imported post
The concept of "more guns = more gun deaths" is based on the assumption that gun deaths and gun violence is committed proportionally across the population. The fact is that in the US roughly 90% of our violent crime is committed by about 8% of our population, most of them convicted felons who are prohibited by law to posses a firearm, let alone use one. Annually in the US, depending on whose figures you prefer, somewhere between 1.5-2.7 million violent crimes are prevented or stopped by a law abiding citizen (LAC) with a firearm. Of those instances, less than 10% of the time is the firearm discharged (showing great restraint among the legally gun owning popultion). In less than 1% of the cases does the offender die from gunshot wounds (I don't have exact percentages readily at hand but I'm sure someone else will). So, in reality, when law abiding American citizens use firearms to prevent millions of violent crimes per year, 99% of the time the perpetrator is not killed, ergo, more guns does NOT = more gun deaths.
Furthermore, LAC licensed to conceal carry handguns are more than 12X less likely than the general population to have any interaction with law enforcement for any infraction or criminal act than the general population. In short, we who are licensed to carry firearms are as a group, among the most law abiding citizens in the nation and are actually even less likely than police officers to commit a crime. I have never seen statistics as to the open carry population and I think it would be nearly impossible to obtain such statistics, however, I expect they would be much the same. Citizens who choose to openly carry a handgun are putting themselves out there in the public and law enforcement eye for great scrutiny. Typically, only people who fall into the LAC category, who take the time to be very cognizant of the law and to follow it, and who have nothing to fear from law enforcement legally (ie they have no arrest warrants or criminal history) are going to be willing to carry a firearm openly and subject themselves to such scrutiny.
What is disingenuously included in our handgun violence statistics are gang shootings (criminals shooting other criminals and most of that 8% of the rogue, hard core criminal population) and suicides. As Japan's recent spike in suicide rates show us, eliminating handguns does not eliminate suicides. Furthermore, many anti-gun groups include people as old as 23-25 in the "child deaths" category thereby putting those most likely to commit a violent crime (those 18-25) in the child category. In nearly all other standard statistics, "child" only includes those up to the age of 17 years old, as those 18 and older are in nearly every legal category considered adults (handgun ownership and alcohol consumption which are limited to 21 and older being the primary excepted categories).
Because of the high legal standards allowing use of a firearm by a law abiding citizen (ie we cannot use our firearm or even draw our firearm in situations where law enforcement officers can and do), law abiding citizens are far less likely than law enforcement to accidentally shoot an innocent bystander and we hit our intended targets more often. That is not a dig at law enforcement (LE) just the facts. LE have to use their firearms in situations where non-LE citizens would not or could not. LE is also actively pursuing and often cornering dangerous criminals whereas LAC are only acting to end the threat the criminal poses. If we can get the criminal to run away merely by the presence of our firearm we have succeeded in self-defense. LE must run after the criminal and try to apprehend him which leads to scenarios unlikely for LAC to ever find themselves, which makes direct comparison of LE shooting statistics to LAC shooting statistics somewhat of an apples to oranges comparison.
Hope some of the above helps in your struggle to inform your fellow Aussies.