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Gun laws where guns take the most lives

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Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#101

Post by pryce »

jostmey wrote: post #55

The debate here has focused on guns as the problem. Guns are not the problem, they are an expression of the problem. To quote the article: "The Economist stated that rapid urbanisation and inequalities in wealth distribution were some of the largest factors in violent crime, and as one of the most unequal countries on the planet, Brazil backs up this claim." I think this statement applies to Mexico and other Latin Am…

In Latin America there have been repeated movements for many decades to identify and address these underlying social injustices, including the wealth distribution. These movements often do not fare well, and the US Government is invested (financially, militarily, politically) in ensuring that these movements do not fare well.

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#102

Post by dang »

mrhappyunhappy wrote: post #56
mrhappyunhappy wrote: post #49

I never understood how anyone can take another life. To take away the memories, the experiences, the future potential of another spirit - all for the sake of what? Hate? Money? Power? How can anything be worth more than the only thing that allows one to experience this world? Sad.

Seriously, you downvote this? Huh. The hate runs deep.

Please follow the site guidelines.

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#103

Post by leereeves »

pryce wrote: post #101
jostmey wrote: post #55

The debate here has focused on guns as the problem. Guns are not the problem, they are an expression of the problem. To quote the article: "The Economist stated that rapid urbanisation and inequalities in wealth distribution were some of the largest factors in violent crime, and as one of the most unequal countries on the planet, Brazil backs up this claim." I think this statement applies to Mexico and other Latin Am…

In Latin America there have been repeated movements for many decades to identify and address these underlying social injustices, including the wealth distribution. These movements often do not fare well, and the US Government is invested (financially, militarily, politically) in ensuring that these movements do not fare well.

Yeah, Venezuela's going through one of those movements right now, and thanks to it, has the third highest homicide rate in the world.

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#104

Post by jxramos »

There's a YouTube channel called Active Self Protection where the subscribers have this running joke almost about the next video being from Brazil. Even the commentator says stuff like "...you guessed it, from Brazil", because there's just so much content coming out of these Latin American countries for his show's focus which is analysis and review of crimes captured from surveillance camera footage, badge cams, and bystander journalism and what not.

It's interesting the ubiquity of these video feeds that we can get a glimpse into another part of the world and see the problems people have to deal with. The commentator for the channel often informs his audience about how certain things pose entirely different risks in other parts of the world. This includes things like not boxing yourself in with your car in Latin America where car jackings often play out where you gave yourself no exit by stopping so close to the car in front, or being oblivious to two men on a motorcycle, the so called "motochorros", etc.

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#105

Post by dang »

updateYourMind wrote: post #76
mk89 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why you got downvoted, because what you said makes sense. Unfortunately, it seems that when you touch people's belief, facts become fake news. No weapons mean no idiots able to kill dozens of people for no reason at all. It's insane to even have to explain that weapons just have the potential to kill and don't serve any other purpose.

Lots of people owning guns are downvoting anything that is not pro-gun.

Could you please stop posting unsubstantive comments to Hacker News, and follow the site guidelines?

https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#106

Post by hexane360 »

leereeves wrote: post #91
flattone wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lets have a serious discussion... knife is like number 5000 on a crazy persons shopping list. gun is probably 300 but also easier than 1-299

People don't see a gun and decide to use it. They decide to hurt someone, then look for a weapon. If it's not a gun, it will be a knife, or acid, or poison, or fists, or a vehicle...

This actually isn't well backed up by psychology. The large majority of violent crimes aren't premeditated--they're impulses.

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#107

Post by baroffoos »

leereeves wrote: post #91
flattone wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lets have a serious discussion... knife is like number 5000 on a crazy persons shopping list. gun is probably 300 but also easier than 1-299

People don't see a gun and decide to use it. They decide to hurt someone, then look for a weapon. If it's not a gun, it will be a knife, or acid, or poison, or fists, or a vehicle...

See what happens when someone gets in a crowded place with a gun vs a knife. Also the general public should not be allowed to take a vehicle in to a dense area like a city.

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#108

Post by Scramblejams »

ouid wrote: post #2

> Small Arms Survey reported that in 2017, Mexico had 12.9 guns per 100 civilians, although of the 16,809,000 guns estimated in circulation in that year, only 3,118,592 were legally registered. >This high level of unregistered firearms has been attributed to Mexico’s proximity with the United States, as thousands of gun retailers sit just over the border. A report on gun trafficking between the US and Mexico revealed…

A subtlety in that quote: most guns were not submitted for tracing in the first place. Of those that were, ~90% led to the US.

The whole 90-percent-of-Mexican-gun-crimes-happened-with-US-sourced-guns argument never passed the smell test with me. Guns are expensive at retail. And wholesale prices aren’t low, either. Who wants to spend truckloads of cash on brand new guns from licensed dealers when all manner of ex-military AKs and FNs are available on the Latin American black market? Much cheaper and less risky to get guns from the south than the north.

Anyway, what’s the proportion made up by US-sourced firearms? Nobody’s sure, but probably nowhere near the bulk of it:

https://www.factcheck.org/2009/04/counting-mexicos-guns/

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#109

Post by [deleted] »

giancarlostoro wrote: post #95
baroffoos wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Guns are like a megaphone for violence. Violent people will still exist but their reach is far less with a knife

You are a bit quieter with a knife though. A gun gives you away immedietly to all around you unless you have a silencer but those arent so easy to get in the USA (class 3 if I remember correctly). In England people get knifed and who can know? And if its not a knife it will be a car, power tools, planes, boats, pushing someone off of a building. I rather retain my right to protect myself from crazies and die trying t…

[deleted]

Re: Gun laws where guns take the most lives

#110

Post by morpheuskafka »

leereeves wrote: post #90
updateYourMind wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass_shootings_in_the_United_S... > The United States has had more mass shootings than any other country.

Wikipedia as primary source? If you'll check the references for that statement, they're all news articles based on a single study. A study that the link above already discussed. A study that "excluded gang-related shootings, drive-by shootings, hostage-taking incidents, robberies and acts of genocide or terrorism."[1] In other words, it's a custom-designed, cherry-picked statistic designed to make the US look worse t…

It's not cherry picked, it focuses on the phenomenon of mass shootings specifically. Gang wars and genocide are certainly tragic, but they are a very different type of gun violence than what people mean by mass shootings. The study is asking why in America people are shot by the tens or hundreds at ordinary, law-abiding venues such as schools or concerts, which is relevant in its own right.
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