from rural frontier nations).

Please don't look at firearm related deaths but firearm related homicides. Gun suicide isn't the same thing as gun violence.

UK has half the suicides of USA's rate and considerably less guns so OF COURSE guns are used less in suicides, too. They're one of the available tools. Want lesser gun suicides? Ban guns. Want less suicides overall? Err... look at Switzerland.

Homicide and gun number ratios vary a lot within Europe and there just isn't a causality between the two. At least not before we look at countries with no control at all like many US states. Gun violence was used as the basis for UK and Australia's gun bans, yet violence and homicide ratios are going up still. Just with different tools.

[LoSboccacc]

Meanwhile, USA and Australia developed from frontier nations, where there was a relatively high level of private gun ownership compared to the USA, so restricting guns can theoretically have a big impact.

Data shows in Australia there was NO impact on violence, only on means. Sure there's less gun violence, but homicide rate remained constant.

[truckload of probablys and maybes]

The only valid comparison is first/after within the same country to have apples-to-apples data. Relating two countries is meaningless, the socioeconomic structure where violence is generated is too much different different.

This is what the only hard data we have tells us, and it's hard to argue with that. And I'll refrain to post the more controversial statistics.

[Reelya]

Australia: Figure 2 Homicide incidents by year, 1989–90 to 2009–10 (rate per 100,000)


Looks like a big drop in all types of homicide to me. The proportion of homicides which involve guns also dropped from about 24% in 1996 to 16% now, which further backs up that declines in the use of guns are partly responsible for the drop.

Australia had more guns than the UK (where guns are only used in 2.4% of homicides), but nowhere near as many guns as the USA (where guns account for over 90% of homicides). Australia is more of a gun culture than the UK, but it's still pretty "gun free" compared to the USA, so other types of violence are pretty much independent of guns here, and always have been.

"Other types of violence" involves a whole lot of stuff such as drunken fights. Why would gun laws affecting rifles be expected to play a role in drunks fighting each other? If there are more drunken fights now than before, that's clearly not something restrictions on semi-automatic rifles has anything to do with. You might as well state that the gun laws didn't cure cancer: it's just as relevant.

[Erkki]

Except it didn't happen when the guns were bought back. Homicide and violence are going down in Australia, but for reasons other than less guns being available.

Please see this graph: http://www.findikaattori.fi/en/10

And this: http://www.findikaattori.fi/en/97

And point out at the timeline when firearm laws changed.

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

They didn't. 1991 is when the depression ended. Pistols became more difficult to get in 2008 but legal ones weren't used in suicides or homicides basically at all besides the two school shootings in the 00s. Typical firearm homicide remains committed early in the morning between heavily drunk, jobless friends/family members of 45 years or more in age and firearm restrictions would just change the tool.

[Reelya]

Australia had gun programs from 1996-2003. That fits the start of the declines pretty well.

But a legal amnesty wouldn't logically be expected to have instant effects. The main effect is to limit the supply of guns which enter the illegal pipeline, from legal guns being stolen etc, while the pool of illegal guns is gradually diminished through police work and wear and tear (guns do stop working). It would take a few years for that to kick in, so it would not be logical to expect an "instant" drop.

Well you can point to a country which didn't have a gun problem, that solved some problem by doing something other than restricting guns. That doesn't really tell you anything about how to deal with a country which does have a gun problem.

Israel stopped letting soldiers take guns home on weekends, just the reduction of weekend shooting deaths was enough to pull the entire nations suicide rate down by 40%.

[Sheb]

Apparently the Orlando shooter had a grindr account.

[Erkki]

Australia had gun programs from 1996-2003. That fits the start of the declines pretty well.

But a legal amnesty wouldn't logically be expected to have instant effects. The main effect is to limit the supply of guns which enter the illegal pipeline. It would take a few years for that to kick in.

Well you can point to a country which didn't have a gun problem, that solved some problem by doing something other than restricting guns. That doesn't really tell you anything about how to deal with a country which does have a gun problem.

Israel stopped letting soldiers take guns home on weekends, just the reduction of weekend shooting deaths was enough to pull the entire nations suicide rate down by 40%.

The point was that there are a multitude of things effecting suicide and homicide rates other than availability of tools. That goes to countries that did decide they had a gun problem and get away with firearms, too.

Gun problem should be defined. 2 homicides per 100,000 is low. Problem seemed(seems) to be perception of guns being dangerous and/or causing mortalities rather regardless of whether they actually do so in reality or not. Saying this independently of the whole guns for self defense debate.

Maybe homicide victims' last seconds are more peaceful knowing they weren't murdered with a horrible, horrible black piece of metal but a knife. edit: or better yet, an illegal firearm.

[Reelya]

[truckload of probablys and maybes]

How is any of that "probably and maybes".

If guns account for 2.4% of homicides in the UK, then of course the effects of gun laws in the UK are going to be equally small, so you can't really read anything from the changes. The noise is bigger than the effect.

[Loud Whispers]

Apparently the Orlando shooter had a grindr account.

I heard it was Jack'd

All conjecture until proof is provided, like his surprise jihad

Everybody seems to forget about surprise jihad nutil the next surprise jihad, dunno why

[Erkki]

[truckload of probablys and maybes]

How is any of that "probably and maybes".

If guns account for 2.4% of homicides in the UK, then of course the effects of gun laws in the UK are going to be equally small, so you can't really read anything from the changes. The noise is bigger than the effect.

In your own source, this, it says on page 77 that firearms were used in 9,3 % of homicides in 2010-2011.

Thats pretty high for a country almost without guns. And incidentally, its the same 9-ish% in Finland, where theres a gun for every 3 citizens.

Interestingly there is no statistics on how many of the homicide guns were held or acquired illegally for UK.

[Reelya]

For the 2.4% figure I was citing a link which cites these figures for 2011
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-kingdom
But it looks like ~5% from that source, I'm not sure now where they got 2.4%, so let's scrap that figure.

But back to the original point. I had said that what happened after the UK's handgun ban doesn't tell us anything about whether gun control in the USA would work.

Looking at the link i provided, in 2011 was a grand total of 4 reported murders with a handgun in the UK. That's actually an increase from 2001, in which exactly 1 person was murdered with a handgun. So it's pretty close to zero, and you'd also expect the effects of the UK's 1997 handgun ban to be close to zero.

Therefore, the UK's handgun ban tells us nothing about what effect laws restricting handgun would have in the USA, where handguns make up the bulk of murders.

This also highlights where the people who are propagating the "UK handgun ban failed" meme are being misleading. They're conflating USA culture, which is awash with handguns, with UK culture, where handguns are basically unknown, but they acted preventatively to avert a future where handguns have become common, like in the USA.

[Erkki]

For the 2.4% figure I was citing a link which cites these figures for 2011
http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-kingdom
But it looks like ~5% from that source, I'm not sure now where they got 2.4%

BTW, "handgun homicides" in 2011 was a grand total of 4 reported cases. Considering it's pretty damn rare, it's not a surprise then that the handgun ban in 1997 didn't blip the homicide rates much.

What?!?!? That was for 2011. Did you not read the paper you used as a source?

See page 75. That is for 2010/2011. Handguns were used way or another in 34 homicide cases, shotguns in 20, rifles in 5. Not 4 cases! Plus, someone was killed with an air weapon, I don't know how that happened, maybe a lot of bad luck, 10 year olds shooting each other for fun?

There were 636 homicides of which 58 were by firearms, thats not 2,4%.

Also handguns(banned, you know) were used in about 300 grievous bodily harm cases. Handguns were fired in about 400 cases.

This is very odd.

[Reelya]

    I cited the figures given in the links I actually provided.

    I went looking for alternate info when you questioned it. There are over 200 citations in the two wiki's that I linked, it's not reasonable to expect someone to read all of that. I'm still not sure where you source the link you provided for which you said "in your own source it says ...". Where is that linked connected btw?