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Harvard Journal Study of Worldwide Data Obliterates Notion that Gun Ownership Correlates with Violen

Doug Huffman

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http://www.cfif.org/htdocs/freedomline/current/in_our_opinion/Gun-Ownership.htm

Center For Individual Freedom wrote:
Harvard Journal Study of Worldwide Data Obliterates Notion that Gun Ownership Correlates with Violence

Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy Confirms that Reducing Gun Ownership by Law-Abiding Citizens Does Nothing to Reduce Violence Worldwide

By now, any informed American is familiar with Dr. John R. Lott, Jr.'s famous axiom of "More Guns, Less Crime." In other words, American jurisdictions that allow law-abiding citizens to exercise their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms are far safer and more crime-free than jurisdictions that enact stringent "gun control" laws.

Very simply, the ability of law-abiding citizens to possess firearms has helped reduce violent crime in America.

Now, a Harvard Journal of Law & Public Policy study shows that this is not just an American phenomenon. According to the study, worldwide gun ownership rates do not correlate with higher murder or suicide rates.

In fact, many nations with high gun ownership have significantly lower murder and suicide rates. In their piece entitled Would Banning Firearms Reduce Murder and Suicide? A Review of International and some Domestic Evidence, Don B. Kates and Gary Mauser eviscerate "the mantra that more guns mean more deaths and that fewer guns, therefore, mean fewer deaths." In so doing, the authors provide fascinating historical insight into astronomical murder rates in the Soviet Union during the Cold War, and they dispel the myths that widespread gun ownership is somehow unique to the United States or that America suffers from the developed world's highest murder rate.

To the contrary, they establish that Soviet murder rates far exceeded American murder rates, and continue to do so today, despite Russia's extremely stringent gun prohibitions. By 2004, they show, the Russian murder rate was nearly four times higher than the American rate.

More fundamentally, Dr. Kates and Dr. Mauser demonstrate that other developed nations such as Norway, Finland, Germany, France and Denmark maintain high rates of gun ownership, yet possess murder rates lower than other developed nations in which gun ownership is much more restricted.

For example, handguns are outlawed in Luxembourg, and gun ownership extremely rare, yet its murder rate is nine times greater than in Germany, which has one of the highest gun ownership rates in Europe. As another example, Hungary's murder rate is nearly three times higher than nearby Austria's, but Austria's gun ownership rate is over eight times higher than Hungary's. "Norway," they note, "has far and away Western Europe's highest household gun ownership rate (32%), but also its lowest murder rate. The Netherlands," in contrast, "has the lowest gun ownership rate in Western Europe (1.9%) ... yet the Dutch gun murder rate is higher than the Norwegian."

Dr. Kates and Dr. Mauser proceed to dispel the mainstream misconception that lower rates of violence in Europe are somehow attributable to gun control laws. Instead, they reveal, "murder in Europe was at an all-time low before the gun controls were introduced." As the authors note, "strict controls did not stem the general trend of ever-growing violent crime throughout the post-WWII industrialized world."

Citing England, for instance, they reveal that "when it had no firearms restrictions [in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries], England had little violent crime." By the late 1990s, however, "England moved from stringent controls to a complete ban on all handguns and many types of long guns." As a result, "by the year 2000, violent crime had so increased that England and Wales had Europe's highest violent crime rate, far surpassing even the United States." In America, on the other hand, "despite constant and substantially increasing gun ownership, the United States saw progressive and dramatic reductions in criminal violence in the 1990s."

Critically, Dr. Kates and Dr. Mauser note that "the fall in the American crime rate is even more impressive when compared with the rest of the world," where 18 of the 25 countries surveyed by the British Home Office suffered violent crime increases during that same period.

Furthermore, the authors highlight the important point that while the American gun murder rate often exceeds that in other nations, the overall per capita murder rate in other nations (including other means such as strangling, stabbing, beating, etc.) is oftentimes much higher than in America.

The reason that gun ownership doesn't correlate with murder rates, the authors show, is that violent crime rates are determined instead by underlying cultural factors. "Ordinary people," they note, "simply do not murder." Rather, "the murderers are a small minority of extreme antisocial aberrants who manage to obtain guns whatever the level of gun ownership" in their society.

Therefore, "banning guns cannot alleviate the socio-cultural and economic factors that are the real determinants of violence and crime rates." According to Dr. Kates and Dr. Mauser, "there is no reason for laws prohibiting gun possession by ordinary, law-abiding, responsible adults because such people virtually never commit murder. If one accepts that such adults are far more likely to be victims of violent crime than to commit it, disarming them becomes not just unproductive but counter-productive."

John Lott couldn't have stated it better himself.
The Harvard study is at [font="Verdana,Arial,Helv"]http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf[/font]
Either we are equal or we are not. Good people ought to be armed where they will, with wits and guns and the truth. NRA KMA$$
 

tapper95

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I must have ESP... I was just thinking about a study like this... It's a shame that so many prior studies have been manipulated or abandoned by the anti-gun liberals who started the studywhen the truth starts coming out...

England used to be such a nice place... Many places in the world have sucha basic need for self-defense because of gangs, warlords, and battling political parties, but often times those are the places that have disarmed their people....

Israel and Switzerland are beautiful places for gun rights...

Straight from Don Kateswritings that have been placed on the NRA webiste:

Quote:

[size=-1]Switzerland[/size]
[size=-1]And then there is Switzerland, where the laws are similar to those in Israel and gun availability is comparable to that in the U.S. In Switzerland, handgun licenses are available to any law-abiding applicant. In half the Swiss cantons (similar to U.S. states), licensees are free to carry their personal handguns concealed. Beyond this freedom of ownership, every law-abiding military-age Swiss male is issued a firearm and he must keep it at home to perform his mandatory militia obligation.[/size]

[size=-1]
sig90.gif
[/size]



[size=-1]Switzerland`s enlisted men are required to keep at home the STGW 90 assault rifle ("Sturmgewehr") (above), which fires both full- or semi-auto. Retired militiamen may buy their issued firearms. Below: The Walther P-38, one of several pistols that the Israeli government furnishes to its citizens, including teenagers.[/size]

End Quote
Here is a little more info on some myths debunked by the Cato Institute...

http://www.cato.org/dailys/05-13-00.html
 

dvas

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tapper95 wrote:
I must have ESP... I was just thinking about a study like this... It's a shame that so many prior studies have been manipulated or abandoned by the anti-gun liberals who started the studywhen the truth starts coming out...

England used to be such a nice place... Many places in the world have sucha basic need for self-defense because of gangs, warlords, and battling political parties, but often times those are the places that have disarmed their people....

Israel and Switzerland are beautiful places for gun rights...

Straight from Don Kateswritings that have been placed on the NRA webiste:

Quote:

[size=-1]Switzerland[/size]
[size=-1]And then there is Switzerland, where the laws are similar to those in Israel and gun availability is comparable to that in the U.S. In Switzerland, handgun licenses are available to any law-abiding applicant. In half the Swiss cantons (similar to U.S. states), licensees are free to carry their personal handguns concealed. Beyond this freedom of ownership, every law-abiding military-age Swiss male is issued a firearm and he must keep it at home to perform his mandatory militia obligation.[/size]

[size=-1]
sig90.gif
[/size]



[size=-1]Switzerland`s enlisted men are required to keep at home the STGW 90 assault rifle ("Sturmgewehr") (above), which fires both full- or semi-auto. Retired militiamen may buy their issued firearms. Below: The Walther P-38, one of several pistols that the Israeli government furnishes to its citizens, including teenagers.[/size]

End Quote
Here is a little more info on some myths debunked by the Cato Institute...

http://www.cato.org/dailys/05-13-00.html
I will have to disagree.... Here in Israel, it is not possible for every law abiding citizen to have a gun :cuss:. You need to either live in certain 'dangerous' areas, or to be a taxi driver, or to deal with daimonds,....... It sucks. :banghead:
 

Drewesque

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tapper95 wrote:
I must have ESP... I was just thinking about a study like this... It's a shame that so many prior studies have been manipulated or abandoned by the anti-gun liberals who started the studywhen the truth starts coming out...

England used to be such a nice place... Many places in the world have sucha basic need for self-defense because of gangs, warlords, and battling political parties, but often times those are the places that have disarmed their people....

Israel and Switzerland are beautiful places for gun rights...

Straight from Don Kateswritings that have been placed on the NRA webiste:

Quote:

[size=-1]Switzerland[/size]
[size=-1]And then there is Switzerland, where the laws are similar to those in Israel and gun availability is comparable to that in the U.S. In Switzerland, handgun licenses are available to any law-abiding applicant. In half the Swiss cantons (similar to U.S. states), licensees are free to carry their personal handguns concealed. Beyond this freedom of ownership, every law-abiding military-age Swiss male is issued a firearm and he must keep it at home to perform his mandatory militia obligation.[/size]

[size=-1]
sig90.gif
[/size]



[size=-1]Switzerland`s enlisted men are required to keep at home the STGW 90 assault rifle ("Sturmgewehr") (above), which fires both full- or semi-auto. Retired militiamen may buy their issued firearms. Below: The Walther P-38, one of several pistols that the Israeli government furnishes to its citizens, including teenagers.[/size]

End Quote
Here is a little more info on some myths debunked by the Cato Institute...

http://www.cato.org/dailys/05-13-00.html
I wish we were issued nice guns like they get. I've always been kind of jealous of them.
 

ChefSMW

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The Israel Dept. of the Interior makes notification to the generalpublic the requirements necessary for the obtaining of a permit topossess a firearm:
1. Applicant must be a permanent resident of Israel for 3 consecutiveyears prior to making application for a firearms permit.
2. Applicant years of age.
3. The permit request must be for personal use, not to engage in thebusiness of firearms sales.
4. Applicant must fall into one of the following categories:
a. Part-time reservist (volunteer) for 3 years- may own 1 handgun
b. Such a reservist (volunteer) is a member of a gun club- may own 1rifle
c. Professional, licensed public transportation driver, transportinga minimum of 5 passengers- may own 1 handgun
d. Licensed animal control officer- may own 2 hunting rifles, *not*full automatic weapons, or semi-automatic weapons with a limitedcapacity magazine.
e. Full-time dealer of jewelry or large sums of cash or valuables-may own 1 handgun

West Bank and Gaza Strip Settlers:
1. A resident in a militarily strategic buffer zone, essential to thesecurity of the State of Israel- may own 1 handgun
2. A business owner in these geographic areas- may own 1 handgun
Veterans:
1. Veterans of the Regular Army honorably discharged with the rank ofnoncommissioned officer, and veterans of the Reserve Army with the rankof regimental commander- may own 1 handgun
2. Retired law enforcement officers with the rank of sergeant- may own 1handgun
3. Retired prison guards with the rank of squadron commander- may own 1handgun
Individuals:
Upon presenting documentation that one is about to receive a souvenir, aprize, an inheritance, or an award of appreciation from the Israelmilitary.


http://www.jpfo.org/israel-firearms.htm


 

tapper95

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...and Israel used to be sucha a nice place... Anyone have crime stats on Israel since they started introducing gun control? Then again, Israel's greatest crime threat is more like an overt act of war... I'll take a crack head asking me for a ride (last night at the grocery store) over a jihad-head with a bomb-laden-undershirt...
 

dvas

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tapper95 wrote:
...and Israel used to be sucha a nice place... Anyone have crime stats on Israel since they started introducing gun control? Then again, Israel's greatest crime threat is more like an overt act of war... I'll take a crack head asking me for a ride (last night at the grocery store) over a jihad-head with a bomb-laden-undershirt...

i don't have such a number, but i can tell you what i see around.... in the past, until around January, there was not so much news about this.... Gun carry community, that you can find around local gun forum Haslik were keeping on to try to educate the others and were and still are sharing experience and practicing IPSC.Ministry of Interior is canceling more and more permits. So last January, this happened: Shari Dromi killed a robber.
This was all around news, even some new laws was proposed that you will not be criminally prosecuted if you kill a robber, but the law didn't pass. What is happening today, if someone gets into my house, he can beat the crap out of me, and if he is not armed, I can not use gun :banghead:.
For last few months, you suddenly see on the news, more and more robberies, but you also suddenly see some examples, were the shop owners are shooting back. One such example happened not so far from where I leave, and according to what I know, the shop owner was not criminally prosecuted. To be honest, I find that strange, since the shop owner was running after the robber on the street and shooting after him :what:!
There was another similar example just two weeks ago.
I hope that the authorities will understand that we have the right to protect not only our lives, but our property as well. You can see every day on the news, that older people are getting attacked, with a sad, but not tragic example of putting an acid on an old lady face during the robbery.

Sad, sad, sad... I wish we have here a trespassing law! If you enter my property, you are taken out in a bag!
 

tapper95

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Here in Virginia welost the battle again this year for a "Castle Doctrine"... basically, if you enter my house, you are not there for good intentions, so I can immediately escalate my defensive posture to condition black... obviously this is not a simple matter, since the argument of a neighbor accidentally walking into your house comes up, or kids playing around, etc... but I think it sends a message to criminals...

And yes, criminals do know the laws... at least the important ones... Why else would crime against Florida residentsfall while crime against out of state tourists rise after they passed their concealed carry law?
 

nickerj1

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It doesn't take a Harvard Journal to come to this conclusion.

Here's how the arguments on some message boards played out after VT:

The democrats say that gun control stops crime and we need more.

The republicans point at Austria and Switzerland, where everyone has a gun and crime is non-existent.

The democrats point to England and their low crime and say that correlation does not imply causation and cite a beautifully written Wikipedia article.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correlation_causation

The republicans embrace the statement and say that's what they've been saying this entire time. It's why gun control is pointless.
 
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