the "Australia" argument

[thorn726]

can you guys help me out with this one?
i know there have to be some stats...
an idiot's best and pretty much only argument was that Australia has had great success taking away everyone's guns, murder rates went down, etc.

the FRustrating thing is trying to implicate a nationwide gun grab here vs there, not to mention the black market, but i think it would be a more helpful argument to show that in fact the gun grab in Australia has not really stopped crime??
yes or no?

also, did every Aussie submit to a search or what? how did they get all the guns back?

COmpletely annoying- this was a disabled guy, who has an abled bodied, middle aged wife. if anyone could use some protection, these two could.

how people think taking away all guns will make them safe from the 280 pound angry monster i do not understand

 

[Molon Labe]

When it comes to arguing about gun rights, I have a couple rules:

1. Never bring up statistics. This is because of the implications they bring. As an example, let's say there's statistical evidence that gun control in America has not decreased the crime rate. You say, "See, gun control doesn't work! We shouldn't have gun control!" Ah, but this is not a good argument, as it implies gun control would be O.K. if it did decrease crime. Lesson learned? Never bring up statistics when arguing about your right to keep and bear arms. You should argue that you have a right to keep and bear arms regardless of what statistics say.

2. Never bring up the Second Amendment. It has nothing to do with the existence of your right to keep and bear arms.

With these two things in mind, your argument should go something like this:

"I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in Australia. I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in the U.S. I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in Japan. It doesn't matter. A human has an inalienable right to keep and bear arms. The existence of this right does not depend on crime statistics."

 

[Alex45ACP]

People who focus on crime statistics are missing the bigger picture. The number of people who have been disarmed and massacred by their own governments is exponentially higher than the number who have been killed by common criminals with firearms.

Also I think mentioning the 2nd Amendment can be a good thing:

You: Do you believe in the 1st, 3rd, 4th, etc. Amendments?
Gun grabber: Of course.
You: Well do you really believe that if we allow government to violate the 2nd, they will still respect the others?

 

[Ryder]

I tried researching that some months back and found NOTHING.

 

[No_Brakes23]

I believe the murder rate went up in Oz, not down. That is, it went from someting like 5 people shot to 6 people shot or something like that.

Stats make for sad arguments.

What was it Samuel Clemens is supposed to have said?

"Figures lie and liars figure"

Something like that.

 

[LAK]

Statistics were manipulated by the British government before and after increased firearms legislation to place their actions in a favorable public light. This is what oppressive governments do and should be expected.
-----------------------------------------

http://ussliberty.org
http://ssunitedstates.org

 

[Molon Labe]

Also I think mentioning the 2nd Amendment can be a good thing:

You: Do you believe in the 1st, 3rd, 4th, etc. Amendments?
Gun grabber: Of course.
You: Well do you really believe that if we allow government to violate the 2nd, they will still respect the others?

This argument will only work if the anti-gunner believes the 2nd Amendment protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms. Many do not.

Based on my experience, it is always better not to bring up the 2nd Amendment when arguing about the right to keep and bear arms.

 

[22-rimfire]

John Lott's book, More Guns Less Crime, deals in part with Australia. His statistics are quite convincing. Good raw data is generally not available, so all of the data presented by both the pro and anti-gun groups is somewhat biased (or you have no way to confirm or deny the "facts"). However, as a pro-gun person, Lotts book is quite convincing.

 

[Deadman]

From memory, the murder rate in Australia was on a downward trend for several years before the 96/97 gun legislation was enacted. Afterwards certain types of crime rose. A search here and at TFL should provide quite a bit of information on the subject.

In fact just today in Melbourne Vic. a crime related shooting took place -

http://www.smh.com.au/news/national/murder-stops-underworld-trial/2006/02/07/1139074199637.html

You can also check the Sporting Shooters Association of Australia's website for more data -

http://www.ssaa.org.au/

also, did every Aussie submit to a search or what? how did they get all the guns back?

Some gun registration was in place before 1996, many simply obeyed the law but there are also plenty who hid various firearms. When one compares the no. of SKS rifles imported into Australia with the no. handed over to police there is a significant deficit for example.

 

[Gunfire]

This argument will only work if the anti-gunner believes the 2nd Amendment protects an individual's right to keep and bear arms. Many do not.

Based on my experience, it is always better not to bring up the 2nd Amendment when arguing about the right to keep and bear arms.

You can argue that every amendment gives rights or protects rights of the 'individual' not the state. Why wouldn't the 2nd be the same as every other amendment?

 

[Maxwell]

Why wouldn't the 2nd be the same as every other amendment?

Many dont believe in a full freedom of speach, and readily admit theres times when they think its ok for a person to be silenced. Many also dont truly believe in the freedom to own property, or to privacy, or to a fair trial, or to religion.

Our own judges in America were quick to ignore the meaning of "militia" found in the dictionary, and decided that theres a marked difference between "the people" and "we the people" because those words were written on different lines.

Not unlike how the KKK read the bible and found justifications for hate, many of our judges read the constitution and find a blueprint for a nanny-state of the police and by the police.
Its not a solid argument by itself because it has not been binding.

 

[Mk VII]

With these two things in mind, your argument should go something like this:

"I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in Australia. I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in the U.S. I don't care if gun control has increased or decreased crime in Japan. It doesn't matter. A human has an inalienable right to keep and bear arms. The existence of this right does not depend on crime statistics."

That stance is open to the attack, "I don't care whether evils attend on gun ownership or not, so long as my selfish interest is left intact."
And who is qualified to select these lists of 'alienable' and 'inalienable' rights in the first place? "We hold these truths to be self-evident" amounts to saying "Because we say so".

 

[Graystar]

Both Molon Labe and Mk VII have valid points. Self-defense is a natural right. And as such, possession of instruments of self-defense should also be considered a right. However, if the exercise of any right leads to the extinction of the human race, then we can’t possibly allow its exercise to occur. I have a right to procreate, but rape is illegal (as it should be.)

I think that you must use statistics to demonstrate that widespread gun ownership is NOT detrimental to the health of society. I don’t believe that concealed carry has any effect on crime. Nor does it need to. The purpose of carrying a firearm is to defend life when that life is in imminent danger. Statistics that show this works (such as the federal governments estimates of 83,000 acts of defense per year between 1987 and 1992) and statistics that show no harmful effects (such as the dropping crime rate through the nineties) are absolutely necessary to help people understand that firearm possession, on the whole, is good for society.

 

[kfranz]

That stance is open to the attack, "I don't care whether evils attend on gun ownership or not, so long as my selfish interest is left intact."
And who is qualified to select these lists of 'alienable' and 'inalienable' rights in the first place? "We hold these truths to be self-evident" amounts to saying "Because we say so".

My selfish interests end where your nose begins. Until then, prior restraint restricts MY rights.

"We hold these thruths to be self-evident" IS a statement of beliefs, nothing more.

 

[Molon Labe]

You can argue that every amendment gives rights or protects rights of the 'individual' not the state. Why wouldn't the 2nd be the same as every other amendment?

You've brought up two distinct questions:

1. Does a human have a right to keep and bear arms?

2. Is our government allowed to infringe on a person's right to keep and bear arms?

There's no reason to bring up the 2nd Amendment when discussing #1. You should only bring up the 2nd Amendment when discussing #2.

 

[thorn726]

thanks guys, i will check out the link also.
it really so pathetic to imagine control like that would work here, or that it is really doing all that much good over there.

the thing i find most disturbing about bay area folks and full-on disarmament -
- every one around here thinks the govt is out of control, stealing rights, elections , whatever/ but they dont think they would ever need to fight the govt ever ever? duuh .

that if no one has guns that their skinny vegan butts will be able to stop muggers with a song? i dont know.

anyway, some decent arguments here

 

[CAnnoneer]

I always establish a parallel with abortion. It works all the time, because most gungrabbers are also pro-choice.

GG:"But thousands of people would live if there were no guns."
Y:"If there were no abortion, then thousands of people would live too."

Ultimately, both issues boil down to the rights of the individual.

 

[MechAg94]

I found some crime statistics for Austrailia a while back for a post on another site. Someone tried to bring up one recent year for crime in Austrailia and tried to say they were better because they had no guns. I had to pull up the statistics from before their gun ban to show their crime had always been lower than ours at least according to the statistics and their gun ban didn't do anything.

Basically, what I found was that their gun ban had at best No effect on crime and may have caused a slight uptick in some violence. What that means is that all that money they spent enacting the ban and managing it now are all for nothing. The only accomplishment was trampling on Australian's rights.

Crime is not necessarily directly related to legal gun ownership (as we should know). Criminal punishment, law enforcement, and all sorts of social factors affect it as well as many other things.

 

[Vermont Guy]

When it comes to arguing about gun rights, I have a couple rules:

Both of which are wrong. Let me explain.

A human has an inalienable right to keep and bear arms.

Yes, but... it is a derived right. Humans have a right to their life. This is basic. If someone disagrees with this they are simply un-American and the only solution is to watch them very carefully.

(As an aside, during a discussion about guns, I once asked a woman if she had a right to live. She was afraid of where I was going with this argument and couldn't answer. Sigh.)

This right to life implies a right to defend that life.

The right to defend life implies a right to any tools that would help in that defense.

IF weapons are useful for self defense THEN we can derive a further right to arms. Conversely, if concealed carry actually caused all the mayhem the anti's claim then of course it should be a crime.

Never use statistics? Statistics are the way we determine reality. Statistics are the only way we have of determining if private arms really do preserve the right to life.

As to your second point, never use the Second Amendment, we very nearly didn't have a Bill of Rights in this country. There were arguments against it. One such argument was that if there was a list of rights then any rights that weren't on the list could be lost. It was feared a complete list could not be compiled so it would be better to have no list.

One of the arguments for a Bill of Rights was that in some future time, when people had become decadent and no longer treasured their rights, then having them written down would give greater force to their preservation. Being written down in the primary document of our government for over two centuries has hallowed these words.

There has been a great deal of court opinion legal research supporting the right to keep and bear arms as set forth in the Second Amendment. Throwing out the Second Amendment would also deprive us of that vast resource. The Second Amendment is there to be used. Now seems to be a good time.

 

[CAnnoneer]

This right to life implies a right to defend that life.

The right to defend life implies a right to any tools that would help in that defense.

That does not work, because gungrabbers can and will argue that the defense of a life cannot involve taking another life. Basically, they believe that your right to defend yourself (#2) is of lower priority than the right of the criminal to have his life (#1). That is the philosophical basis of many an idiotic law they have passed or jurislegislated in their past decades of political dominance.

The most secure way to argue pro-gun is through individual freedom vs the tyranny of the majority. (they don't call them "bolsheviks" for nothing)

 

[Baba Louie]

What was it Samuel Clemens is supposed to have said?

"There are three kinds of lies. Lies, damn lies and statistics."
Also attributed, in various form to others...

The right to self defense, which we here in the US take for granted, is obviously not applicable universally when it is legislated out by those in power by various means. Once we have a SCOTUS who decides to pass judgement based on other laws from outside our national boundaries... who knows what we will or won't have?

The 2nd does not guarantee the RKBA. It (supposedly) limits Congress from infringing on that right, ICC be darned (i.e., '34 NFA, '68 GCA and Sporting Use as decreed by Bureacratic whim) as said right exists PRIOR to any Constitutional agreement resolved by men.

Or so said wiser men than I. What the government giveth, it can taketh away (and will, or at least Tax Heavily until it is such a burden as to be abandoned or only, thus forming a bigger band of criminals to foist off as outlaws worthy of catch/release, all requiring MORE Tax Revenue)

A tidbit from Snopes... which may (or may not) come in handy
http://www.snopes.com/crime/statistics/ausguns.asp

One can DEBATE (not worthy of argument) all one wants, whether mankind has a right or obligation to defense of self and the use of implements which allow a 110 lb., 85 year old female to ward off an attack by a 20 year old, 250 lb male... and still not convert anyone into agreement that, on the surface (and to my mind) is the only logical decision. (Sad that) But why bother? Better to indoctrinate our youth with the proper spirit and moral values; to know and always be aware of the latin adage "Sic Vis Pacem, Parabellum"

 

[Graystar]

That does not work, because gungrabbers can and will argue that the defense of a life cannot involve taking another life. Basically, they believe that your right to defend yourself (#2) is of lower priority than the right of the criminal to have his life (#1).

There is no historical basis for such arguments. However, there is a lot of history supporting the notion of taking life in defense of your own. So such arguments are invalid right from the start.