Australia's mass shootings dropped to zero after gun reforms | Hacker News Reader

Australia's mass shootings dropped to zero after gun reforms

cnn.com

Article fails to mention the Sydney Hostage Crisis of 2014. Three people, including the gunman, were killed, so this event just fails to qualify as a mass shooting, but the fact is, in a country where shotguns are banned, a lone gunman still used a shotgun to hold 10 people hostage.

Shotguns are not banned in Australia.

Only one of the deaths (Tori Johnson) was caused by Monis. The other two (Katrina Dawson and Man Monis) were caused by police.

Australia also doesn't have a quite porous border, while it's well known that illicit materials - guns, narcotics, people - flow relatively freely across the US-Mexico border. While I would wager that mass shootings would likely decrease to some degree, expecting to eliminate all gun violence is a goal not currently achievable.

Firearm-related crime was already on a downward trend in Australia when the ban was enacted. The crime rate in America followed a similar downward trend without the ban. Rapes increased after the gun ban. Violent crime increased 42.2% after the ban. [1]

[1] http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2225517/posts

The study acknowledges this downward trend, and shows that the trend accelerated after the ban. They are quite clear that this is not enough to conclude the ban worked as intended, but it is plausible.

Quoting from the discussion section (http://jama.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=2530362#D...):

This study has several issues related to terminology and limitations that should be considered in the interpretation of these findings. ...

Second, the observational nature of the data in this article precludes assigning causality between enactment of the 1996 gun laws along with the buyback program and subsequent elimination of mass shootings and reduction in rates of total firearm-related deaths and gun-related suicide. Even though the rates of firearm-related homicides and suicides were declining before gun law reforms, banning rapid-fire weapons, and removal of a substantial number of firearms, it is plausible that reducing the availability of weapons may have been related to the acceleration in the rates of declines for these deaths after gun reform.

Dead is dead, armed robbery is armed robbery. People (except those responsible for cleaning up the mess) could don't give two craps how someone was killed if they've been killed.

If you were in a position to reduce the net number of homicides by 1% in exchange for a >1% increase in the amount committed by firearms how would you defend not taking that deal?

If you have to use a national tragedy as leverage to get something done that's a damn good reason not to do that something. We've only begun to take baby steps to undo the damage that was legislated post 9/11.

Focusing on a tiny fraction of the problem is a complete disservice to everyone. People would look at you like you had three heads if you said seatbelts make you less safe because they can trap you in your car. Using "mass shootings" as though it's representative of all gun violence is just dumb. The most effective ways to tackle edge case don't carry over to the non-edge cases.

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