So is gun control working in the U.K????q

[Mendo223]

Hey i was wondering, since the UK likes to trample peoples rights and restrict gun ownership, has it even solved anything over there?

Is gun violence almost non existant (like in japan)

Is violence by use of knife, etc on the rise?

In general is crime low and the population safe?

Im kind of confused because on one hand you have a place like Japan where guns are strictly banned and there are less than a dozen gun related homicides in the whole country per year.

and on the other hand you have chicago, where guns are banned but gun violence is higher than in places where there is no gun control.

How does the right trampling U.K. compare in all of this?

[NiteQwill]

I jump with several Brits many times throughout the year (they belong to the UK Army) and have asked them the same question.

They absolutely hate the fact that their country is under siege from criminals and thugs who still have guns and knives. They understand the fact that even they (and their families) are left defenseless against this farce of public safety.

You're not factoring in homicides through the use of other objects.

[Maddog5150]

Yes its working great. The citizens are unarmed and are helpless. At any time the government can force any policies upon its "subjects" who are already bombarded by criminal activity. So I would think that the government there thinks it works. Glad we whoop thier *** over 200 years ago and we dont have to deal with that

[Casual_Shooter]

Im kind of confused because on one hand you have a place like Japan where guns are strictly banned and there are less than a dozen gun related homicides in the whole country per year.

Is this a fact?

[cdtx2001]

Yakuza take their time when it comes to whacking somebody with a gun.


As for the UK, it's working great over there, if you're an evildoer. No one's gonna put up much of a fight when it comes to a robbery.

[CAL.BAR]

Is this a fact?

Yes, it's well known; I believe that suicides far outnumber murder deaths in Japan.

[lumwilliam]

I'd like to see some facts! They're hard to come by in our media, which is a hint to me that the numbers might not look so good for the anti-gun left. There's a liberal brit in my Rotary club who's always telling me how much safer it is in England than here, and how he fondly remembers that even police didn't need to carry guns there because nobody had them. I'd sure like to have something to rebut him with...prove he's living in a fantasy world.

[b.faust]

Unlike japan though they also have Samurai Sword Control.

All those drive by beheadings finally got to be way to much for them.

That being said:
I'm over in the UK at least once a year to teach classes, and in the last few years the incidents of people getting stabbed in pub brawls, or just by gangs of youths goes up. The problems there (like here) aren't about weapon availability.

You could hide all the kitchenware and projectiles in the world and if people want it bad enough, they'll kill with stones and bricks.

The problem is deeper social issues that are complex, hard to really nail down, and the ones that nobody wants to deal with. So they blame the objects instead. That's easy...the objects really can't protest. It's the same with their proposed "Pint Tax", make the booze more expensive so people drink less. Instead of "why are people drinking more?"

B.

[BlackViper]

I'm over there quite a bit and while it's probably unrelated to the gun control aspect, the number of youths carrying knives seems off the charts. Any youth violence seems to result in a stabbing, even just a scuffle - which you don't really see here.

For the gun control aspect, they're grappling with it over there because basically a robber can come in your home and do whatever he wants. There are a lot of cases of a home being robbed several times before a citizen finally gets fed up and puts the criminal down - then has to go through a nationally publicized review of whether it was justified or not.

They just recently released a man from prison who chased a robber down the street and beat the crap out of him with a cricket bat (causing brain damage). I believe he had been robbed several times.

If you ask me it's a real mess there, but that's my perspective. Not sure how the Brits feel.

[b.faust]

I also forgot to add that home invasion is on the rise in the UK. Especially targeted are "pensioners" (the retired elderly), who often get beat to, or near death in the process.
When I was in N.I. in November, the Belfast Telegraph had a report nearly everyday about a home invasion/assault.

They've got absolutely no way to defend themselves, and criminals know that if the place is lacking a doggy toys on the front step, it's going to be a soft target.

B.

[slik556]

I listen to a few different podcasts and I feel they have there facts correct. From what they say and they do say it is all fact, per capita, over all violent crime is higher in the UK then here in the US. That being said the murder rate per capita is higher here in the US then the UK.
0.042802 per 1,000 people in US.
0.0140633 per 1,000 people in UK.

add: The op asked about gun control... These numbers do not say how or what was used to commit the crime.

[audihenry]

All the pro-gun and anti-gun BS aside, here are some numbers. Keep in mind HANDGUNS are banned in England, but you can still get shotguns and rifles, though there are obviously restrictions. If you recall, handguns were also banned in DC prior to Heller.

So here's an interesting document from the horse's mouth: Home Office Stats. Go to page 22. As you can see, more people are killed with sharp instruments and hitting/kicking than with firearms, which does make sense, because so few people have firearms.

The firearm numbers appear typically statistically insignificant, but the problem is this data goes back to 1998, a year AFTER the Gun Control Act of 1997. HOWEVER, England and Wales had a combined total population of over 52,000,000 in 2001, much greater now. Still, they've ONLY had an average of 63 gun-related homicides over the last decade, and only 71 in 2001/2. By comparison, the US had 8,719 for 281,000,000 in 2001, or nearly 23 times more.

Any way you cut it, the U.S. has more gun deaths per capita than England and Wales combined. From the POV of the anti-gun people, this is proof positive that guns increase crime. From the POV of pro-gun people, these numbers are unreliable, not broken down by situation, or otherwise ignore the fact that the more guns you have, the more gun crime you will have (just as if people used rocks to kill each other, the more total rocks you had, the more absolute rock-related crimes you'd have).

And for the record, I am a firearm owner and enthusiast, but I also realize that there is a problem of too many gun crimes in the U.S. Having said that, the vast majority are done by criminals, not responsible gun owners, but that goes without saying.

Sources:

http://www.fbi.gov/filelink.html?file=/ucr/cius_01/xl/01tbl2-10.xls

http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs07/bcs25.pdf

[DavidRSA]

Great post audihenry. Nice to see a thinking man's post instead of all the emotion and hysteria one often finds in our pro-gun crowd

[Vtec44]

The firearm numbers appear typically statistically insignificant, but the problem is this data goes back to 1998, a year AFTER the Gun Control Act of 1997. HOWEVER, England and Wales had a combined total population of over 52,000,000 in 2001, much greater now. Still, they've ONLY had an average of 63 gun-related homicides over the last decade, and only 71 in 2001/2. By comparison, the US had 8,719 for 281,000,000 in 2001, or nearly 23 times more.

That's a very simplistic way of looking at the stats. It's almost the same as comparing the automobile death rate in US vs Vietnam, then come to a conclusion that US has 143 times more automobile deaths than that of Vietnam. Well, obviously since the US has FAR much more number of cars than that of Vietnam. I'd seprate the legal vs illegal ownership of guns , compare the legal vs illegal use of guns prior to the Gun Control Act, compare the use of guns AFTER the Gun Control Act, then compare the crime rate in England and Wales the decade before the Gun Control Act vs the decade after. On top of that, I'd also looking into if the Gun Control Act of 1997 has any relationship in the increase/decrease of homicide using other objects.

[CSACANNONEER]

Great post audihenry. Nice to see a thinking man's post instead of all the emotion and hysteria one often finds in our pro-gun crowd

+1! Yes, I'm sincerely complimenting you audihenry!


On another note, currently England is attempting to ban pint mugs from pubs! Too many are used in fights and it's costing the government millions in health care!