Thugs, Guns and Cities

Over at the Canuckistantian (which, I might add, lays bare its perspective with its title), Jack writes about gun ownership and preventing accidental deaths. He offers some sound advice on–should you choose to have a gun in your home–how to educate your children about it.

(If they’re not a hunter or target shooter, I’ve got no idea why a Canadian would want a gun in their home. It can’t be crime prevention. There are only 85 robberies, 78 sexual assaults and 2 homicides per 100,000 people in this nation. More importantly, the crime rate has been falling for the past 15 years.)

What I want to take issue with is this statement:

If a society decides to disarm itself for whatever reason, it creates an ideal climate for thugs to move in and take over. We are seeing that now as gangs from foreign countries with no inhibitions regarding the acquisition or use of illicit firearms turn our streets into war zones and our cities cower in fear.

I’m afraid this doesn’t stand up to the slightest scrutiny. Let’s pick the nations with the lowest rates of recorded gun violence–Ireland, Japan and Spain. All, coincidentally, have very restrictive gun laws. Where, I wonder, are the gangs of thugs? All of these nations manage to be a heck of lot safer than the gun-friendlier USA. In fact, all of them have a crime rate that is one quarter or less that of the US.

Now, I appreciate that crime and gun ownership are complex issues, and that there are many other variables to consider. In fact, I suspect that it’s nearly impossible to statistically demonstrate that gun ownership laws–regardless of their strictness–significantly affect the crime rate. There are just too many other factors which influence crime.

In truth, one of the few stats we can rely upon is this: fewer guns mean fewer gun deaths. I just wanted to point out that, without supporting evidence, all Jack’s statement does is foster fear and ignorance.