[karajorma]

Exactly, neither gun ban had anything to do with the troubles. In fact they don't actually cover Northern Ireland at all.

[achtung]

So I wanted to get involved in this debate, because I definitely oppose any legislation that attempts to remove firearms from legal markets,but then I remembered that everyone is seated firmly in their ideologies. Although, haven't there been several well-known studies that show that open-carry and to some extent, concealed-carry laws resulted in lower crime rates? I may look for these after I get back from work, not much time to go looking now.

Although I'm a (proud?) gun owner myself, I would feel silly walking around with my Colt Combat Commander strapped to my belt. I guess I'm a fan of concealed-carry, even though I don't have my license yet.

[Nuke]

i should also point out that various gun control laws are not at the federal but at the state and local levels. here in alaska (at least some parts of it) guns are essential. if you live anywhere north of anchorage you need guns just to avoid getting eaten by a large bear. we also have a lot of people who hunt. so our gun regulations are more lax than say new york or california. i would push for more safety oriented gun control, like mandatory trigger locks or safes, laws on obtaining ammunition, and mandatory safety training. but banning guns is something im strongly against.

i also lived in arizona which is another gun happy state. having worked in a pawn shop where half the people who worked there either wore a gun or had one in near reach during the work day. did get to see the federal gun control in action, where make, model, serial number, store information and the personal information of the applicant are all needed, as well as a phone call to the fbi who ultimately have the last word on whether or not a sale can be made. assuming things havent changed much since then that is all the control there is at the federal level.
 

The interesting thing here is  that I was completely unaware of the fact that trigger locks or safes are not required by legalization there. This sounds almost unbelievable to me - I can't even imagine walking with a firearm without a safe! Also new was that the bears are generally aggressive in Alaska, here they prefer to avoid human at all cost - the only notable difference is when somebody gets between the mother and the cub. What I heard too was that this is not the case any more in Siberia, as the bears have became more aggressive over the time again. It would be interesting to know the levels of bears and wolves here before the firearms arrived, I'm willing to bet it was considerably higher. The side effect of this is that nowadays the large predators avoid humans, only wolves have gained some courage in the recent years. But the old saying goes, wolf does not belong in the list of native predators of this region.

What do you think of sports shooting?

yea, the gun safe thing is pretty absurd, this mostly comes from the home defense mentality some people in the us have on guns. what good is a gun in this respect if its locked up. a home intruder sees you trying to unlock a gunsafe or trigger lock, hes probably gonna shoot you. my brother is one of those with a home defense mentality, but he tends to lock up his guns. my sisters family on the other hand has guns in every conceivable place in their house, usually hunting rifles but the occasional pistol, they usually have their safeties on with rounds unchambered but loaded none the less. they follow the gun as a tool mentality, and use them for hunting, and in some cases defence from bears. they do have kids, but they will likely get an early indoctrination into gun culture and will be able to handle them safely. my brother in law has had at least one run in with a bear where having a gun saved his life. alaska has 2 of the worlds largest bear species. and these bears will hunt a human given the opportunity. we have a few populated areas near polar bear territory and many more in reach of grizzlies. in the south east here we mostly just have blackbears, which can also be dangerous. we also have wolves and moose (these are ****ing killing machines, just ask the canadians) and other critters that can pose problems for the unarmed.

im also about to go off to the bush for a few weeks here. deer season starts on the first of the month, and i plan to bag me a buck.

[karajorma]

Although, haven't there been several well-known studies that show that open-carry and to some extent, concealed-carry laws resulted in lower crime rates?

Carried out in exactly which countries?

The exact point I've been making along with several others is that what works in the US won't necessarily work in the UK. Britain doesn't have the same kind of gun culture the US does. Allowing open carry or concealed-carry laws in the UK wouldn't result in less gun crime at all because most of the civilised responsible people still wouldn't go out and buy a gun on the day that law passed, but I think we can all guess at exactly the kind of person who would flock to the stores in droves!

[StarSlayer]

Although, haven't there been several well-known studies that show that open-carry and to some extent, concealed-carry laws resulted in lower crime rates?

Carried out in exactly which countries?

The exact point I've been making along with several others is that what works in the US won't necessarily work in the UK. Britain doesn't have the same kind of gun culture the US does. Allowing open carry or concealed-carry laws in the UK wouldn't result in less gun crime at all because most of the civilised responsible people still wouldn't go out and buy a gun on the day that law passed, but I think we can all guess at exactly the kind of person who would flock to the stores in droves!

[AtomicClucker]

Although I'm a (proud?) gun owner myself, I would feel silly walking around with my Colt Combat Commander strapped to my belt. I guess I'm a fan of concealed-carry, even though I don't have my license yet.

I hate cleaning guns, that's my sole reason for not owning one. Too many chemicals, oils, and combustible stuff for my liking. It's like bonafide oil painting with all the poisons, lead, and arsenic

[Nuke]

Although, haven't there been several well-known studies that show that open-carry and to some extent, concealed-carry laws resulted in lower crime rates?

Carried out in exactly which countries?

The exact point I've been making along with several others is that what works in the US won't necessarily work in the UK. Britain doesn't have the same kind of gun culture the US does. Allowing open carry or concealed-carry laws in the UK wouldn't result in less gun crime at all because most of the civilised responsible people still wouldn't go out and buy a gun on the day that law passed, but I think we can all guess at exactly the kind of person who would flock to the stores in droves!

concealed carry permits do require an extra class with some safety instruction as part of it. not sure if there was a need for an open carry permit, in phoenix it certainly seemed like if you owned a gun you were allowed to wear it in a holster without any extra certification. given the fact that you need to take a gun class to get said permits, id rather trust people that hold the permit with guns than those that do not, because it is likely that they have had no formal gun training.

[karajorma]

Yes but you're missing the point of exactly who would be going to get the permits in the first place. Either we make the rules so stringent that next to nobody gets one or you end up with exactly the wrong kind of person having them.

[Mika]

yea, the gun safe thing is pretty absurd, this mostly comes from the home defense mentality some people in the us have on guns. what good is a gun in this respect if its locked up. a home intruder sees you trying to unlock a gunsafe or trigger lock, hes probably gonna shoot you. my brother is one of those with a home defense mentality, but he tends to lock up his guns. my sisters family on the other hand has guns in every conceivable place in their house, usually hunting rifles but the occasional pistol, they usually have their safeties on with rounds unchambered but loaded none the less. they follow the gun as a tool mentality, and use them for hunting, and in some cases defence from bears. they do have kids, but they will likely get an early indoctrination into gun culture and will be able to handle them safely. my brother in law has had at least one run in with a bear where having a gun saved his life. alaska has 2 of the worlds largest bear species. and these bears will hunt a human given the opportunity. we have a few populated areas near polar bear territory and many more in reach of grizzlies. in the south east here we mostly just have blackbears, which can also be dangerous. we also have wolves and moose (these are ****ing killing machines, just ask the canadians) and other critters that can pose problems for the unarmed.

im also about to go off to the bush for a few weeks here. deer season starts on the first of the month, and i plan to bag me a buck.

For me that sounds more like being in war, we used to carry assault rifles loaded but unchambered in the army. Here home intrusions are usually not that fast, or that the thieves break in when they know you are not home. Putting so many loaded weapons in the house sounds more like being afraid of somebody coming to murder you, instead of just home defense. One of the examples was somebody trying to break in to someone's house some time ago in this region, the owner woke up and said that if they break the door he will shoot. In the end he lost his nerve and shot the assailants through the door, resulting in I don't recall what. In the end court did not accept his shooting as home defense, the reason being that the assailants did not actually break into his house. Scandinavian legalization regarding to this is occasionally rather interesting... I recall the guy who pulled the trigger got heavier penalties than the injured assailants.

A trigger lock is legally accepted as a storage measure there? The only legal way to do it here is a safe.

[NGTM-1R]

Yes but you're missing the point of exactly who would be going to get the permits in the first place. Either we make the rules so stringent that next to nobody gets one or you end up with exactly the wrong kind of person having them.

Statistics on the subject don't actually bear this out. Having a concealed-carry permit doesn't make you any more likely to do something criminal than simply owning a firearm.

[karajorma]

Statistics from the US! Are you not listening or something?

Why are you assuming your culture is the same as the UK's? Why are you continually assuming that the exact same demographic even exists in the UK?

And that's before we get to the point that I'm not even talking about carry-conceal except in answer to Swantz's comments on how it reduces crime. My argument referred to anyone in the UK who would rush out to get a handgun if they were legalised again and how they would be a disproportionately higher percentage of people who shouldn't own handguns than you'd get in the US. So even if your point does apply to the UK, since as far as my point was concerned carry-concealed = gun owner your point is pretty much moot anyway.

[NGTM-1R]

Statistics from the US! Are you not listening or something?

Faulty premise isn't going to help you. I bothered to check statistics for a number of other countries too. There's really no correlation, except perhaps a negative one if you count what it takes to get a carry concealed permit in Japan. (Which, I was surprised to discover, is actually possible. If you're a saint with the connections of a devil.)

My argument referred to anyone in the UK who would rush out to get a handgun if they were legalised again and how they would be a disproportionately higher percentage of people who shouldn't own handguns than you'd get in the US. So even if your point does apply to the UK, since as far as my point was concerned carry-concealed = gun owner your point is pretty much moot anyway.

Your argument is so utterly hypothetical and specious it doesn't deserve serious consideration in that context. You have literally nothing to back up that statement at all except your own negativity about the nature of humanity. Cite a source and we'll talk.

[karajorma]

You haven't cited any source from the UK nor can you. So your entire argument is specious.