help me make a good pro gun case

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JEB

JEB

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so heres the story; i am working on a paper for a college class right now and my topic is how more guns = less crime. basicly i am presenting a case for how more lienient gun laws will lead to a reduced overall rate of violent crime. i want to be able to present a very well put togather paper and make a strong point. what i am having trouble with is finding good sources of information on the subject. also, my instructor is a big fan of statistics so if anyone has a good source for related statistics that would be a big help.
 
Making the argument that more guns = less violent crime is more difficult than pointing out that, less guns and restricted liberty leads to more violent crime. IOW, debunk the myth of the antis; that less guns equals less violent crime. Simple statistics bear this out.

But regarding your chosen subject, this video has some good points.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j_YTM_eAWnQ

Pay close attention to the video at 2:33 - 2:53.
 
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Making the argument that more guns = less violent crime is more difficult than pointing out that, less guns and restricted liberty leads to more violent crime. IOW, debunk the myth of the antis; that less guns equals less violent crime.
Click to expand...

very true. the difficulty in finding good sources for the more guns = less crime side is what i am really running into now. i plan on also debunking the less guns = less crime myth and could use some statistics/sources for this too.
 
If you're talking about crime, you should mention that all of the worst crimes in history were committed by powerful governments against mostly unarmed subjects. For a statistic, how about 262,000,000 people killed during the 20th Century by Democide (death by government)? Here is a good webiste on that topic: http://www.hawaii.edu/powerkills/20TH.HTM

That is the most convincing argument for gun rights if you ask me. Whatever impact gun control has on crime perpetrated by individuals is small potatoes, and doesn't really matter one way or the other to me. If gun control makes it even a little more likely that something like what happened in Nazi Germany or Stalinist Russia or Mao's China could happen here, it's not worth it in my mind. Do you think democide is more or less likely to happen to an armed populace versus an unarmed populace?

But if you want some good statistics and studies on the subject of "More Guns, Less Crime," then you should check out the book with that title, by Gary Kleck.
 
For statistics, Florida has often been cited as a great example, but one must be careful when doing so. Look at the rates of violent crime in Florida before and after Concealed Carry was introduced (87-88). Shortly after the introduction of CC, Florida changed it's violent crime reporting process, so the results are partly contaminated, however. You might want to check out the Lott-Mustard report and track down those sources. A simple google search easily turns up the report. :)
 
For statistics I can share two web sites. The first is the "Home Office" they issue England's version of the Unified Criminal report. Page 51 of the pdf shows that there has been a more than 300% increase of crimes labeled as "violence against the person." Page 90 shows that despite the regulation in England there are over 7,900 firearms crimes a year. That is an increase of about 500 crimes since the begining of the decade.

The second is the Unified Crime Report Data Tool. It allows you to create your own table of data from the FBI's Unified Crime Report database. I recently used it to show that the murder rate in America has declined more than 30% since 1991.

http://rds.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs10/hosb1210.pdf

http://www.ucrdatatool.gov/
 
I forgot to include a link to the 2010 preliminary numbers. According to the FBI the crime rate is down across the country. The exception is the north east. The North East tends to have stricter gun laws than anybody besides California and Chicago.

http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2010/december/crime_122010/crime_122010

The website GunFacts.info has a lot of great information. When you find a tid bit that helps look at the source. It is easy to do because they put foot notes on every page. Then you can look in to the individual reports. That opens up a whole world of studies and information that is largely unknown.

Guncite actually has some good stuff regarding the myth of old west violence. It helps to show that when people were more armed predatory violence was much lower. Violence was usually a matter of two willing combatants. Rape, murder, and assault were rare.
 
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go on youtube and search, guns and Switzerland, a lot of good videos. Also i know that Kennesaw Ga has a law that states basically every home needs to have at least 1 firearm, crime in that city is very low.

I am sure that other cities in this country have similar laws, i think that you would be able to reference those cities and statistics. That may put you on the correct track. Also after you are done writing your paper, you should post it for all to see, maybe we would catch somethings that you missed. Go get an A on it.
 
John Lott is the man for statistics, as posted above.

For philosophical discussion of gun control, I like "Nation of Cowards" by Jeff Snyder. You can get a copy from Amazon.com:

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_n...ks&field-keywords=nation+of+cowards&x=21&y=22

I also read an interestion paragraph in the Lyman Cast Bullet Handbook, page 9:

"The Bullet Makes Democracy Possible"
A single, relatively small pellet of lead from a matchlock musket could penetrate the finest armor and kill the strongest man inside it. The bullet tended towards an equality of men in combat long before it was achieved politically. A democratic government was probably impossible when wealthy men could buy armor for themselves and their retainers that made them almost impervious to the weapons of the poor. So long as offensive weapons depended on the strength and skill acquired by long training, the common man was at a distinct disadvantage. However, in a few hours the average man could learn to load, aim, and fire a musket. Bullets, not laws, made men substantially equal."
 
Here in Kennesaw GA, it is the law to own a firearm. One for every household or something. This county happens to have a very low crime rate.
 
wow, i hadnt found gun facts yet. lots of good information there!

keep it coming guys this is great!
 
Mother Nature

figured this out before we were ever a twinkle in a hominid's eye. Talk to a Biology Prof about Batesian mimicry. The best known example is the monarch/viceroy butterfly phenomenon. The monarch feeds on milkweed and accumulates cardiac glycosides which cause discomfort to birds that eat them, so they don't eat any more. The viceroy looks like the monarch and thus benefits from the protection of the monarchs. Back in the 18th century (I think) worked out the mathematics of how many viceroys there could be before they lost the protection. This is analogous to the protection CCWers give to the rest of the population.
This can be tested by comparing crime rates before and after relaxations on carrying. Arizona would be a good place to look. First they allowed car carry without a permit, I'm told car jackings declined.
Overall it the past 20 years gun ownership has increased and crime has declined.
A big problem you will have is demonstrating causality.
Good luck.
 
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