Protestantism

» redback - 1950s - answer to redback

"Quite a few reasons. But not guns."

Guns are the medium, not the reason. My concern is not simply successful murders. The nature of crime ebbs and flows with local crime initiatives, whether the criminal gang moves in or leaves town, whether our army continues to leave several rocket launchers unguarded etc, banks robbed yesterday, shops today. One person was arrested recently here and 37 recent burglaries solved. A 'crime wave' stopped with this one arrest.

I ABC when I see seasonally-adjusted eg unemployment as its a way to fudge figures. Same with any population adjusted figures.

We just don't have this gun mentality here so have the luxury to speculate on yours. We have a country that agonises over a national road toll of 25 over this 2007 Easter break. Our total gun-related deaths in 2003 (? later figures unavailable) was 290 with homicide 54. It's been going down every year so should be less now.

Following "our" like massacre 10 years ago, our gun buyback...reportedly the largest in the world..and amnesty..resulted in 820,000 firearms** being destroyed. Reportedly halving the number of gun-related deaths since. (**Maybe in context, this only equates to clearing one US city?)

You have the mentality over there that the right to bear arms over-rides any other risk that comes with it. A kid is accidently killed by a gun and this DOES "defend to the death" your freedoms. An immigrant from a country without a right to bear arms enjoys or becomes sadly exposed to the freedoms your country offers...sometimes shortly after arrival. Who knows the exponential effect.

We learn a lot from the USA. One thing we've learned is that you can learn from us.

-- posted by redback