guns prevent violence!

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

At 03:05 PM 5/4/99 -0400, Barkley Rosser wrote:
>Margaret,
>     I'm sorry, but I have no use for this love of the
>Second Amendment.  Even if the Hungarians had
>had guns, they would still have been mowed down.
>     I just saw the numbers.  We have 13.5/100,000
>persons dead from guns per year in the US.  The 
>next highest (not counting outright war zones) is
>Canada at around 3/100,000 with many countries
>at way less than 1/100,000.  We are talking orders
>of magnitude differences here.
>     Nowl, there simply are not orders of magnitude
>differences in social structure, income distribution, racism,
>or what have you, between the US and the rest of the 
>world.  What there is an order of magnitude difference
>in is the sheer availability of guns, 240 million by the
>last count.  It is also true that we have a frontier legacy
>of guns and that we are the only nation that allows people
>to own guns without having a license.  I suggest that
>these facts rather overwhelm everything else, thank you.

Barkley:  Agreed, resource availability argument travels very far in
explaining collective behavior - so there is no reason to believe that
sheer availability of guns have an impact on gun-related deaths - even by
law of probability alone.  The order-of-magnitude difference is a bit more
moot, I think there is order-of-magnitude difference between the US and,
say, Europe.

But even if we all agree that availability is the main culprit here, what
is to be done about it?  Do you really think that a ban would work any
different than prohibition or war on drugs?  That is, more police, more
prosecutors, more invasions of civil rights, more wasted public funds, and
zero effect on the problem itself?

Wojtek

PS.  For the record, I do not have a gun and have no intention of buying
one.  I can find greater pleasures in life than arming myself to the teeth
and waiting for "them" to strike.

PS.  As to the argument in this thread that Hungarians could better defend
themselves against the Soviets in 1956, had guns been not outlawed -- well,
folks, it must be real good stuff you've been inhaling.