Gun Law question about Israel and Switzerland... Rachel Maddow noted...

[battleknight24]

... Rachel Maddow noted just now that Israel and Switzerland have a large number of guns but have less violence (I don't remember exactly how she said it).

Don't Israel and Switzerland have some of the strictest gun control laws in the world? Does anyone know what the guns laws are like in those two countries?

[trouble.smith]

1. teachers are armed in Israel and swiss men are issued machine guns by their government.

[jbgood1977]

2. There was a time when Israeli schools were targeted

for machine gun attack. They no longer are. Guess what they started doing in Israel. Hint: It had NOTHING to do with posting gun free zone (read: free fire zone) signs.

[gejohnston]

3. Israrel does have strict gun laws

Switzerland is laxer than some parts of the US, including CT. In Switzerland, you need a permit to buy a gun from a store, but not for private sales. Switzerland and Germany bans some FPS games.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Switzerland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Finland
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics#Israel
Both countries have less wealth inequality than we do. We are closer to Mexico in that regard. What I find interesting, is that Finland raised their age from 15 to 18.

Canada, Norway, and Finland also have high gun ownership.

If gun laws mattered, USVI wouldn't have the highest murder rate in the US, and Vermont wouldn't be the lowest.
What matters is
history, culture, inequality in wealth, health care.

[intaglio]

4. Israelis and Swiss nationals are members of a well trained militia

Spot the difference with the USA

[gejohnston]

5. they both have a draft

and Swiss militia members do keep machine guns at home, but you don't have to be a militia member to own a gun. Although I do support replacing the MIC with a Swiss style system. Have an active duty air force and navy big enough to patrol our borders and have a militia army.

[intaglio]

8. And how does that change my observation?

The obvious difference is that the Swiss are much less likely than US citizens to experience gun violence. However they are 3rd or 4th worst in the developed world as regards gun death per capita.

[gejohnston]

9. because they have a high suicide rate

and suicidal people use what's there. Sweden and Belgium have more rope deaths per capita than Switzerland has gun deaths if you get my drift.

[intaglio]

10. And how does that change this second observation?

US States with lax gun laws also have higher rates of suicide by gun.

Keep on going, straw men are so easy to burn

[gejohnston]

11. what straw man is that?

are you saying that shooting yourself is more tragic than hanging yourself? Rural areas do tend to have higher suicide rates than their urban counterparts.

[intaglio]

14. Attempting to subvert the argument about gun violence in the USA

into an argument about suicide in other countries.

Per capita death from gun violence, which always includes suicide, is far greater in the USA and the USA does not link the freedom to own weapons with militia training. The rate of death by gun violence in Switzerland (always cited as how a gun owning democracy does not have to be violent) is, despite the training, far higher per capita than countries which have more rigorous gun control.

The rate of death by gun violence in Switzerland is almost an order of magnitude lower than the USA. My reply to the OPs question was that the Swiss and the Israeli gun owners are part of what might be termed a "well regulated militia" (where regulated means well trained and controlled) in contrast to the USA.

Your first reply to me sought to divert the argument into one about a military draft and your second into an argument about suicide. The draft and the subdivision into suicide are the straw men you attempted to set up.

[gejohnston]

15. it seems like that is where you were moving to

Per capita death from gun violence, which always includes suicide, is far greater in the USA and the USA does not link the freedom to own weapons with militia training. The rate of death by gun violence in Switzerland (always cited as how a gun owning democracy does not have to be violent) is, despite the training, far higher per capita than countries which have more rigorous gun control.

suicide is included for propaganda purposes, to prop up the numbers. Otherwise you would have to talk about rope violence. The fact that almost all of Switzerland's gun deaths are suicides was my point.

The rate of death by gun violence in Switzerland is almost an order of magnitude lower than the USA. My reply to the OPs question was that the Swiss and the Israeli gun owners are part of what might be termed a "well regulated militia" (where regulated means well trained and controlled) in contrast to the USA.

They don't have the gang and organized crime problem either. Neither this shooter nor the the one in Portland were gun owners, trained or not, since they stole the guns. One from his room mate and the other from his mother.

You opened the door to suicide when you mentioned Swiss gun deaths.

[intaglio]

21. I am talking about Switzerland, Israel and gun violence

You are talking aggressively about "propaganda" also making excuses about "gangs" and "organised crime." It may surprise you but the homeland of organised crime in Europe, Italy, also has lower death by gun violence. Britain with all of the input of the Provos and the IRA still maintained a lower death rate per capita by gun (and bomb) violence than the USA.

Where will you go next? Violent unions? Will you blame immigrants? Perhaps those nasty Democrats who want gun control are to blame.

Face it, developed countries with gun control or those which insist upon training for their gun owning masses have lower per capita death rates from gun violence than the USA and all your dissembling cannot hide that fact.

[gejohnston]

22. not dissembling at all, just trying to figure out your point

[intaglio]

27. My point was in reply to the OP

and I believe you read that - or did it escape your memory? http://www.democraticunderground.com/117292784#post4

The USA needs to implement strict gun control and/or appropriate licensing and continued training of gun owners - yourself included.

[gejohnston]

29. CT has strict gun laws

the shooter wasn't a gun owner, in fact he stole them after killing his mother apparently. You might have a valid point in general but isn't that relevant in this case.

[intaglio]

30. Not as strict as Switzerland and Israel

also CT doesn't have the training given to Swiss and Israelis.

In respect of the mother, would she have been allowed to hold her paranoids cache* under the rules in Switzerland or Israel?

__________________________________________

* No she was not a "Gun Collector" or else there would have been far more than one vintage weapon in the collection.

[gejohnston]

31. not everyone is drafted in the Milita

in Switzerland, so membership is not required to own a gun. That makes your point mostly irrelevant. As for "paranoids cache" you are projecting a value judgment on someone else. Maybe you would own them only if you are paranoid, but that does not mean she would be. That and the over use of various logical fallacies are part of the reasons why the gun control movement is impotent. Rather than looking at themselves in the mirror and dealing with it, they would rather rant and rave about big bad Wayne. She could be a target shooter. Those are the only guns we know of in her collection, which is not the same as being the whole collection. Even if we did, I doubt you would know what guns are vintage and what are not.

[intaglio]

32. FFS check your sources

and stop being an apologist for the enablers of mass murder.

In Switzerland those who are not in the militia and own weapons are either;
1) in the Swiss professional military - for example air force; or
2) employed as private or government security staff and as such subject to strict certification by examination and training; or
3) Those retired from the militia/military can in limited circumstances be allowed to keep their weapons; or
4) Those whose lives may be under threat (eg Bankers) can keep a weapon as long as they go through the certification process.

Guess what? They all have (military grade) training in weapons handling before they can be certified. What is more that certification process has to be repeated at intervals.

It has been pointed out elsewhere on this thread that Swiss firearms licensing is far more strict than any US gun licensing provisions. Despite this the Swiss have one of the worst records in the developed world for deaths by gun violence (number 3, I believe) but this is dwarfed by the nonsensical levels of gun violence in the USA.

To be frank, I am sick of repeating myseld and bored by your purblind defense of the indefensible so I will leave this thread and you will no doubt claim victory. Feel free and continue in your ossified view even through the next "massacre of the innocents".

[gejohnston]

33. check yours

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Switzerland#Number_of_guns_in_circulation
If you change the word Swiss with Israeli, you might be correct.
I'm guessing you have never been there? There "gun violence" are mostly suicides since their murder rate is almost nonexistent.

I'm not an apologist for anyone. Although if you must misrepresent or make shit up for your cause, then maybe you should question your cause.

I cited my source, what is yours?

[DanTex]

16. True. In fact, there are many studies finding that gun availability increases suicide rates.

Here is a chart from a study from the Harvard School of Public Health.

[gejohnston]

18. all of which indicate

rural vs urban suicides.

[DanTex]

20. Wrong. More false statements from you!

Did it ever occur to you if you actually read some of these studies, you might not keep getting so many things wrong?
http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matter/means-matter/risk/index.html

[gejohnston]

23. Yeah I read the studies

I just know the difference between quality and bullshit when I see it. Hemenway took a conclusion and created a study to prove a predetermined conclusion. If you removed your ideological bias or actually understood that correlation does not mean causation, or that it shows rural areas, which tend to have higher gun ownership, have higher suicide rates. He tells you what you like to hear, but I doubt you actually understand it as well as you think. That is why you rant about "scientifically illiterate NRAbots" or use some inane appeal to authority or bandwagon instead of explaining anything with any clarity. That is why I take nothing you say as seriously and I doubt your claimed credentials.

[DanTex]

24. LOL. Sure you did!

Of all the false statements you've made, I think that one is the funniest.

"I read the studies"

[gejohnston]

25. in other words,

you have nothing as usual. You don't even know true from false.

[DanTex]

26. Get back to me when you've read some of the studies.

At which point, maybe you can make a post that addresses the content, rather than just fantasizing about what you think the studies might say...

[gejohnston]

28. get back to me when you understand the diffrence between real science

and propaganda made to look like it.

[DanTex]

6. Israel and Switzerland have much tighter gun laws than the US

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2012/12/14/mythbusting-israel-and-switzerland-are-not-gun-toting-utopias/

[gejohnston]

7. the blog is actually wrong

about how Swiss laws.

[Clames]

12. Well, you know he isn't going to do his own research. n/t

[DanTex]

17. LOL. Given your track record vs the truth, the fact that you say something is wrong actually

makes me even more confident that it is correct.

[gejohnston]

19. given your track record for intellectual honesty and civil debate

and the fact that you turn on the personal attacks when you can't refute anything
I know I'm right.

[Clames]

13. Missing the bigger picture.

It isn't gun laws, it's culture.

It's the absence of violent, drug fueled gangs.

It's better access to mental health care.

It's a more homogenized society.

It's less wealth inequality.

It's all the little things like these that anti-gun people ignore that mean that no matter the gun laws those countries would have less crime period than the US.