It would help if you name these countries and their stats. Not giving you homework to do, but it is an empty statement to make after the OP posted actual data.
Happy to accept that the US isn’t a standalone if we see your information.
This may be referencing a chart from CNN’s report on Small Arms Survey data, which includes many other statistics making the same point. Here’s another:
This would be much more impactful if it actually balanced it compared to total suicide rates to demonstrate guns create a meaningful increase in suicide. Otherwise viewers will simply thing people are doing the same amount by other methods in other countries
Amazing how this topic/narrative surges whenever the chances of leftists and minorities arming themselves and/or actually doing something peak.
So what happened this time? Recent Performative Resistance/“No-Kings Protest” turn-out lower than expected? Higher? Someone show up armed and people talked to them instead of assuming they were a counter-protestor? Police and other local morons particularly brutal in a way the press couldn’t gloss?
Hmm, why did you exclude Switzerland, Mike?
Because Americans don’t know where the continent of Switzerland is?
Comics like this are just preaching to the choir, and only the ones so fervent they’re blinded by their own self righteousness. It’s so obviously cherry picked and slanted if you’ve looked into the issues at play. It shows no respect for the reader at all, and likely only hardens the opinions of those it disagrees with.
You can’t convince anyone of anything with this kind of trollish virtue signal. It only exists to get the author pats on the back from people in their own camp.
This kind of shitty rhetoric harms the cause. You can’t win hearts and minds with blatant disrespect.
Why all the side issues. Is it true, or not?
If it is true, and I believe that it is, it may explain why you are triggered?
I see no disrespect. I see a good and valid point being made that a huge amount of Americans are oblivious to the obvious.
That is a cherry picked statistic. It is blatant propaganda.
Explain which bit is cherry picked and why? Is it disputed that the US has very high gun ownership and very high gun deaths when compared to other first world countries?
It doesn’t include countries with high gun ownership and low deaths. Gun ownership doesn’t actually necessarily correlate with gun violence. USA is a violent country for various other reasons.
I did a bit of research myself. A few Nordic countries, and New Zealand, have high gun ownership and low gun death rates.
It seems that the difference is that these countries have very high gun regulations, strict purchase and permit laws and restrictions on storage. I’m not an American, but in truth, is this the case in the US? For instance, none of these countries permit handgun open carry. In Australia owning a handgun at all is next to impossible (almost) and the requirements hardly make it worthwhile for target shooters.
You’re totally right
What’s missing here are all the counties where guns are prohibited, period, and where basically there are no gun deaths because doh.
It’s easy to just throw this as “cherry picked” but it’s a basic fact that the US has ab insane amount of gun violence whereas counties with strict gun laws have little gun violence and countries with extremely strict gun laws have practically no gun violence because there aren’t any guns to use to begin with
You bad guns, you ban gun violence, period
The mental health issue that is constantly brought up is a separate issue that should of course also be fixed, it’s just that the US thinks it’s a good idea to have extremely bad mental health support mixed with free guns when you open up a bank account.
Hey, look, it’s divisive rhetoric!
Crimes and violence are caused by unjustified heirarchies, in particular, the ruling class ruling over the working class.
You know what would reduce school shootings? Publicly funded mental health services for young people.
This kind of post is aimed at dividing the working class into two groups, pro-gun, and anti-gun. Refuse to give in to their messaging. Solidarity across the WHOLE working class!
nothing on this comic advocates against publicly funded mental health services
My point is that we can fight together to advance our mutual goals instead of arguing amongst ourselves while the tides of a far greater battle are turning against us.
Fight the ruling class, the rest of our problems will be much easier to solve once they are removed from power.
Sure, but know what else would reduce school shootings?
Less guns.
Would it? Is that the only solution?
Why do Yemen and Switzerland have such high ownership and no school shootings?
Don’t get me wrong, less guns would be good for many reasons. And I think we can get there, eventually. But right now, I have zero confidence that our government is fit to enforce any law fairly. Neonazis are openly running the DoD and ICE, this is not the time to dial back the Bill of Rights.
As well some of those numbers tend to skew. There’s those who have a shotgun as opposed to the images of Republicans during the holidays where everyone in the family has their own AR and we don’t know what else they own.
Which is more likely, funding for better mental health services as a whole or removing guns from the unwilling?
So, Australia doesn’t publicly fund mental health treatment and still hav3 way, way less gun deaths.
We also have way less guns.
You guys have stock standard excuses. None of them are true.
How about both? Why do you pretend it’s one or the other?
Give free mental health support AND prohibit guns. Best of both worlds
Oh yes, gun nutters will murder people if you try and take their guns away. They will also just murder people period.
There is no mental help for these terrorists.
I’m a firm believer of firearm ownership, especially for the marginalized groups in the USA right now. That said we need better mental health services and people who have a distinct lack of empathy should not own one to begin with.
Yes, arm both sides like the fascist love to do. Clearly you have the wool pulled over your eyes.
Removal of firearms is also a fascist thing. I’d rather have an armed trans person next to me than a RWNJ. That trans person is higher likely to be mentally stable, trained, and practiced. As well given the targeting of trans people to marginalize them to the point that they can then be exterminated as is the Heritage Foundation’s plan, I’m going to say you have a lousy take.
Giving guns to trans isn’t going to solve the problem and you should be ashamed for suggesting it is anything other than setting people up to be killed. Your take is impossibly dumb.
Right now? Neither.
It’d be a good start to just conduct proper tests before handing people firearm permits. People who can barely read or who rage when you honk at them should never be allowed to own, let alone carry firearms.
It should be noted that this chart compares gun homicides to gun ownership, which… of course those will correlate
If we plotted kangaroo injuries vs kangaroos per capita, we’d see a similar outlier in Australia
It would be more useful to see gun ownership compared to total homicides, to see if an overabundance of guns correlates with more murders. Even then, though, a correlation between the two might not be casual in that direction. It may instead be that in areas with a high homicide rate, people are more likely to own a firearm for defense.
What you would need to prove is that places with high gun ownership have significantly higher homicide rates, but places with high homicide rates don’t have significantly higher rates of gun ownership
Well for most of the named countries using all homicides versus gun homicides makes little difference.
australia 0.8 belgium 1.08 canada 1.8 france 1.3 portugal 0.72 spain 0.69 usa 5.76
What you should look up is homicides/non-homicide crimes against gun ownership. You will find that the US does not in general have more crime except for homicides.
You also are not going to find a country with anywhere near the gun ownership that the US has, so I suppose your are safe there.
My problem with this dataset is, it combines US in one dot, while all other countries crowd at the corner. I failed to see a trend saying “more guns = more gun homicide”.
If there is a chart showing that state by state, presumably regresses to a line, that I can get behind.
That’s exactly the point! The whole, “it’s the owner, not the gun” argument is dumb. If you have more guns, you have more gun-related homicides – as simple as that.
When the populace don’t have easy access to guns, then that’s one weapon less they can use to hurt others.
Another interesting tidbit is that homicides (among all violent crime) have fallen steadily since 1993 in the US, while firearms ownership has increased.
Don’t think everyone needs or should own a gun. But of course if you compare gun ownership to gun related deaths it’s generally going to be higher when more guns per capita are present. You can do the same thing with cars, lawn mowers, dogs and even vending machines. The more of a thing there is, of course there is going to be more deaths and injuries related to it.
Finally, proof that homicides cause gun ownership
I know you mean this as a joke but does that not make sense with US history?
A lot of killing causes people to own guns, a lot of guns causes a lot of killings, and repeat.
The chicken or the egg
Yes, just a joke.
I’d have a hard time preparing for a school shooting or similar, simply based on the mere lack of guns in my environment. I think I held an actual gun in my hand once in my life and that was in Murica. And it was a civil war times rifle. Not sure I’d even be able to do a shoot without hurting myself.
Fucking liberals. It’s a graph showing “gun deaths” which you’re conflating with “murders.” Which is intentional; you’re being deceived, and propagating the deception.
Here’s a simple breakdown from an anarchist responding to this standard milquetoast liberal argument a few years ago:
Guns are not correlated to violence, inequality is.
And according to the defensive gun use (DGU) data The Violence Policy center (which is extremely anti-gun fyi) gives the low range estimates at ~67,000 DGUs per year. Consider this the extreme low:
http://www.vpc.org/studies/justifiable.pdf
FYI most estimates put it far higher, including the CDC:
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwR/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5214a2.htm
http://www.nap.edu/read/18319/chapter/1
Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million per year…in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008.
http://www.nap.edu/read/18319/chapter/1
http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdguse.html
So how about guns killing? Statistics show only .0005% of gun owners commit a gun related crime. Best estimates put gun ownership at 37% in America, and that was in 2013, the number today is estimated to be closer to 45% but lets go with the smaller number to do the math conservatively. So America has population of 318 million people. So the number of gun owners is 318,000,000 x .37 = 117,660,000 Source: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2013/06/04/a-minority-of-americans-own-guns-but-just-how-many-is-unclear/ So we have ~117,660,000 gun owners. What is the latest FBI statistic on violent crime? FBI database shows ~11,000 fatal gun crimes a year. The study linked in the OP including suicides is beyond BS. So 117,660,000 / 11,000= .0000934897 = 99.99065% But there is a problem with this number, it doesn’t take into account illegal gun ownership and assumes the legal gun owners are the ones causing all the crime. This source shows 90% of homicides involved illegally bought or sold guns, or owners who where previously felons: Source: http://www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcgvmurd.html So for fun lets re-run the numbers to differentiate between criminals and non criminals. Since a felony record disbars you from legally owning a firearm, yet 90% of murders are committed by those with felony records, we know only 10% of murders are committed by legal gun owners. So we have ~11,000 murders, ten percent of which are committed by previously law abiding gun owners. So that is 1,100 murders. So we have 117,660,000 law abiding gun owners commenting 1,100 murders, which comes out to 99.999065% So yes 99.999065% of Legal gun never murder someone. Only .000045% of them become murders. So as you can see, the stats clearly show that guns do not increase the likelihood of violent crime, or cause anyone to be less safe, quite the opposite as the DGU data shows.
So using the high estimates for gun violence, and the low estimates for DGUs, DGUs outnumber use of a legally held weapon in a deadly violence by ~60 times.
Also: https://dx.doi.org/10.1080%2F13504851.2013.854294 & http://cnsnews.com/commentary/cnsnewscom-staff/more-guns-less-gun-violence-between-1993-and-2013
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http://www.law.harvard.edu/students/orgs/jlpp/Vol30_No2_KatesMauseronline.pdf
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http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13504851.2013.854294
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http://marginalrevolution.com/marginalrevolution/2004/01/using_placebo_l.html
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https://www.nap.edu/read/10881/chapter/2#2
You are just wrong in every way it is possible to be wrong. If you want an even more simple summary, the “moar guns moar death” BS is just hilariously wrong on the face of it. According to the Washington Post, civilian firearms ownership has increased from ~240 million (1996) to ~357 million (2013) (For reference to the figures below, it shows about 325 million guns in 2010). According to Pew Research, the firearms homicide death rate fell from ~6 per 100,000 persons (1996) to 3.6 per 100,000 (2010). So according to these figures, between 1996 and 2010, the number of civilian firearms increased by ~35%. Over the same time period, firearms homicide deaths decreased by ~40%. If you want to focus on ccw specifically, fine that shows the same thing. Rather do murder per 100,000 globally? Sure thing. And that is where you get your GINI connect fyi. The correlation is a lot stronger than gun ownership. This has been looked at and somehow keeps getting forgotten. You don’t pick up a gun to hurt someone because it is your first choice, you generally do it because it is your last. Inequality, desperation, the effects of capitalism in the third world and increasingly the first, drastically increase this.
Real anarchists know this, and know that anything attempt to restrict the rights of the proles is class war.
“i mean, you don’t really think a popular army could challenge the authority of any sovereign great power state like US or China do you???”
I’m sorry but if you think this, you simply do not understand military conflict in the 21st century or historically. Allow me to give you a few examples that will quickly show you the reality of the situation ( which is that the U.S. military stands no chance what-so-ever against even a moderate proportion of the population rising en-mass).
Iraq and Afghanistan: In over 10 years resistance has never been stamped out, in countries with much smaller populations than ours (both <1/10th), despite our massive technological advantages. This is with significant infighting in both countries.
Vietnam: A country of less than 1/10th our population was subjected too more bombing than was used in all of WWII and began the conflict less well armed than the US public is now. We lost handily.
There are countless more examples from all across the globe (From Russia to Nicaragua, From Columbia to Kurdistan, etc.) that unequivocally show armed populations can crush organized militaries, or at the very least resist them effectively for extended periods of time.
This is not even count the even more obvious problem with your statements: Almost 100 million Americans are armed (the number of which would likely grow in this event) armed with over 300,000,000 guns including almost 500,000 machine guns (although to be fair most are sub-machine guns). You’d have to do this with a combined army and police force (including reserves) of a little over 2million (with no desertion or refusal of orders). Mass defection and resistance from within the military and police would be very common. These US soldiers have families and friends in the civilian world, and many (like the oathkeepers) are dedicated to NOT engaging those targets with violence. There would be massive resistance in the ranks, it would be at best chaos. However even if this were NOT the case (which it is) and it was an army of automatons, the sheer number of armed citizens would be so overwhelming as for it not to matter much. That’s not to say any conflict wouldn’t be a BRUTAL and costly affair, but with enough participants from the public the conclusion would be forgone.
An armed proletariat obviously helps to balance the power equation between the public and those in power, to the point that exploitation beyond a certain point and conflict becomes EXTREMELY unattractive to those in power. In a similar manner to nuclear weapons an armed populace acts as a DETERRENT to elite exploitation and violence. In other words this conflict (that the people would likely win all things considered) isn’t likely to occur and for good reason. Those in power squeeze any opportunity to do so as much as they possibly can, and if you give an inch, they take a mile. I wish it wasn’t so but that is just the way they operate. In addition, taking away weapons from the population while leaving them in the hands of the government of almost ANY kind of weapon (AR to SAW to whatever) is a horrible idea, given that the government has proven they are far less responsible than it’s citizens. My entire post gives all the reasons why removing power from citizens and giving it to those in power is a horrific idea with terrible historic consequences.
All revolutions historically had bloodshed, and those in power do not give it up without a fight.
4,000+ child deaths this year compared to zero everywhere else. Keep telling yourself guns aren’t the problem when it is now the number one killer of children. Impossibly dumb.
“Defensive gun use” is horseshit. Statistics clearly show that owning a gun increases the risk that anyone in the household (including children) will die by homicide, suicide or unintentional injuries. The amount of successful defensive uses of a gun pales in comparison to the number of preventable injuries and deaths that gun ownership brings.
The only defensive weapon is a ballistic shield.
If you actually looked at the statistics, you’d know that’s not the case. Defensive gun use is not horseshit, but being a privileged liberal is.
Guns are a tool of equality for all manner of marginalized and dispossessed people.
How frightening it is that the statistical likelihood of accidental injury goes up for a family when a parent goes from carless to owning a car. It’s bullshit that we don’t have ubiquitous, safe public transit, but it’s also bullshit to demonize the most effective tool for the family’s to thrive in capitalism.
Oh look the liar lies.
Yikes capitalist apologist liberals get real mask off around guns
Oh look another bootlicker for the gun industry.
Sure, just like Guevara, and the anarcho-syndicalists of the CNT, we care for nothing more than the corporations? The fuck. Get class conscious, you’re clearly a boot-licking liberal
Listen, gun manufacturers pushing death on our society is not about class solidarity. Keep telling yourself that as you lick their boots.
no
The US seems to be a huge outlier on both axes. You would have to exclude it to make any sense of the data.
Don’t worry, they instead excluded countries like Switzerland that have high gun ownership with nonexistent homicide rates. So is all good. Also, including only gun homicides instead of all homicides, as if it is suprising that people use the weapon available to them. I guess as long as people are stabbed to death instead of shot, is all good.
100% agreed.
Simply pathetic. I’m gun owner and I fully support firearms registration, proper licensing which includes a thorough background check, school, psychological check and an annual visit from law enforcement to make fucking sure everything is OK.
The US gun laws are sick.
I fully support a highly limited access to guns, only in specialized locations for gun clubs, that’s it
There is no need for people to have guns. Want to hunt? Be an official hunter or get limited to bow and arrow. “Self defense”? That rarely works and when in a country without guns, you don’t need guns for self defense.
Basically, nobody should have guns because even the highly responsible ownership still has people using guns to murder each other. Responsible people still commit suicide or murder suicides with guns, they still use them for crimes, they still use them for loads of bad shit.
The only honest argument for gun ownership is that guns are fun toys. They’re cool, and there are 500 shitty excuses that are being used instead. No, you don’t need guns, you want guns, because it’s cool.
Guns should be as much as possible be eliminated
I’m not a republican, but I don’t think anyone is saying gun crime doesn’t happen.
It’s easy to say that banning guns = no more gun violence. But the devil is in the details. Given the U.S.A’s history with guns, banning them will have consequences. Not can, will.
Let’s not forget that a gun ban will only affect law abiding citizens.
Comics like the one in OP always ignore the primary underlying difference between US and the other developed nations: free, nationalized healthcare vs the Insurance Apocalypse that is the American healthcare system
Yup. If Americans struggling with poor mental health had better access to professional help, crime as a whole would go down. But it’s not the only factor. Things like financial strain and environment also contribute. Crime is a slippery slope. Not a leap.
Agreed, but financial strain is part of what keeps people from getting care in the USA
Free healthcare would alleviate some of that
Agreed, but it’s a vicious cycle.
It does cost money to provide healthcare. Funding doesn’t come from thin air. But healthcare in the U.S is also ridiculously expensive. A lot of people can’t afford it without insurance (if your insurance even covers what you need). The system needs fixing.
Americans pay 10x per capita for their healthcare, compared to other countries like the Nordics or Germany. Still, the costs of the war on Iran would have funded public healthcare for all for how long? Decades?
Americans subisdize Israelis free healthcare that includes access to abortion care
It does cost money to provide healthcare. Funding doesn’t come from thin air.
Then tax the rich. There’s no reason for Jeff Bezos to pay less money than someone flipping burgers at McDonald’s.
Unfortunately we’re caught in a Republican scheme to remove government benefits by gutting taxes that was started during Nixon’s adminitration
I don’t disagree with you there
Exactly this. If the US had proper social safety nets and low income inequality, all violence (which includes gun violence) would drop.
Also note that the arguments like in the OP only ever mention gun violence. It seems dishonest that they need to be that specific to get the narrative they want.
Well it’s a start.
You could also then make sure that America doesn’t have a gun centric industry that is saturating your market with easily accessible guns.
Then also make sure your society is restructured in a way that actually prevents people from mentally breaking down so far that they’ll cause extreme violence.
In the end it will still require banning guns.
True. But the U.S. has more guns than people. And a lot of them aren’t registered, so law enforcement doesn’t know they exist. Plus the people who own them won’t just happily give them up. So if you ban guns, how do you reasonably plan to enforce it? (That wasn’t a rhetorical question, by the way.)
That’s not my main issue with gun control, but the way I see it guns are just a tool used to commit those crimes. You want to put a stop to it, you go to the root of the problem. Banning guns would be treating the symptom instead of the problem.
Not making a specific argument for or against your argument, but I’d like to object to this like:
Let’s not forget that a gun ban will only affect law abiding citizens.
I’ve seen this argument used a lot, but it’s a broad generalization. You are assuming all criminals are the hardest criminals who will disobey any law, but a lot of law breakers and a lot of gun violence perpetrators are first time offenders, or someone who thinks they can get away with minor things.
A lot of people will do legally ambiguous stuff if there’s a low chance of being caught and punished but wouldn’t put themselves on the line for more heavily enforced things, plus even just the hint of illegality will put a type of social pressure on someone.
Will hardcore criminals still get and use guns? Absolutely. Are all gun deaths perpetrated by hardcore criminals? Absolutely not. Even that annoying brandishing couple at the BLM protests a while back would likely not have had the courage to bring out their weapons were it illegal to do so, since they tended to abuse law and loopholes rather than outright break them. They’re a milder case, but the point works with others who carry for “personal protection” but are a little too trigger happy. Plus stuff like legally owned but carelessly stored etc.
Are you saying that committing a mass shooting is legally ambiguous and people think they are likely to get away with it? Because buying a registered firearm in the U.S. Isn’t illegal. I’m not sure what you’re getting at. You’re also kind of implying that people who do shootings are mostly opportunistic, when in reality there are likely other factors at play.
Nah, I’m mostly saying it isn’t black and white. It will have some effect on all layers, but I agree it wouldn’t stop all violence. To take your note about school shootings; yes, many of them are from legally purchased firearms, often a parent or something. Not all of course, so a gun ban would probably reduce, but not eliminate, school shootings. Plus outright bans aren’t the only form of gun control the US hasn’t tried, there are multiple things that can be done to limit without outright ban guns.
That’s true, and I can’t argue with you there. Banning guns would solve some problems, but you’d also be opening pandora’s box.
Given the US’ history with guns, banning them would almost certainly fuel a violent black market, making it easier than it already is for criminals to illegally obtain unregistered firearms. And with an estimated 400 million guns already in existence in the US, it would be really difficult to enforce, even if you did manage to pass a law. And loopholes exist like gun shows and private sales.
Regulating but not banning outright would be a slightly better solution, but it wouldn’t be a silver bullet (pun not intended).
I’ve always said banning guns doesn’t make violent people incapable violence. Trying it during a time where we can 3D print guns isn’t really realistic. Its a cultural issue.
Well said
Trying it during a time where we can 3D print guns
Firstly, you don’t need a 3D printer to make a gun. Any plumbing store in America can sell you the supplies you need to make a gun.
Secondly, 3D printers make shit guns. Plastic has a low melting point and high elasticity. You’ll get off two shots if you’re lucky, before your bullets are firing sideways.
Thirdly, you don’t just need a gun. You need ammunition. And ammunition is much more difficult/hazardous to produce.
If you’re crazy enough to decide you want to become a revolutionary/reactionary anti-government insurgent, you’d be stupid to try and make your own gun from scratch. Bombs are easier to manufacture, simpler to deploy, and much more effective against the kind of people an anti-government activist has beef with.
I think you’re really underestimating 3d printed guns. There are some alarmingly reliable 3d printed 9mm semi-auto carbines that can be constructed with zero gun parts (source: I built one back when it was still legal in my state, but destroyed the receiver when registration became mandatory)
You’re correct about ammo, but I’m pretty sure making a bomb without reliable, stable explosive compounds is extremely dangerous
There are some alarmingly reliable 3d printed 9mm semi-auto carbines that can be constructed with zero gun parts
I have seen 3D guns in action and they have never failed to disappoint.
Maybe a professional gunsmith can turn cheap extruded plastic into something useful. But then they can just make a real proper gun.
You’re correct about ammo, but I’m pretty sure making a bomb without reliable, stable explosive compounds is extremely dangerous
Sure. Both of these hobbies are of dubious benefit and serious safety issues
The gun used to take out UHC CEO was 3d printed. Wired did a cool video on it
Was it? I don’t believe they ever actually recovered the murder weapon
There are many different polymers with a much higher thermal resistance and elasticity. You wouldn’t use PLA.
The people of Myanmar used 3D printed guns to overthrow their government.
I’m starting to think you just don’t know what you’re talking about.
The people of Myanmar used 3D printed guns to overthrow their government.
No they didn’t. They’re in the midst of a horrifying civil war with no end in sight. The current military junta is massacring people by the score with airstrikes. Over 5M people have been displaced.
I’m starting to think you just don’t know what you’re talking about.
Are you looking into a mirror?
Firearm sales have TRIPLED since 2000.
Fun fact: Gun sales (and production) don’t dip under Democratic leadership. USA is world’s number one arms dealer (all weapons)
Every state is involved in the firearms industry, even Hawaii.
Truly disgusting, defense theatre that costs countless lives so the gun industry gets rich.
Meanwhile since 1993 homicide rates (and all violent crime in fact) have steadily decreased. Interesting.
Gun sales (and production) don’t dip under Democratic leadership
They often go up because people get paranoid that their gun will be taken away. When Biden was elected, AR15 sales sky rocketed.
