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Comment by superxor | Hacker News Reader

Living here in India it's surprising to see the mostly unregulated Gun sale in the US. I believe it's a right the constitution of US grants to its citizens. But I've read that this is a major cause for higher homicidal rate in the US. It seems like common sense to us here that allowing nearly everyone to purchase Guns is counter-productive and will only result in more violence.

Correct me If I am wrong, I understand this is a highly polarized issue in US and it's election time too.

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You might actually want to look at what kills people in the US statistically. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/dvs/deaths_2009_release.pdf [PDF]

Homicide is down at 15th and had been going down for a number of years. So increasing gun ownership is not tipping the balance up.

Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the act of depriving a whole nation of arms, as the blackest.

~ Mahatma Gandhi, My Experiments with Truth (1927) [1]

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[1]: http://notableandquotable.blogspot.com/2008/02/gandhi-on-gun...

Almost. The full quote has "act" capitalized[1], along with a better explanation of what he's on about.

[1]: http://blog.ryjones.org/2008/11/29/the-gandhi-quote/

It's also common sense to see that allowing nearly everybody to purchase guns will result in reduced violence, because the potential immediate penalty for violence is higher.

It's up to you which you believe, and after making your decision I suggest you use google to find further justification for it.

This isn't really true since people and especially small-time violent criminals aren't especially rational actors.

The more likely outcome is ongoing gang/tribal violence and blood-feuds, as we've seen throughout history.

> It's up to you which you believe, and after making your decision I suggest you use google to find further justification for it.

This is exactly the wrong order to do things in.

Assuming you value truth, then it's not up to you which you believe. You have to look at the evidence first, and then believe whichever one is best supported. Ask questions before you shoot.

http://lesswrong.com/lw/js/the_bottom_line/

Yes, that would be one valid interpretation of my post.

Correct me If I am wrong, I understand this is a highly polarized issue in US and it's election time too.

You are correct that this is a very polarizing issue.

You don't have guns there because of crime, but rather because the Brits wanted to keep you disarmed in order to control your population better. Gandhi himself said, "Among the many misdeeds of the British rule in India, history will look upon the Act depriving a whole nation of arms as the blackest."

People have access to many types of lethal weapons. To me it seems silly to try and regulate everything, so why even start with guns?

I agree. Military fact: offense is always superior than defense (no tank is immune to rockets/artillery, there is no nuclear shield able to stop a missile etc). Same goes with guns: if someone wants to kill you, he will be able to do it, even if you have a gun with you (sneaking up on someone is not that hard). More guns indeed means more guns in the hands of violent people. Common sense (for me at least) says "this is idiotic"

Uhm, statistics don't really show that. North Dakota is one of the most gun heavy per population states in the union. 2008 had 4 murders, all of which didn't use a gun(1).

I would say your "gun not a defense" argument is also wrong as home invasions tend to be one area to research to show counter examples.

1) http://www.ag.state.nd.us/reports/bcireports/crimehomicide/M...

You're overgeneralizing. Let me overgeneralize in the same vein then, "Camping beats offense". In my house, in a home invasion, I'm a camper. I'd rather camp with a gun than a knife.

> But I've read that this is a major cause for higher homicidal rate in the US.

Explain what "cause" means. It's not like a gun can walk around and start popping people. I would say people are the "cause" for homicide, and we have many instruments at our disposal to use. What if violent movies and television caused violence? Should we ban television and movies?

> allowing nearly everyone to purchase Guns is counter-productive and will only result in more violence.

What if I told you it took violence to take people's guns away and prevent them from having them? Then would you support banning guns? At that point you would be in favor of using violence to prevent self-defense.

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