Friday, December 20, 2013

Why Gun Control Matters.

NRANorth
WhatWeWorryVille


Earlier this week, we examined some of the connections between gun use advocates in Canada and the National Rifle Association in the United States.

And we did so because said advocates had been making a bit of a fuss about Victoria city council voicing concerns about gun sales in that city.

Look.

You can go on about shades of grey, constitutional rights, nanny states, and how it is people rather than guns who do the actual killing all you want but there is no ignoring the kinds of things that will happen in Canada too if the NRA and their northern friends ultimately prevail.

Bill Moyers and Michael Winship have the story of that which cannot be ignored:

...Mother Jones has counted 194 children shot to death since Newtown a year ago; probably more by the time you read this. Average age: 6. The magazine’s Mark Follman writes that after Newtown, “The National Rifle Association and its allies argued that arming more adults is the solution to protecting children, be it from deranged mass shooters or from home invaders.” But what Mother Jonesdiscovered is a “stark rejoinder to that view” — 127 of the children died in their own homes and dozens more in the homes of family, friends and neighbors, not strangers. Seventy-two pulled the trigger themselves or were shot by another youngster (only four adults have been found liable in those cases). At least 52 of the deaths involved a child handling a gun left unsecured...


And then if you step back and take a wider view of the situation down south there's this:

...There has been a lot of killing in America since Newtown a year ago, perhaps more than 30,000 gun deaths since that fatal day. And gun purchases are way up. The biggest publicly traded firearms manufacture in the United States, Sturm Ruger, had more than half a billion dollars in sales for the first nine months of this year, 45 percent higher than two years ago, with a 67 percent profit rise over the same period...

'Nuff said?


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2 comments:

Ed said...

What you fail to point out is, overall gun related deaths, which encompass homicide, suicide, accidental and "other" have been steadily declining from a high in the 1960's .... Now down approximately 60% and continuing to decline. Gun ownership had trebled.... 'Nuff said?

RossK said...

And what happens if you compare border cities?

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