Wednesday, January 16, 2013

How Do Other Countries Deal With Guns?

Business Insider

The debate over gun control in the United States doesn't take place in a vacuum.

Other countries all over the world play the same video games and have the same mental health problems as the United States, but manage to avoid a sky-high gun murder rate and frequent public shooting massacres. 

The differences are due, in part, to the way that the different countries regulate gun ownership. 
Here's how several other prosperous nations deal with the issue:

The United Kingdom

In 2011, the U.K. had 0.07 gun homicides for every 100,000 people; the U.S., by contrast, had 3 gun homicides for every 100,000. In 2009 there were 138 gun deaths in the U.K, where there are 6.7 firearms for every 100 people. 

Canada

The U.S.'s neighbor to the north also has outstandingly low gun casualty statistics. In 2009, there were 0.5 deaths per 100,000 from gun homicide — only 173 people. Still, the ownership is comparatively high — there are 23.8 firearms per 100 people in the country.

Japan

Japan's gun policies are notoriously strict. Civilians cannot possess handguns, automatic assault weapons, semi-automatic assault weapons, military rifles, or machine guns. Japanese civilians aren't even allowed to own swords.

Without a license, a Japanese citizen isn't even permitted to touch a firearm. Failure to follow this law can result in up to 10 years in prison. 

Japanese civilians hold a mere 710,000 guns, with 0.6 firearms for every person. In 2008, there were 11 gun homicides. For perspective, there are 122,800,000 people in Japan. That year is not an anomaly. In 2006 there were 2 gun homicides and in 2007 there were 22, a national scandal.

Australia

Australia had 30 gun homicides in 2010, which amounted to 0.13 gun deaths for each 100,000 people. Australians hold 3-3.5 million guns, a rate of 15 guns for every 100 people.

3 comments:

  1. This is what happens when people are hypnotized by the government-media conspiracy into voting for some socialist who says that everybody will get everything for free. We end up just like the rest of the world with their kings and dictators. And that's why George Woshington said that everybody needs a gun to fight off another tyrannical-overloard guberment taking away our constitutional right to shoot whenever and whereever we want, to smoke whereever we want, to drive as fast as we want, and to eat whatever game and roadkill we want, regardles of what some "endangered feces" people have to say!

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  2. And everyone likes to ignore the non-cherry picked examples. Russia, for example, has a murder rate of 10 per 100,000; and a firearms ownership rate of 5 per 100. And why do they never mention non-firearms homicides, as if somehow murder fails to exist without guns and these countries don't have much higher rates of non-firearms homicide.

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  3. South Africa--not mentioned. Because of its high murder rate and strict gun control? The Czech Republic--not mentioned. Because of its good gun laws and low murder rate?

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