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I keep hearing the statement "America has the highest murder rate of any developed country." Or that "America is the only industrialized country without reasonable gun laws." Well, lets take the United States completely out of the equation for a moment and just look at some facts.
The top 10 major countries in Europe with the highest gun ownership rates are, Switzerland(45.7), Finland(32), Sweden(31.6), Norway(31.3), France(31.2), Austria(30.4), Germany(30.3), Iceland(30.3), Greece(22.5), and Belgium(17.2).
The murder rates of these countries are, Switzerland(.7), Finland(2.2), Sweden(1.0), Norway(.6), France(1.1), Austria(.6), Germany(.8), Iceland(.3), Greece(1.5), and Belgium(1.7). Averaging about 1.05 murders per 100,000 people.
The top 10 major countries in Europe with the lowest gun ownership rates are, Romania(.7), Poland(1.3), Netherlands(3.9), Hungary(5.5), Bulgaria(6.2), the UK(~7), Portugal(8.5), Ireland(8.6), Russia(8.9), and Spain(10.4)
The murder rates of these countries are, Romania(2.0), Poland(1.1), Netherlands(1.1), Hungary(1.3), Bulgaria(2.0), the UK(1.2), Portugal(1.2), Ireland(1.2), Russia(10.2), and Spain(.8). Averaging about 2.21 per 100,000 people.
If you remove Russia(which is a significant statistical outlier), these countries with the least guns would average 1.32 murders per 100,000 people.
Why does Switzerland have about half the murder rate of the UK? Why does Norway have nearly half the murder rate of its neighbor Sweden? Why does Finland have such a high murder rate compared to its Scandinavian neighbors Norway and Sweden? Why does Britain have four times the murder rate of Iceland? Why does Belgium have a murder rate 50% higher than France, and more than twice as high as Germany? And why does Russia have such an incredibly high murder rate?
Well, lets not obsess about Europe for a minute. Let me just throw a string of three countries at you, and you tell me which one has the lowest murder rate.
Canada, Belgium, Somalia...... Answer is Somalia
Greece, Canada, Egypt...... Answer is Egypt
UK, Poland, Portugal...... Answer is Poland
Slovenia, Spain, Denmark...... Answer is Slovenia
Sweden, Ireland, Qatar...... Answer is Qatar
Serbia, Czech Republic, Greece...... Answer is Serbia
My point is, murder rates are sort of a mystery. And its difficult to really know what the murder rate of a country will be. Some of the poorest countries, have very low murder rates. While other poor countries have incredibly high murder rates. If you focused only on Europe, the murder rate gap between Iceland and Britain is about the same as the gap between the United States and Britain. The murder rate difference between Canada and Norway, is about the same as the difference between Canada and the United States. And the gap between Finland and Norway, is greater than the gap between the United States and Canada.
If we look at Mexico, Brazil, Russia, and South Africa. Their gun ownership rates are, Mexico(15), Brazil(8), Russia(8.9), and South Africa(12.7). The United States has a gun ownership rate of 88.8.
But the murder rates for those countries are, Mexico(16.9), Brazil(21), Russia(10.2), and South Africa(31.8). Compared to the United States at about 5.
The point is, there simply isn't a strong correlation of murder rates to gun ownership. The murder rate in Africa for instance, is as low as 1.1 in Tunisia, all the way up to 38 in Zambia.
Puerto Rico has about five times the murder rate of the United States, but has had far more strict gun laws. Nicaragua has about 1/7th the murder rate of its neighbor Honduras. Venezuela has one of he highest murder rates in the entire world, and has very few guns.
This obsession with guns is simply not based in any logic. It isn't based on any actual facts. It is to try to use whatever argument that is potentially available to justify an agenda.
There is absolutely no proof that getting rid of guns lowers crime. Gun control did not even lower crime in our own country the multiple times it was put in place. But you can't explain that to these people, who are convinced that guns are the devil. Regardless of the fact that murder rates have gone down greatly as gun rights have expanded. Regardless of the fact that violent crime rates are now much higher in Britain than in the United States. Nearly twice as many people report being the victim of a crime in the UK each year, compared to the United States. And this is what liberals want the United States to become.
Well, lets not obsess about Europe for a minute. Let me just throw a string of three countries at you, and you tell me which one has the lowest murder rate.
Canada, Belgium, Somalia...... Answer is Somalia
Do you really believe this? I honestly don't even believe they capture accurate homicide rates in a country like Somalia with basically little to no functioning governement that's been in the midst of one civil war or another for over 20 years. Furthermore, most deaths due to firearms are just counted as war casaulties.
Do you really believe this? I honestly don't even believe they capture accurate homicide rates in a country like Somalia with basically little to no functioning governement that's been in the midst of one civil war or another for over 20 years. Furthermore, most deaths due to firearms are just counted as war casaulties.
It was certainly something I questioned. I don't presume to believe that Somalia is a safe country to live in by any means. But I don't really know exactly how many actual murder murders there are, vs how many people are killed because of war.
I was just basing this post on the statistics that were available by international agencies. And I was just trying to prove a point, that its nearly impossible to look at a country on the map and know what its murder rate is. Even if you look knew the murder rate of neighboring countries, its still impossible to know. Nor is it possible to know by looking at the number of guns in a country.
The argument against guns, is that somehow you can prove that more guns equals more murder. But is that actually true?
When you look at the countries in the world with the highest murder rates. They almost always have incredibly strict gun laws, and very few guns. The only truth in this world when it comes to guns, is that guns don't kill people, people kill people.
When you look at murder rates in the world. Looking at their rate of gun ownership is completely useless. What really matters, is culture. It is the structure of their societies. It is demographics.
Homogeneous countries tend to have low crime rates. The more diverse a country is, not just racially, but ethnically, religiously, etc, the more crime. Countries with a history of interethnic violence, have high crime rates. Communist countries, or countries who previously had communism, tend to have higher crime rates compared to their neighbors.
There are a lot of correlations that someone could make about crime. But there simply isn't any proof that more gun control leads to less crime. And its getting on my last nerve for anyone to try to imply otherwise. And they do so by being incredibly selective in their data.
Yes, Europe has low murder rates, but the crime rate in Europe has been going up, while the crime rate in the United States has been going down. The crime rate in Europe has historically been much lower than in the United States.
For instance, the crime rate exploded in the United States during the 1950's and 1960's, and continued to rise until the mid 1990's, and has since tapered off. Why? Was it guns?
No, because guns don't cause crime. Culture causes crime. What caused crime in the United States, was a growing hostility between blacks and whites, the entitlement culture where people believe that the world owes them something. So they feel like they have the right to just go out and take it. A culture in America that promotes the "tough guy" ideal. You have to be bigger and stronger and tougher than everyone else. Because that is where many men get their self-worth from in this country. As opposed to being educated, or having a good job, or being a good person. We have made the epitome of manliness into who is strongest and most violent. This is especially true in public schools, where bullies have become an epidemic.
We can fix the violence problem in the United States, but banning guns accomplish nothing. Because it just empowers the bully. We can fix the violence in this country, but that requires changing our culture. It requires people to feel responsible for themselves and their families. It requires people to value being successful, and being morally righteous. Rather than value being the tough guy, who thinks he can do whatever he wants, and everyone else owes him.
Do you really believe this? I honestly don't even believe they capture accurate homicide rates in a country like Somalia with basically little to no functioning governement that's been in the midst of one civil war or another for over 20 years. Furthermore, most deaths due to firearms are just counted as war casaulties.
Anyone who uses Somalia as a model nation is an idiot. Anyone who thinks Somalia has less crime than Canada or Belgium is an even bigger idiot.
Do you really believe this? I honestly don't even believe they capture accurate homicide rates in a country like Somalia with basically little to no functioning governement that's been in the midst of one civil war or another for over 20 years. Furthermore, most deaths due to firearms are just counted as war casaulties.
Do you believe the violent crime stats? I don't!
One country's violent crime is another's simple misdemeanor. It is highly probable that a significant number of the violent crimes committed in some countries aren't even reported due to no action being taken regardless.
It would be more accurate not to refir to the whole US because gun laws differ state to state county to county .
States and counties. Chacago ,New York, Detroit, the strictest gun controls and the worst problems .
Creating greater controls against gun ownership makes for more and easier prey.
it doesn't fix the problem it makes it worse.
It protects the criminal , and punishes the victom and continued future victoms by unchecked conciquences .
But the larger point in the OP is correct in the sense that we don't see much of a link between overall homicide rates and the specifics of the local gun laws.
Within the US, Louisiana has by far the highest murder rate of any state. Is that due to its relatively lax gun laws? Probably not, since other states have similar laws, but much lower rates of murder. And so on.
We can fix the violence problem in the United States, but banning guns accomplish nothing. Because it just empowers the bully. We can fix the violence in this country, but that requires changing our culture. It requires people to feel responsible for themselves and their families. It requires people to value being successful, and being morally righteous. Rather than value being the tough guy, who thinks he can do whatever he wants, and everyone else owes him.
You are never going to get leftists to agree with this. The leftist answer to every problem is government. Even when the answer to a problem is to change the culture, their means of changing it is through government. When people feel responsible for themselves, government has no role. Empowering individuals to be personally responsible to freely choose the best paths for themselves is never, ever a solution you will see a leftist support.
Even the one area they hypocritically champion self determination, abortion, ends up with a breakdown of the traditional family and the reliance of more people on government. It's no coincidence that the communities with the highest abortion rates are also the ones with the lowest marriage rates and most dependence on government benefits.
Anyone who uses Somalia as a model nation is an idiot. Anyone who thinks Somalia has less crime than Canada or Belgium is an even bigger idiot.
Well, I didn't say Somalia had less crime, I said they had a lower murder rate. These were statistics based off the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Which listed Somalia as having a lower murder rate than Canada or Belgium. It didn't list all crime. UNODC actually got the data from the World Health Organization, and much of it is in this report. Which is pretty interesting really.
But regardless of whether or not Somalia has a lower murder rate or not. My point is, there is no proof whatsoever that gun ownership rates cause higher murder rates. Obsessing about guns diverts attention from the real problems. And the real problem is a cultural problem.
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