In light of the emotionally driven legistlation that is soon to be introduced into the United States Congress in January 2013, I was doing some reading on California Senator's, Diane Feinstein, website and came upon the following article.

http://www.salon.com/2012/12/2...ons_works/singleton/

I was very confused with regard to the following paragraph because it is in such stark contrast to everything else I have heard and read about the "success" of the gun laws in Australia. Care to elaborate?

"Abroad, the data is even more convincing. In Australia, a 1996 mass shooting that left 36 dead led the conservative government to act swiftly to ban semi-automatic assault weapons with a much stronger law. They did not grandfather in old guns and paid to buy back old ones. Gun-related homicide plummeted by 59 percent between 1995 and 2006, with no corresponding increase in non-firearm-related homicides. Meanwhile, gun suicides — which are responsible for most firearm deaths in most developed countries — dropped by a whopping 65 percent. Robberies at gunpoint also dropped significantly. In the decade prior to the ban, there were 18 mass shootings. In the decade following it, there were zero."

Five drive by shootings in Sydney in one day,the left never tell the whole story.

Monash University shooting,i don't remember the date but was after the buy back.

quote:

Originally posted by Kenati:
In light of the emotionally driven legistlation that is soon to be introduced into the United States Congress in January 2013, I was doing some reading on California Senator's, Diane Feinstein, website and came upon the following article.

http://www.salon.com/2012/12/2...ons_works/singleton/

I was very confused with regard to the following paragraph because it is in such stark contrast to everything else I have heard and read about the "success" of the gun laws in Australia. Care to elaborate?

"Abroad, the data is even more convincing. In Australia, Meanwhile, gun suicides — which are responsible for most firearm deaths in most developed countries — dropped by a whopping 65 percent. "

It would be interesting to know if the suicide rate dropped as well, or were other methods chosen to commit suicide? I know that in South Africa there is a high gun related crime rate, but in the instance of murders, knives, axes and pangas feature quite highly. No inanimate object has ever killed or injured a human, it is the damn loopy wielding the inanimate object!

here is a website that may hep you http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/australiahat may help you

They correlate falling firearm crime rates with confiscation of firearms from law abiders and that is an incorrect assumption. It has not been shown anywhere that removal of legal firearms or registration have resulted in falling crime rates.

Even the instigator of this whole thing in Australia - former Prime Minister John Howard - admitted that it did little to reduce violent crime rates.

By the way the opposing reports you have read, stating that crime rates are sky-rocketing - are just as fabricated as this anti-gun deal.

quote:

Originally posted by roo1:
here is a website that may hep you http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/australiahat may help you

Thanks for that, just a quick look at South Africa, it can be seen that homicides and suicides using firearms are less than 50% of totals. Yet the damn press and "Feinstein" type oxygen thieves persist in blaming firearms and not individuals who for the most part should be terminated before they cause harm to innocents.

G'Day Fella's,

About all I can think of to say in response to that is; "Never let the Truth get in the way of a good Story"!!!

Best wishes to you all for 2013!
Homer

I'm with Homer on this one, any time you get extremes pushing their agenda they can paint it any way they like with "statistics" that they have trolled the internet until they find stats that fit their agenda.
The truth is out there somewhere.................
Personally, I would be looking at the mental health system that lets us all down.

The change in gun laws in Australia after the Port Arthur incident were more wide ranging that just banning assault weapons. What was instigated was a new set of guidelines for firearm ownership that were to be applied Australia wide by the individual States who regulate firearm ownership.

In general the new rules can be boiled down to:
• To own any Firearm a genuine reason is needed
• Proof of the genuine reason needs to be supplied at time of application ie member of a gun club or agricultural property owner or permission from an owner ect. Self/property defense is not considered a genuine reason.
• Each firearm that is owned must be registered (National Firearms Registry)
• Self-loading long arms ownership needs a special approval process and additional genuine reasons proven – they have made this hard to prove unless you are a property owner and have a vermin problem. Effectively banning them from the vast majority of people
• There were some other but these are the main ones I remember.

There wasn’t a ban only on assault weapons but on all self-loading long arms. There was a self-loading long arm buy back and each State handled this differently. Some States didn’t have mandatory individual gun licensing provisions before this new law (registry). As a result the authorities didn’t know who owned self-loading weapons. So they didn’t get all these weapons back. So potentially there are many now banned weapons in the community that have been kept, one can assume that anyone planning on being bad in these circumstances would not have handed them in – common sense.
As a result the grand plan to remove these existing weapons from the community is flawed and as a result there are many still out there. It will however have reduced the addition of new self loading firearms. The resent escalating gang related violence particularly in Melbourne and Victoria are a testimony that gun laws don’t exclude undesirables from firearms.

In my opinion the changes to the laws have made no difference to the amount of firearm violence. Law abiding firearm owners now just have to work harder to keep the guns they have and continue to jump through hoops to participate in the sport they love.

The types of self-loading weapons that the vast majority of people owned in Australia were rather “low key” compared to what is available in the States. Mostly the Government brought back a heap on 10-22 Ruggers and 5 shot self-loading 12 ga shot guns. There would have been a few Mini 14’s and SKS’s thrown into the mix. So the situations are vastly different.

The issue here really is about getting people to stop people thinking the way to solve a problem in the community is picking up a firearm and pointing it at other people. Address the issue why people feel marginalized enough to act in such an extreme way, address the mental heath issues and it will go a lot further to stopping this type of thing happening. The problem is the Politicians knee jerk reaction of implementing more firearms legislation is much easier than working on the people side of the problem.

For those wanting some facts and data about firearms related deaths andcrime related to firearms in australia.
Have a look at the wish web site
http://ic-wish.org/
Wish stands for women in shooting and hunting.

Some good points in all those posts. The suicides no longer done with guns changed to hangings - not really an improvement in my opinion. I'm pretty sure closing down access to .22 semi-autos, to cut down, helped make the critical mass that promoted the bulk smuggling of handguns here, as did the ban on pistols in Britain.

As an old unionist, I have never liked John Howard. His ignorance in firearms matters combined with his unwillingness to go through the normal process of community consultation before enacting his new laws disgusted me.

However, after the Aurora massacre I stopped and thought about the Australian record. Something like 13 mass murders before the new laws but nothing since.

Maybe "Little Johnnie" just stumbled on some factor common to these nutters, who tend to be young, white loners with a liking for violent video games but without previous criminal convictions. Can't be sure, of course, but I suspect it is the image as well as the capacity of assault rifles. If they can get one legally, without having to develop contacts in the underworld, they will. If they can't, maybe they just go back to their computer games.

And just to make you think a little more...

http://www.digitaljournal.com/article/340113

Just so much

quote:

Something like 13 mass murders before the new laws but nothing since

Actually there has been something like 13 mass murders since the buyback, it is just that they have not been perpetrated with firearms. Notable examples include 15 killed by an arsonist at Childers Qld in 2000 and 11 at Quakers Hill NSW just last year. There was also five bludgeoned to death in their home at Ryde NSW a couple of years ago, and a number of family annihlations. Like the 13 massacres before Port Arthur, some of these involved mass killing of strangers, some were domestic in nature. The numbers of dead were comparable too, indeed if the Black Saturday bushfires of 2009 were included - there was evidence of arson for at least some, and charges were laid - then the numbers may even be considerably greater.

quote:

Originally posted by dan_oz:

quote:

Something like 13 mass murders before the new laws but nothing since

Actually there has been something like 13 mass murders since the buyback, it is just that they have not been perpetrated with firearms. Notable examples include 15 killed by an arsonist at Childers Qld in 2000 and 11 at Quakers Hill NSW just last year. There was also five bludgeoned to death in their home at Ryde NSW a couple of years ago, and a number of family annihlations. Like the 13 massacres before Port Arthur, some of these involved mass killing of strangers, some were domestic in nature. The numbers of dead were comparable too, indeed if the Black Saturday bushfires of 2009 were included - there was evidence of arson for at least some, and charges were laid - then the numbers may even be considerably greater.

Worth comparing the NZ firearms homicide rate as well - no mass shootings since '96 but they still have their semi's...

The Hoddle St & Strathfield type incidents will always be the media focus but as Dan points out a number of mass shootings were domestics - pretty sure the demographic stats post '96 show average family size has decreased in Australia, not sure if it is the same in NZ?

Bombs and fire are always a way to kill lots of people at once and the latter is so simple a means that it will never be beaten. But just because we can't solve all aspects of a crime is no reason to abandon all efforts to stop it.

The NZ situation is interesting and I hope it continues. What explains it I don't know but smaller numbers, a less-stressed, more homogeneous society might have something to do with it - or maybe they are just better people.

quote:

Worth comparing the NZ firearms homicide rate as well - no mass shootings since '96 but they still have their semi's..

There is simply no general context of such events.
In Germany, between ´55 and ´71, every citizen over 18 years could buy a rifle or shotgun. Ammo and propellants were not restricted. With a permit, you could buy a handgun, and it was not a problem to get a permit for carrying a gun.
And o´wonder, no mass shootings, no school shootings or other "events".
In the ending sixties the German terrorists from the RAF killed many people. But with stolen guns from army and police. But we got a new gun law ´71/´72 and ´77. Everything must be registrated. For buying a gun, your need a genuine reason.
In the ending nineties we have had two shootings, by young boys, with stolen guns from their parents. And 2003 and 2009 we have had this mass schooting at two schools. We got although new gun laws after 2003 and after 2009. If it works? Yes, nearly one millon of legal guns would be destroyed in the last three years. And the next new gun law is waiting.....

Martin