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[Neonivek]

It reminds me of the Young Offender statistics.

The statistic was set up to make it seem like we are sending tons and tons of children to jail.

Yet what was actually going on is that a few individuals, who may have been convicted but have got exceedingly leniant punishments such as being grounded, had repeat offenses.

[Lord Shonus]

Reminds me of a Dateline "Investigative Report" from the early 90s "evaluating" the NRA "don't play with guns" lectures for children. They put a class of preschoolers through the course, while they secreted a few deactivated guns in the classroom, behing a counter, on the teacher's desk in the toybox etc. Then they videotaped the kids playing in the classroom. Unsurprisingly, the kids were soon playing with the guns that wer mixed in with their toys.

[Arrkhal]

Though the one I am thinking of right now isn't appropriate for this board. Though I seen it used on a whole class to try to shock them into submission. When I found out how his statistic was found I become very aggrivated.

Is it black people?  Whether or not it was, you should look into the history of gun control in the USA.  It's lots of fun.  While slavery existed, laws were passed in the south to prevent slaves from using guns to escape on the underground railroad.  After the Emancipation Proclamation, states either kept old laws on the books (one kept their "needs written permission from their master to carry a gun" law, then made it so that a freeman was not legally his own master), or made new ones.

Less than a century later, Martin Luther King Jr. was "sectretly" very unpopular with a lot of the civil rights movement, because he owned a handgun, tried to get a concealed carry permit after his house was bombed (which was denied, because this was before shall-issue licensing), and was best buds with Chalton Heston.  Most of the recent editions of a lot of books conveniently "forget" those little facts, though.

Bill Cosby once brought a crowd to complete, utter silence, after telling a story about his childhood, when lynch mobs in the streets were a reality, and his parents would carry rifles around so that they, their children, and their neighbors would be safe.  He's got something like 3 or 4 different concealed handgun licenses.

It's pretty ridiculous, really.

---------------

Many "gun crime" statistics work any firearm related into their dataset.

Actually, most of the crimes are simple possession.  To "switch sides" for a moment, it's like the statistic that a lot of right-wingers like to cite about England.  After England passed a complete ban on handguns, crime committed with a handgun increased by like 50% or whatever, and stayed high.  Well, yeah, possession of a handgun became "crime with a handgun."  It's like saying "after Texas reinstated their sodomy laws, crime committed by homosexuals increased by 50%."

Like I said, legislation has little to nothing to do with crime.  If you don't cherry-pick your data set, there is no correlation between gun control and real crime.  An anti-gun person would select South Africa and Japan for their dataset, pro-gun would select Switzerland and New Zealand.  The actual truth is in between those extremes.

Fixating on crime committed with an inanimate object is idiotic at best, genuine fodder for conspiracy theorists at worst.

--------------

Reminds me of a Dateline "Investigative Report" from the early 90s "evaluating" the NRA "don't play with guns" lectures for children.

That has less to do with the training itself, and more with the way children's minds work.  They can't really grasp subtleties and contexts as well as adults, and a gun in a toybox will be thought of as a toy gun.  Even by adults, a lot of times.  A Kel-Tec P3AT weighs under 8 ounces and is about 3.5" long, and it shoots the exact same cartridge, and holds the same number of rounds, as the Walther PPK.  Put one of those in a toybox, and you probably can't fault someone for thinking it's a toy.  The 90's was also the last decade where you could get cap guns made of real metal.

Actually, most of the "pro-gun" people I know, with real world experience with them, are even more strict about "no toy guns" than the anti-gun ones.

[Lord Shonus]

Oh, I quite agree. I was simply remembering the third most ridiculous anti-gun propaganda I'd ever encountered.

[Neonivek]

No the study was on homosexuality (refering to an earlier post)

[Cthulhu]

Quote the post then, silly.

[Neonivek]

Though the one I am thinking of right now isn't appropriate for this board. Though I seen it used on a whole class to try to shock them into submission. When I found out how his statistic was found I become very aggrivated.

Is it black people? 

No the study was on homosexuality.

[Cthulhu]

ITT:  Researchers massage data to get the results they want.  Some people might even be surprised by this.

[Arrkhal]

Actually, I've been considering writing an article for the Pink Pistols, which draws some incredibly disturbing parallels between the anti-gun and anti-gay movements.

But imagine this.  A "public safety" campaign, related to the genuine statistical fact that unprotected gay sex is the leading way of transmitting HIV in the western world, the alleged danger presented by people with HIV running around everywhere, and a healthy dose of that Canadian guy or whoever who tried to give HIV to as many people as possible.  After all, an HIV positive person can accidentally infect others about as "easily" as accidentally shooting someone (i.e., only through a criminal level of negligence or a completely freak and unforseeable accident, but the ignorant public doesn't know that), and there have been cases of people using their own HIV as a biological weapon.  Conclusion: ban gays, or at least ban certain, more "dangerous" forms of intercourse.  For "public safety."

That's the anti-gun movement, with but a single concept changed.

Like I said, disturbing.

[Cheeetar]

Actually, I've been considering writing an article for the Pink Pistols, which draws some incredibly disturbing parallels between the anti-gun and anti-gay movements.

But imagine this.  A "public safety" campaign, related to the genuine statistical fact that unprotected gay sex is the leading way of transmitting HIV in the western world, the alleged danger presented by people with HIV running around everywhere, and a healthy dose of that Canadian guy or whoever who tried to give HIV to as many people as possible.  After all, an HIV positive person can accidentally infect others about as "easily" as accidentally shooting someone (i.e., only through a criminal level of negligence or a completely freak and unforseeable accident, but the ignorant public doesn't know that), and there have been cases of people using their own HIV as a biological weapon.  Conclusion: ban gays, or at least ban certain, more "dangerous" forms of intercourse.  For "public safety."

That's the anti-gun movement, with but a single concept changed.

Like I said, disturbing.

I don't know if you're trying to say banning guns or something is bad, but I think I disagree with it. I think.

[Arrkhal]

The connection between HIV and homosexuality is as tenuous as the connection between crime and guns.

More criminals than non-criminals have guns.  Oh noes, guns cause crime!  More gay people than straight people have HIV.  Oh noes, gays cause HIV!

Correlation is not causation.  Banning gays will do nothing to stop HIV transmission.  Banning guns has already done nothing to affect crime in tons of countries.

The real solution to HIV is to cure it.  The real solution to crime, once again, is to cure it.  Limiting law-abiding peoples' freedoms cannot possibly help either case.

[Leafsnail]

The connection between HIV and homosexuality is as tenuous as the connection between crime and guns.

The real solution to HIV is to cure it.  The real solution to crime, once again, is to cure it.  Limiting law-abiding peoples' freedoms cannot possibly help either case.

I'm sorry, I really can't tell what you're trying to say.  Every idea I have of what you're saying just sounds like a strawman.

[penguinofhonor]

Actually, I've been considering writing an article for the Pink Pistols, which draws some incredibly disturbing parallels between the anti-gun and anti-gay movements.

But imagine this.  A "public safety" campaign, related to the genuine statistical fact that unprotected gay sex is the leading way of transmitting HIV in the western world, the alleged danger presented by people with HIV running around everywhere, and a healthy dose of that Canadian guy or whoever who tried to give HIV to as many people as possible.  After all, an HIV positive person can accidentally infect others about as "easily" as accidentally shooting someone (i.e., only through a criminal level of negligence or a completely freak and unforseeable accident, but the ignorant public doesn't know that), and there have been cases of people using their own HIV as a biological weapon.  Conclusion: ban gays, or at least ban certain, more "dangerous" forms of intercourse.  For "public safety."

That's the anti-gun movement, with but a single concept changed.

Like I said, disturbing.

Yeah, but the thing about this connection is that you're wrong. Nobody really uses HIV as an argument against gays anymore. Now it's all just "protecting the sanctity of marriage" (which is code for "using thinly veiled religion to weaken separation of church and state") and "protecting the children" (which is code for "using discredited arguments to support bigotry").

[Arrkhal]

Yeah, but the thing about this connection is that you're wrong. Nobody really uses HIV as an argument against gays anymore. Now it's all just "protecting the sanctity of marriage" (which is code for "using thinly veiled religion to weaken separation of church and state") and "protecting the children" (which is code for "using discredited arguments to support bigotry").

Exactly.  That's why they're being less successful.  How many new people would they rope in with the "public safety" issue?

Those guys do tend to still believe that HIV is an exclusively "gay thing," anyway.

Liberals consider HIV = gay to be discredited, because it is.

Conservatives consider crimes = guns to be discredited, because it is.  Gun control has done nothing to lower crime rates in England, Australia, New Zealand, or any other country.  It hasn't reduced crime in Maryland, California, New York, or any other state in the USA.  The only states and countries with lots of gun control and low crime are ones which have always had low crime rates, like New Jersey and Japan.

What is it that makes people think that logic != same logic?

[Leafsnail]

Conservatives consider crimes = guns to be discredited, because it is.  Gun control has done nothing to lower crime rates in England, Australia, New Zealand, or any other country.

Can't comment on the others, but England has a lower homicide rate than America, and a far, far lower rate of guncrime.

It hasn't reduced crime in Maryland, California, New York, or any other state in the USA.  The only states and countries with lots of gun control and low crime are ones which have always had low crime rates, like New Jersey and Japan.

Woah... citations needed?