>>In 1997, the Australian Institure of Criminology stats show that for the
>>entire country of some 19 million people, there were 360 homicides. One a
>>day. 76 used firearms
>Proving a point, obviously lowering the gun related deaths isn't the motive
>as there aren't enough of them to matter.
What? Oh, of course, it was an evil plot by the Fourth International to
strip Aussies of our only defence against our vicious, deomcratically
elected socialist government. (`Socialist'? Socialite, maybe.)
>If the motive WAS to lower deaths,
>it failed miserably.
I won't get into this tiresome discussion beyond amplifying the obvious
corrective I already provided. I see no attempt to relate to the ethos
behind these data, which is really what's at issue. Guns don't kill people,
some of the people who have access to guns (and knives and syringes of
HIV-contaminated blood) kill people. In Australia, very few people do so.
One of the reasons is that we long ago chose democratically to deny
ourselves free access to hand guns and certain other lethal firearms.
>I noticed you didn't go after the Australia wide
>armed robberies up 44% stat.
You are referring to the data at
http://www.aic.gov.au/stats/robbery/index.html#graphs
which shows a close-to-flat rate in use of firearms in robberies. Other
weapons are on the increase, and have been for some time. As in the USA,
this is very probably related directly to the spread of the drug sub-culture.
Your implication, I take it, is that the (quite limited) additional
restrictive gun laws introduced in Australia have led to an outbreak of
armed robberies of banks, stores, etc. Perhaps you imagine that banks
managers and their guards, previously armed to the teeth, now cower
defenceless before any punk who arrives with an illegal gun. Get a grip on
reality.
Damien Broderick
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b30 : Mon May 28 2001 - 09:56:21 MDT