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The Mistake Of Only Comparing US Murder Rates To "Developed" Countries

Tyler Durden's picture




 

Submitted by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

Much of the political thinking about violence in the United States comes from unfavorable comparisons between the United States and a series of cherry-picked countries with lower murder rates and with fewer guns per capita. We’ve all seen it many times. The United States, with a murder rate of approximately 5 per 100,000 is compared to a variety of Western and Central European countries (also sometimes Japan) with murder rates often below 1 per 100,000. This is, in turn, supposed to fill Americans with a sense of shame and illustrate that the United States should be regarded as some sort of pariah nation because of its murder rate.

Note, however, that these comparisons always employ a carefully selected list of countries, most of which are very unlike the United States. They are  countries that were settled long ago by the dominant ethnic group, they are ethnically non-diverse today, they are frequently very small countries (such as Norway, with a population of 5 million) with very locally based democracies (again, unlike the US with an immense population and far fewer representatives in government per voter). Politically, historically, and demographically, the US has little in common with Europe or Japan.
Prejudice about the "Developed World" vs "the Third World"
 
But these are the only countries the US shall be compared to, we are told, because the US shall only be compared to “developed” countries when analyzing its murder rate and gun ownership. And yet, no reason for this is ever given. What is the criteria for deciding that the United States shall be compared to Luxembourg but not to Mexico, which has far more in common with the US than Luxembourg in terms of size, history, ethnic diversity, and geography?

Much of this stems from outdated preconceived and evidence-free notions about the "third world." As Hans Rosling has shown, there is this idea of "we" vs. "them." "We" are the special "developed" countries were people are happy healthy, and live long lives. "Them" is the third world where people live in war-torn squalor and lives there are nasty, brutish, and short. In this mode of thinking there is a bright shiny line between the "developed" world and everyone else, who might as well be considered as a different species.

In truth, there is no dividing line between the alleged "developed" world and everyone else. There is, in fact, only gradual change that takes place as one looks at Belgium, then the US, then Chile, and Turkey, and China, and Mexico. Most countries, as Rosling illustrates here, are in the middle, and this is freely exhibited by a variety of metrics including the UN's human development index.

Once we understand these facts, and do not cling to bizarre xenophobic views about how everyone outside the "developed" world is too dysfunctional and/or subhuman (although few gun control advocates would ever admit to the thought) to bear comparison to the US, we immediately see that the mantra "worst in the developed world" offers an immensely skewed, unrealistic, and even bigoted view of the world and how countries compare to each other.

While ignorance about true global poverty, life expectancy, and family planning are no doubt a source of some of these wrong-headed comparisons, one doesn't need to be the world's biggest cynic to recognize that the US is only compared to a selective list of countries because doing so offers a biased view of the United States that makes it looks like an especially crime-ridden place.

But, we are never allowed to compare the US to middle income countries like Uruguay, Russia, or Mexico because that would show that the US is actually a remarkably safe place in global terms on top of having many more legally owned guns than those countries.

Nevertheless, we've all heard it too many times to count: gun laws in the United States are "insane" because countries like Sweden and Luxembourg have far more restrictive gun laws and are much safer because of it. The US has the highest murder rate in the "developed world" — presumably because of its lax guns laws —we are told again and again.

Few people who repeat this mantra have any standard in their heads of what exactly is the "developed" world. They just repeat the phrase because they have learned to do so. They never acknowledge that when factors beyond per capita GDP are considered, it makes little sense to claim Sweden should be compared to the US, but not Argentina.  Such assertions ignore immense differences in culture, size, politics, history, demographics, or ethnic diversity. Comparisons with mono-ethnic Asian countries like Japan and Korea make even less sense.

But for an illustration of where this sort of thinking leads, let's look at this Washington Post article titled  “The U.S. has far more gun-related killings than any other developed country.”
 
After mistakenly using the "gun related" killings rate instead of the murder rate (see below) the author, Max Fisher, carefully construct his comparisons so as to emphasize the gun deaths rate (which is implied to be as good as the murder rate) in the US. 
 
As usual, no reason is given as to why the US should only be compared to “developed” countries, but then Fisher proceeds to add a few non-traditional comparisons to drive home the point as to how violent the US truly is, in his view.
 
Fisher adds Bulgaria, Turkey, and Chile, which are middle-income countries. And that lets him make this graph: 
 
 
Why Turkey and Chile and Bulgaria? Well, those countries are OECD members, and many who use the "developed country" moniker often use the OECD members countries as a de facto list of the "true" developed countries. Of course, membership in the OECD is highly political and hardly based on any objective economic or cultural criteria.

But if you're familiar with the OECD, you'll immediately notice a problem with the list Fisher uses. Mexico is an OECD country. So why is Mexico not in this graph? Well, it's pretty apparent that Mexico was left off the list because to do so would interfere with the point Fisher is trying to make. After all, Mexico — in spite of much more restrictive gun laws — has a murder rate many times larger than the US. 

But Fisher has what he thinks is a good excuse for his manipulation here.  According to Fisher, the omission is because Mexico “has about triple the U.S. rate due in large part to the ongoing drug war.”

Oh, so every country that has drug war deaths is exempt? Well, then I guess we have to remove the US from the list.

 
But, of course, the US for some mysterious reason must remain on the list, so, by “developed” country, Fisher really means “ a country that’s on the OECD list minus any country with a higher murder rate than the US.”
 
At this point, we're reminded that Fisher (and no one else I’ve ever seen) has made a case for what special magic it is that makes the OECD list the one list of countries to which the US shall be compared. 
 
More Realistic Comparisons Involve a Broader View of the World
 
Why not use the UN’s human development index instead? That would seem to make at least as much sense if we’re devoted to looking at “developed countries.” 
 
So, let’s do that. Here we see that the OECD’s list contains Turkey, Bulgaria, Mexico, and Chile. So, if we're honest with ourselves, that must mean that other countries with similar human development rankings are also suitable for comparisons to the US. 
 
Well, Turkey and Mexico have HDI numbers at .75. So, let’s include other countries with HDI numbers either similar or higher. That means we should include The Bahamas, Argentina, Costa Rica, Cuba, Panama, Uruguay, Venezuela, Russia, Lithuania, Belarus, Estonia, and Latvia. 
 
You can see where this is going. If we include countries that have HDI numbers similar to — or at least as high as — OECD members Turkey and Mexico, we find that the picture for the United States murder rate looks very different (correctly using murder rates and not gun-deaths rates):
Wow, that US sure has a pretty low murder rate compared to all those countries that are comparable to some OECD members.  In fact, Russia, Costa Rica and Lithuania have all been invited to begin the process of joining the OECD (Russia is on hold for obvious political reasons).  But all those countries have higher murder rates than the US. (I wonder what excuse Fisher will manufacture for leaving off those countries after they join the OECD.)
 
Things get even more interesting if we add American states with low murder rates.
 
And why not include data from individual states? It has always been extremely imprecise and lazy to talk about the “US murder rate” The US is an immense country with a lot of variety in laws and demographics. (Mexico deserves the same analysis, by the way.) Many states have murder rates that place them on the short list of low-crime places in the world. Why do we conveniently ignore them? The US murder rate is being driven up by a few high-murder states such as Maryland, Louisiana, South Carolina, Delaware, and Tennessee. In the spirit of selective use of data, let's just leave those states out of it, and look at some of the low-crime ones: 
 
 
We see that OECD members Chile and Turkey have murder rates higher than Colorado. Perhaps they should try adopting Colorado’s laws and allow sale of handguns and semi-automatic rifles to all non-felon adults. That might help them bring their murder rates down a little.
 
But you know that’s not the conclusion we're supposed to come to.Comparisons can never work in that direction. The comparisons should only be used to compare the US to countries with restrictive gun laws and low murder rates. Comparisons with countries that have restrictive gun laws (and/or few private guns) and murder rates similar to or higher than US rates (i.e., Latin America, the Caribbean and the Baltic States.)
 
Nevertheless, we have yet to see any objective reason why only OECD countries should be included or why countries similar in the HDI to Turkey and Mexico should be excluded.
 
But before we wrap up, let’s look at the murder rates in all these countries alongside the number of civilian guns per 100 residents. (The x axis is civilian guns per 100 residents, and the y axis is murder rates in x per 100,000.)
 
Here’s the scatter plot:
 
Obviously, the US is big outlier in terms of guns per capita. But in terms of murder rate, it’s very much in the middle of these countries. 
 
Things look even better for some areas of the US. If I include low-crime states, we get this (The x axis is civilian guns per 100 residents and y axis is murder rate in x per 100,000):
 
Of course, if I added countries like Switzerland and Sweden, you’d see many more dots here near Bulgaria with low gun totals and very low murder rates. 
 
But as no reason has ever been given as to why we should only compare to Western Europe,. Let’s compare the US to the rest of the Americas for a more realistic picture of the world beyond the OECD. When we do that, we get: 
 
By comparison, the US look downright pacific. And why should not this comparison be made?
Indeed, it makes more sense to compare the US to other states in the  Americas than to Europe or Japan. The US and most Latin American countries were settled in similar time periods. They are frontier countries settled mostly by European immigrants that displaced a native population (to varying degrees), and most of them gained independence from European imperial nations in a similar time period. They tend to have ethnically diverse populations, and many have been impacted by the slave trade that ended in the 19th century. 
 
European countries share very few of these qualities in common with the US. 
 
So, it would seem that the old diktat of “thou shalt only compare US murder rates to the approved 'developed' countries" is based on really no objective standard at all. And we should stop doing it.
 
If we’re honestly trying to evaluate the nature of crime and violence in a comparative atmosphere, we cannot limit ourselves to a handful of countries that have very little in common with the US beyond a handful of economic indicators.
 
*  *  *
A Note on the Data: 

Gun ownership levels are based on the Small Arms Survey data. This takes into account "registered" vs. "unregistered" civilian gun ownership in the countries surveyed.  Murder rates come from UNODC data.

State by state data in the US is usually presented as a percentage of residents who are gun owners. worldwide, however, gun ownership is presented as numbers of guns per 100 residents. I attempted to make the two lists compatible by taking the percentage of gun owners and adjusting it to reflect the fact that there are about 2.8 guns per gun owner in the US (using Small Arms Survey Data for the US). Thus, in Wyoming, for example, we end up with a number of more than 130 guns per 100 residents.
 
Now, let's address the bait-and-switch of using "gun-related killings" versus homicides, that is often used. These numbers include accidents and suicides. But of course, the reason most people are concerned about gun violence is because of homicides. Many people commit suicides with ropes and cars, but we don't talk about banning ropes and cars. Moreover, many people die from accidents involving power tools, ladders, and other items. Again, we don't talk about banning those things. The other statistic often used is "gun-related deaths." This also ignores the fact that the whole point of gun control (in the minds of most of the public) is to bring down the murder rate. It would be irresponsible to bring down gun murders and then ignore the overall murder rate.  After all, if the "gun murder" rate goes down, but the murder rate remains unchanged, then we find that little has been accomplished. It stands to reason that few murdered people think in their last moments "gee, at least I wasn't murdered with a gun."

 

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Fri, 10/16/2015 - 17:54 | 6677089 TeamDepends
TeamDepends's picture

We capped some folks.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:01 | 6677108 -.-
-.-'s picture

I want to see Chicago's historical murder rates versus that of the same world leader's for some entertainment and patriotism.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:30 | 6677202 NoDebt
NoDebt's picture

I often have to cringe when I read or hear well researched, logical articles like this really excellent piece, above.  

That's because none of this matters.  The elites don't give a crap about gun homicide rates and never have.  That is, once again, the lie wrapped around the real motive.  Like with "climate change" or "healthcare" or any number of hundreds of agendas that have little to do with making life better for US citizens and everything to do with CONTROLING THE POPULATION.

I'm not sure why some people still think that gun rights will be successfully defended in this way.  The government will eventually take our guns because it will HAVE TO in order to impose the kind of iron-fisted control we are headed for.  THEY will be the only ones allowed to be armed because THEY will have to do some really nasty shit to us to hold onto that level of control.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:46 | 6677259 greenskeeper carl
greenskeeper carl's picture

I agree nodebt. and why can't this guy just say what all of us(him too, probably) already know- none of those other countries have 50 million black people and a bunch of illegals. pretty simple.and you are right. Gun control is about 'control' a lot more than it is about 'guns'. Id hate to be an ATF agent going door to door taing people's guns. I really find it hard to imagine many of the small town sheriffs going along with this, which means the feds gotta come do it. Not gonna gin up a lot of support from the locals in rural America doing that. Big cities, ya, youre fucked. But there are too many angry people to go around taking their guns. Too many will get shot, and after enough of that, the feds charged with doing this are going to start thinking that going door to door confiscating guns from innocent people isn't how they want to die. I know a lot of people say 'you can have my guns when you pry them from my cold dead fingers' and most of them don't mean it. But if just a couple thousand do, it would be a blood bath.

 

And as far as this well written article goes, as true as all of this is, its irrelevent to me. A means to defend myself is my natural right. What type of gun I chose to own for that purpose is no one's business but my own, so I really don't care what any of these numbers say

 

 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:36 | 6677410 Stuck on Zero
Stuck on Zero's picture

The best way to compare murder rates between countries is on a long time scale.  Look at the last hundred years.  European countries absolutely top the list for murder rates.  Think Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, Stalin, ...

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:13 | 6677509 TBT or not TBT
TBT or not TBT's picture

But that was governments killing people with guns.  Completely different and off topic.  /sarc

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:21 | 6677722 cheka
cheka's picture

from another zh article:

5 percent of the zip codes do 75% of gun crime

demographics don't lie

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:51 | 6677817 espirit
espirit's picture

Eliminate the outliers, and it's closer to 90%.

(mental illness is unpredictable)

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:37 | 6678782 TongueStun
TongueStun's picture

AMERICA DOES NOT HAVE A GUN PROBLEM, AMERICA HAS A VIOLENT KNEEGROW PROBLEM....

 

Take away the violent kneegrow trash Sons of the Obowelmovement, and America has the lowest gun violence of any country in the world.....

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 05:40 | 6681351 mkkby
mkkby's picture

THE WORLD has a violent nigger problem, not just the US.

Name one black country (hell, even a neighborhood) that isn't a crime infested slum.  You can't.

Same with spics.  Look at the list of top 50 cities for murder.  They are all in S America, Africa and US with large black populations.

Support Trump closing the border and deporting illegals.  Big step toward reducing crime.

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 09:30 | 6681528 jenniewadeguy
jenniewadeguy's picture

Definitely a lesser hominoid incompatible with most other human types, they are.  Very low IQs with a higher athletic propensity about their bodies.  Different, and especially destructive when misplaced in cognitively-aspired societies.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 15:56 | 6679918 californiagirl
californiagirl's picture

Big Pharma kills more people than guns in the U.S.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:54 | 6677286 A Lunatic
A Lunatic's picture

The tragedy of it all is the glaring fact that RIGHTS do not have to be defended, yet here we are......

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:58 | 6677295 Squid-puppets a...
Squid-puppets a-go-go's picture

oh, contrair, no debt. Just as with their orchestrated chaos in iraq/syria/libya etc, they love the idea of americas lower and middle classes engaging in a slow burn ok-corall

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:22 | 6677368 Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill's picture

They plan to Balkanize the US, so a new civil war is exactly what they want.

Aside from tha Oath of Allegance,words I have never spoken, thats rammed down kids throats

at school here, there really is nothing holding the US together as one nation.Four or five

distinctive country's in truth, banded together under manifest destiny, ie imperialism almost from

its inception.Slitting them apart will be easy for the NWO, and well in progress.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:28 | 6677383 WillyGroper
WillyGroper's picture

I too, have thought Balkanization was the plan.

It's going to get real interesting to watch the crybaby libs when TSHF.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 07:50 | 6678712 Arnold
Arnold's picture

The invention of new meanings for old words is Job 1 for the first responder .

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 23:04 | 6678065 joeyman9
joeyman9's picture

That really nasty shit will have to be used to confiscate those guns they want. 

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:20 | 6678755 TonyRUs
TonyRUs's picture

NoDebt, I am constantly thinking this exactly: The logical reasonable argument doesn’t matter, because it wastes valuable time debating the lie. But face it, we have to convince as many of the sheeple as we can-- those starting to question. Most of us were also there at some point, and the logical argument is the first step for many. It says 1. They are wrong, but more importantly, 2. They are being dishonest in their argument, leading to the question 3. Why? We do still (barely) have a country where the people could rise up tomorrow and put a stop to this, although i've long since lost hope.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:31 | 6678775 Jeffersonian Liberal
Jeffersonian Liberal's picture

NoDebt --

Excellent points. The puppetmasters put Obama in power for several agenda items: Socialist medicine, amnesty for millions of illegals (which means guaranteed electoral victories for the Dems/Socialists ad infinitum, regardless of what they do), to destroy the economy through deficit spending as much as possible, and for several social issues intended (regardless of whether you support them) to weaken the fabric of our culture.

The puppetmasters have already chosen Hilary! They can get her into office using the same M.O. they used for Obama: It's Historic! This is the first Black/Woman POTUS.

Hilary's two goals will be twofold: to continue what Obama has started and to destroy the 2nd Amendment.

She will use, "It's time for some common sense from a woman, a mother, a grandmother. Guns are a relic of the oppressive, racist, bigoted, misogynist, adolescent patriarchy. IT'S TIME FOR A CHANGE!"

The mindless sheep will line up behind her and within the first year, the state-run media will have successfully changed the argument from magazine capacity and background checks to federal buyback programs and outright banning/confiscation.

Because you are right. Their goal is CONTROL.

One man with a gun can control 100 without one. That line came straight from their ultimate mentor (Lenin).

A lot here refer to the US as being the USSA, and there is some truth in that because our Dear Leaders have succesfully implemented so much soviet-style totalitarianism (see Stuart Chase's "Free Enterprise into X").

But if you folks think the USSA is a horror now, you have no idea how bad it can get. Talk to some Russians in this country who fled the USSR.

Do NOT give up your guns.

And don't engage in their straw-man arguments. Simply tell them, if you don't believe in guns, don't have one (just like the left says about abortion) and 'from my cold dead hands.'

Our Founding Fathers enshrined the God-given (not government-permitted) inalienable right to KEEP and BEAR arms for one primary reason: to prevent tyranny in government.

Hilary! is a perfect example of the tyrant that they warned us about.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:36 | 6677411 Bay of Pigs
Bay of Pigs's picture

Best I can do for you on Chicago's numbers. 34,453 (total homicides from 1965-2015).

http://heyjackass.com/enlightening-commentary/numbers-game/

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:54 | 6677837 venturen
venturen's picture

if you account for race...the whites of America are below most white european countries

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:37 | 6678783 Jeffersonian Liberal
Jeffersonian Liberal's picture

True. If you remove blacks from the stats, the murder rate among whites in the US is the same as Belgium.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:23 | 6678548 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

First of all if you remove negroids and Hispanics from the American crime stats we are not a particularly violent or high crime nation.  Secondly I would rather live a riskier life of freedom than be enslaved and defenseless like most of the world.  Did you know that thousands of young British girls were systematically gang raped, enslaved, and pimped out for over a decade in England and parents were helpless to stop them?  Why?  Because the police didn't give a fuck and they had no weapons so what could they do?  In America this would never happen because if the police didn't brutally deal with scum like that then the father, brothers, uncles, and friends of the family would show up to the shitbag's house with rifles and kill every mother fucker there.

That's one thing that gets overlooked when talking about the supposed "brutality" of American police and the lengthy prison sentences dished out by the American penal system - American citizens are free men and able to take revenge upon those that have wronged them using firearms.  If your daughter were brutally beaten and raped and the perp got 1 year in jail and 1 year probation like they do in Europe (and that's a "harsh" sentence for such a crime in Europe) would you feel that justice were served?  Or would you be waiting for the shitbag to get out of prison to put him in the ground?  I know my answer.

European style socialism and weak penal system was only tenable when Europe was made up of white nations with ethnically, culturally, and linguistically homogeneous populations.  We are already witnessing the break down of European socialism as the Muslim and African invaders rampage across the continent.  Rape of European women is not a crime at all in Europe and is both under reported and perpetrators are hardly ever punished.  They are also lowering the age of consent in England to avoid having to punish Muslims for raping 10 year old girls.  This is a fact.

Which of these sounds preferable to you?  A land where people can defend themselves and those they care about or a land where people are left defenseless while the police and authorities turn a blind eye as their nations are overrun with violent foreign invaders?

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:14 | 6678743 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

We don't need gun control, we need nigger control.  Don't believe me? Think that's racist?

I submit for your review, one Colin Flaherty :https://www.youtube.com/user/ColinFlaherty712/videos?view=0&shelf_id=1&s...

Take out  all US cities with high percentages of dindus from US murder stats adnd they look like Norway.

Our politically correct author here barely touched on it when he mentioned 'certain states'. But he dare not mention black violent crime rates that are dramatically out of proprotion with their percenatage of the popluation.  13% of Americans. More murders, rapes, welfare, illegitimage kids, HS dropouts, VD carriers, illiterates, and welfare recipients than any other demographic numerically (not proportionally), despite being 13%.

Take them out and our national rankings look more like a civilized country.

Leave them in and they drag the whole place down to 2nd world/bordeline 3rd world numbers.  Point blank:  Yes blacks are THAT bad.  In every measurable context.

America:  Get with the pogrom if you want a safer, kinder, gentler, and more intelligent country. Otherwise watch our shithead government continue to feed and house these 'people' that victimize those of us who do play by the rules, and watch that population grow while ours shrinks. All the while telling us whites everything is our fault, and that clearly if we just give MOAR it will all be better.  I say fuck that.

What kind of future do you want for your kids? One that looks like Zimbabwe/South Africa/Rwanda, or one that looks more like Switzerland.

I'm going for Switzerland.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 10:30 | 6679029 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Amen.  I grew up in a black neighborhood in a black city in a black county.  I know all about them.  Only people that have grown up in some well off white area can be naive about the nature of these creatures.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:04 | 6678729 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

UP == I will comply with President Hillary's executive order to turn in all rifles and handguns.

DOWN -- Who is this Hillary bitch and what fucking right does she have to tell me to do anything.

 

 

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:04 | 6678730 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

downed myself, of course.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:25 | 6677125 Normalcy Bias
Normalcy Bias's picture

Damn! I had no idea that Belize had the 5th highest murder rate in the world.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:39 | 6677417 Stuck on Zero
Stuck on Zero's picture

Belize is a really sweet country.  Full of Amish.  The middle part of the country near the coast is unfortunately a no-mans land inhabited by drug cartels.  I'd recommend a visit.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:11 | 6677139 mechanized
mechanized's picture

Well, this is pretty funny.  The takeaway here is that since the US is such an outlier in gun violence it's just unfair to compare it to first world developed nations, so let's not!  Why, it's much closer by OECD standards to.. Venezuela.  Seriously, does that sit well?  The Richest And Free-est Country In The World?  It shouldn't.

Forget the fact that all those "less violent" countries have gun control, let's focus on the fact that so does Mexico!

The argument about Chicago is a straw man since if the gun control laws don't apply nationally there is basically no point.  Same as it's legal to buy weed in Colorado but there's nothing stopping somebody from driving to Michigan with it.  There's nothing stopping people from buying a trunkful of weapons and driving to Chicago.  In both cases the cardinal rule would be:  Don't Get Caught.

Confirmation bias at its best.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:27 | 6677182 salvadordaly
salvadordaly's picture

Everyone is losing focus on the real issue.

 

#BANNAILGUNSNOW

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:29 | 6677759 NoDebt
NoDebt's picture

Hey.  Hey!  You can have my nailgun when you pry it from my cold, dead fingers.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 03:36 | 6678452 o r c k
o r c k's picture

Ah, shoot.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:14 | 6677350 OpenThePodBayDoorHAL
OpenThePodBayDoorHAL's picture

Let's just count the states that have low rates, and let's exclude certain races, and let's exclude murders by gangs, and then let's compare it all just to countries that happen to be in the right hemisphere.

Oh OK now I feel safe. Wait: I feel safe because I live in Australia.

My sons go to the pub, they know they might have a punch up. But they also know the guy won't have a gun down his pants, or in his car. They go to school. They go to the mall. They go to the movie theater. No guns.

Oh and by the way they both own guns and love to hunt.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:52 | 6677444 Head_Shots_Work
Head_Shots_Work's picture

BTW - where is all of your minorities? Oh - that's right - never mind. Austrailia is just SO much like the US. You fucks have no idea what we deal with here. We have white brain dead crack head 14 year olds murdering their grandparents so that they can use a credit card. We have roving black and mexican gangs that will kill ANYONE in the way of their drug deals. Prison to them is a badge of honor. The rest of the worlds pussies don't have a clue - you have to be an aware fighter in the US. 

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:28 | 6678558 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Europe is in the process of learning some harsh lessons about the savagery that American whites have been dealing with for hundreds of years.  They look at us with scorn because they see us as violent but they are learning that white men can't be soft in an environment full of savage predators.  They are being brutalized across the continent by invading hordes of Africans and Muslims.  The mass rape of European women can't be quantified, because it is under reported and the police do nothing about it.  The few times a perp is caught and tried they get probation or maybe 1 year in jail.  Hardly punishment at all.

Any white man in America that isn't armed at ALL TIMES is a sheep ready to be slaughtered.  I can't imagine how a white man could make it to 20 years old and not know this, but then again, I didn't grow up in a gated white community.  I lived with these animals all my life.

Australia should prepare itself for a mass influx of European and American whites fleeing from the genocides taking place in North America and Europe.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:18 | 6678750 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

What Europe needs to do is two things:

1. Hear the voices of their ancestors

2. Justice:  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SJSVsGHT4vY

We can send y'all the build instructions for Mississipi windchimes (TM). You can create your own variations.  It's lots of fun!

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 23:09 | 6678070 joeyman9
joeyman9's picture

Americans have guns because it's the last check on govt power.  Once that's gone the full bore police state and all its crime in inevitable.  Our govt is much like that of the Vichey French - it's pack full of fellow countrymen working for foreign powers and corporations.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 07:57 | 6678719 Arnold
Arnold's picture

Much worse than Vichey, Daily Democrat talking points.

 

 

(shooting ourselves in the foot)

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:25 | 6678766 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

"Once that's gone the full bore police state and all its crime in inevitable"

That's not going to get done.

Maybe the blue hive dwellers will submit, but they don't have enough soldiers and police to do anything but stamp their feet and act angry out  here in flyover land, because us rednecks simply do not give a fuck what all the milquetoast city libs care about or want. Why they 'care' so much about us is also a mystery.

It's easy for city dwelling non-milquetoasts to get caught up in the feminized group think and start to believe 'everybody supports gun control/confiscation'.

But that is merely a symptom of living in the midst of large numbers of mentally ill people insistinng the sky is green and calling you crazy for saying otherwise.

When you leave the blue hives, it's amazing how fast that operant conditining and groupthink burn off like so much morning fog in the face of a blistering sun. You will then see that the sky is indeed blue, and others around you will affirm that simple truth.

Once the fog lifts you'll never be able to live in a blue hive again, and you'll never be able to take blue hive ideas seriously again.

You'll just want to tell them to fuck off and continue their buggery, but leave us the fuck alone you goddamnl feminist neckbeard fedora wearing manginas.

WE ARE NOT YOU.

And if you think you can step to this, I think you're going to learn a painful lesson about 'what everybody believes' and how much power your God, the government, actually has.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:32 | 6678553 geoffb
geoffb's picture

We aren't the richest or the freest anymore and haven't been for a while. In case you haven't noticed our country and Constitution have been gutted. The Chicago argument is the lament of all failed central planners, if only we could have implemented it more completely. Guess what, if your system sucks, its because it doesn't work, not because those stupid proles aren't doing it right by going along with your every machination. And speaking of confirmation bias, what the Mexico and the non-violent states show you is that the correllation between gun control and safety is not real. Its propaganda for mushheads who don't think very hard about their own assumptions.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 09:07 | 6678816 N2OJoe
N2OJoe's picture

I think you miss the point geoffb. The plan is working perfectly, it's just that the goals are not what they tell you the goals are.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:14 | 6677145 Implied Violins
Implied Violins's picture

If you were to include police data, however, we'd lead the known world.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:14 | 6677146 Government need...
Government needs you to pay taxes's picture

Who'd a thunk it?  Asian nations, full of ethnic asians have lower murder rates than nations full of caucasians, who have lower murder rates than nations full of hispanics, who have lower murder rates than nations full of niggers.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:19 | 6677154 knukles
knukles's picture

That's facualist

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:17 | 6677523 TBT or not TBT
TBT or not TBT's picture

Pol Pot, Ho Chi Min, Mao, Tojo....

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:29 | 6677551 Zero Point
Zero Point's picture

When the President does it, that means that it's not illegal.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 03:37 | 6678454 o r c k
o r c k's picture

Ronald McDonald.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:15 | 6677148 RedDwarf
RedDwarf's picture

Our murder rate drops to European levels when you exclude gang murders anyway.  It's all war on drugs stuff as noted in the article.  Britain just has a bunch of knife related murderst instead which is why they have their stupid knife regulation and prohibition laws.  The Left cares about growing State power and disarming the citizens, not about stopping violence and lowering murder rates.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:20 | 6677157 knukles
knukles's picture

Hah!  Just you wait a few for the EU to catch up to the US and surpass the Middle East!
Plus, gang related murders are by and large good as they count toward Darwin Awards

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:04 | 6677484 Hook Line and S...
Hook Line and Sphincter's picture

Never happen, we got the 'force' on our side. 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:21 | 6677533 TBT or not TBT
TBT or not TBT's picture

The dark side of the force operates mostly on the dark side of town.  

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:23 | 6677732 cheka
cheka's picture

lincoln was right

about liberia

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 03:42 | 6678459 undertow1141
undertow1141's picture

How does US gun violence compare to Liberia I wonder?

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:21 | 6677159 mechanized
mechanized's picture

The cognitive dissonance is strong here.  The Right has done a far greater job in growing state power.  I'll cite the Department of Homeland Security as the first shining example.  Could tack on illegal domestic NSA wiretaps for good measure but hey, don't want your head to explode *too* hard.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 00:21 | 6678240 WOAR
WOAR's picture

This is not about Right or Left.

Both support Tyranny.

Sic Semper Tyrannis.

In other words, kill them all.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:21 | 6677160 Normalcy Bias
Normalcy Bias's picture

Yep. Even if the statists were to achieve their fantasy of disarming the law abiding population, criminals would still have access to smuggled firearms, or they'd just use blades or blunt objects to murder.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:22 | 6677161 knukles
knukles's picture

What happens when caliber is taken into account?

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:31 | 6677207 daxtonbrown
daxtonbrown's picture

The glaring omission is not to compare gun death rates by race, since we are multi-culti. In that case we are as low as any developed country.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:30 | 6678773 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

Pointing out black failurses is simply not allowed in any mainstream US media.  It is never their fault. It is always white racism to blame for every black failure. Failure to fit in, failure to be civilized.

Black America: One massive clusterfuck of FAIL that no one can ever point out. Because 'dat rayciss'.

I point it out all the time. Facts cannot themselves be racist. Blacks on the other hand are quite racist. You know this if you've ever lived around them in large numbers (no not that one black kid in your all white highschool).

Sticks and stones bitches, sticks and stones.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:57 | 6677228 Mercury
Mercury's picture

(see above)

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:46 | 6677262 PoasterToaster
PoasterToaster's picture

The mistake is in the way they blend the very few high crime areas with 300 million other people.  Statistics for propagandists.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:47 | 6677264 Manipuflation
Manipuflation's picture

That is great that Idaho is on the list.  I was fairly heavily armed when there recently.  The wife tried to pick up my bag and couldn't.  She asked what was in my bag that was so heavy.  Well, it was full of magazines of ammunition, a Springfield Armory 45 and a large Bowie knife.  The AK was in the trunk and the Smith and Wesson J-frame was in the unlocked glove box and loaded. (just in case)  I kind of forgot they were there because there was no need to ever use them against any people I encountered.

I had never been to Montana/Idaho before but it was reasonable to surmise that everyone out there is heavily armed.  They are so armed and I saw some trucks with gun racks in the back window.  That is outstanding.  That won't work in New York City.  I think it is more for protecting their cattle from bears and such then anything else and that makes sense to me.  It really is not about who has the biggest balls, it is just that you need tools and a gun is a tool.  There is no "What up gangsta" shit going on out there if you know what I mean and I think you do.  

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:01 | 6677314 Squid-puppets a...
Squid-puppets a-go-go's picture

i do think i know what you mean, but it still kinda seems to me ur bringing a monster truck to a billy cart race

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:58 | 6677468 Manipuflation
Manipuflation's picture

That is cool.  I was probably overarmed for the situation.  I would rather have too many guns with me than not enough.  The thing about Montana and Idaho is that you had best bring what you might need because you can not just run to the store to buy more of anything because there are few stores.  You are on your own.  I do not want to die for lack of shooting back to borrow from "Unforgiven".  I didn't even bring my M1A or anything else.  

That is not the way people are out there.  I didn't need any guns.  Perhaps that is because everyone has guns and they do not fuck with each other.  No one fucked with me.  I didn't fuck with anyone.  You know, like it should be and they have a very low murder rate.  I will tell you this:  It might be 2015 but it is not 2015 out there and it sure as hell is not New York city, LA or Chicago.        

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:21 | 6677535 Squid-puppets a...
Squid-puppets a-go-go's picture

nice to have a respectful difference of opinion

it can be a bit disconcerting when gun proponents act really twitchy on the first hint of detraction.

anyway, I'm in australia, who am i to say what works in the slow burning theatre of civil war that is america?

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:14 | 6677697 espirit
espirit's picture

I'm seriously thinking of leaving 'Cuba Libre'  for 'Freedom north' or Texas south, can't decide which.

Is it easier to stay warm or stay cool?

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:25 | 6677743 cheka
cheka's picture

stay away from big city texas.  same as being in any other collectivist sh-thole.

tx heat sux from mid june until mid sept.  the rest of the year is great

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:28 | 6677754 Manipuflation
Manipuflation's picture

I have a couple friends in Texas and they are about ready to leave.  That is all I know.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:26 | 6677749 Manipuflation
Manipuflation's picture

I thought Cuba Libre was a cigar brand?

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:24 | 6677735 Manipuflation
Manipuflation's picture

I get along most folks from around the world.  We have derailed here in the U.S..  It is not guns that did it though.  It sure as hell was no VW either.  It is all financial.  I have the benefit of being a redneck country boy with a Russian wife, no debt, and three cycles of political experience.  I have plenty of guns and ammo but I don't see the need to deploy them right now but it is close.  I will try politics one more time.  I can't do it alone though.  I do not even know if it would matter.

Perhaps that should be my campaign slogan:  "It may not matter in the end but I have guns too and I am taking you with me on the way to Hell".  

Peace my new Aussie friend.        

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:54 | 6677265 Mercury
Mercury's picture

MOSTLY (even more) BULLSHIT

And why not include data from individual states? It has always been extremely imprecise and lazy to talk about the “US murder rate” The US is an immense country with a lot of variety in laws and demographics.

That's the spirit!...but let's see, where is this article obviously not going in its pursuit of greater accuracy via more granular data?

Can we look at violent crime stats in the US by ethnicity? Yes!....well, we used to but the most transparent administration in history has made that much harder to do.

After Obama took office the Dept. of Justice stopped publishing crime stats by ethnicity - but early 2000s data is still out there. (data is trailing so most recent when Obama took office is 2005 I think).

Bottom line: huge swaths of the US populace tend not to murder each other any more frequently than Europeans do.

 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:27 | 6677753 cheka
cheka's picture

indeed.  in many US urban areas blacks/mexicans are responsible for 95 plus percent of violent crime

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:33 | 6678778 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

But you must never point that out.  You are only allowed to acknowledge white racism as the cause.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:51 | 6677275 A Lunatic
A Lunatic's picture

The higher the murder rate the more I see a need to be armed. These people really are insane.....

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:51 | 6677280 Catullus
Catullus's picture

You also have to remove war-related gun deaths. Because if you included those, Europe has had like 50 million gun-related deaths in the past 100 years. You're still more likely to be killed by governments wielding guns than anything else. Switzerland still being a very nice outlier in all this.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 18:56 | 6677289 flaunt
flaunt's picture

So can we finally stop correlating murder rates with gun ownership rates?  I am a huge fan of people having whatever weapons their hearts desire, and it would be great if we could focus on the real root drivers of murder rates which appear to be mostly related to social and economic status. The scatter plot showing the states with varying levels of gun ownership and equally low murder rates says it all. 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:01 | 6677656 TBT or not TBT
TBT or not TBT's picture

Social and economic status, in turn, correlates strongly to banned racist correlations. 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:01 | 6677298 papaswamp
papaswamp's picture

Compare US states with the same homogeneity as Australia.
US gun murder rate in those states 0.98 per 100k ..Australia 1.3 per 100k. Certainly the UK rate is substantially lower...but their assault rate is magnitudes higher.
In other words...in countries where criminals know no chance of retaliation...they run rough over the citizens.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CQqDe7UUkAA8iZy?format=pjpg&name=large

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:33 | 6678565 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Europe is no place for the weak these days.  You don't want to be a woman alone on the streets of any European city these days.  Nor do you want to be elderly or physically weak.  The Africans and Muslims are manhandling, raping, and rampaging across all of Europe right now. 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:02 | 6677315 atlasRocked
atlasRocked's picture

Liberals NEVER honestly present data comparisons, they are mass liars - the popularity of Obama and Hillary, serial liars, are proof.  

In my book, Atlas Shouts, I expose just how big a liars they are - and the fiscal lies they share with the republicans.

25 reviews, 5.0 stars for honesty and brevity.

http://www.amazon.com/dp/1458217566 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:03 | 6677318 Neochrome
Neochrome's picture

"correctly using murder rates and not gun-deaths rates"

Because everyone knows police don't murder people, so according to this logic US has tamest police force in the world...

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:03 | 6677319 Skip
Skip's picture

The bottom line is this:

Marvin Harris, one of the world's most noted anthropologists, wrote a book in 1980. This title was previously available as America Now: The Anthropology of a Changing Culture. New York: Simon & Schuster. The new title is Why Nothing Works: The Anthropology of Daily Life 1981.

In the chapter titled: Why There's Terror on the Streets, he demonstrates that American White men have violent crime rates LOWER than English in England and the Japanese in Japan. So why does America have such a high level of violent crime? Dr Harris puts it quite plainly: Blacks and Hispanics. That's the story. He also pointed out that the average gun owner is a middle-aged, middle class White guy.

THE WALKING DEAD And Katrina: The “Zombie Apocalypse” Already Happened—And Can Happen Again
By Paul Kersey October 12, 2015

After all, in a story largely reported only in foreign media, European and Australian tourists banded together with white Americans to survive the violent attacks by blacks inside the Superdome—sounding exactly like Night of the Living Dead. [EXCLUSIVE:BRITS’ HELL INSIDE THE TERROR DOME, Daily Mirror, September 2, 2005]

And this may be why TWD is so strangely subversive, despite the window dressing of its multicultural cast. As they said in Fear the Walking Dead, “When civilization ends, it ends fast.”

We saw just that with Hurricane Katrina. And the illusions of egalitarianism fade just as quickly.

It’s the oldest lesson of any zombie film: It’s not the dead you must fear, but the living.

And America’s current obsession with fictitious walking corpses reflects a deep and widely shared unease about the savagery in our midst—the terrible violence our rulers are either powerless to stop, or eager to allow.

THEY want American Whites DISARMED so that THEY can do to Whites what they did to the Czar and his family and TWENTY MILLION White Russians according to Khrushchev. These are BOLSHEVIKS in power in the USSA.

I think it behooves each and every single one of us, AND OUR FAMILIES, to join the NRA.

http://www.nrahq.org/

Because the Bolsheviks are prepared to do their WORST and believe me, that is TOO TERRIBLE to contemplate.

Americans never give up your guns By Stanislav Mishin

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:44 | 6677800 Cornfedbloodstool
Cornfedbloodstool's picture

I have read Harris' "Cannibals and Kings" and recommend it highly. Explores such topics as the origin of war and origin of the nobility.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:54 | 6677838 MalteseFalcon
MalteseFalcon's picture

Bingo, but the NRA is too soft.

GOA.  No compromise.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:34 | 6678566 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

The Bolsheviks want to genocide all white people everywhere.  Disarmament of white Americans will simply make the U.S. completely uninhabitable for whites (see: Rhodesia, South Africa, Haiti).

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:37 | 6678784 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

I agree. But remember, it will only work if you comply.

Who didn't love the wailing and knashing of teeth by the media and radical liberal Jews after Ben Carson's comments on firearms and the Holocaust (which were right on point).

What I noticed was that no one asked the Jews for Personal Firearm Ownership had to say on the matter. Or the survivors who said the very same thing. Anybody who's done any reading about the holocaust and it's lead up in Germany, especially oral histories from surivivors already knows this.  But most Americans don't read, and thought history class was boring, so they don't know this.

Guns are bad,  Mmmmmkay. And black people are exactly like white people.  Mmmm kay.

 

 

 

 

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 22:08 | 6677324 teutonicate
teutonicate's picture

Great article ZH. I have been critical of you of late, so I wanted to make sure that I give credit where credit is due.

I have one suggestion, however; that I believe would have also been an incisive metric about the distinctions between gun-related crimes in various geographies. My metric would be gun-related crimes by ethnic group. I believe that all gun related crimes by country should be reported by the ethnic group of the perpetrator.

As politically incorrect as this may be, I think that if the author had done a breakdown of gun related crimes by ethnicity, he would find that this metric is an almost perfect predictor of gun-related crime by geography - once the ethnic composition of the geography is factored in.

The corollary of this is that one needs to compares gun-related crime in the US, committed by citizens of European descent, to crimes committed in other developed countries by citizens of European descent. In my view, this is the differentiating metric that the author ignores for obvious reason of political correctness.

An even more interesting study would result if one normalizes the gun-related crime rates based on gun ownership rates WITHIN a specific ethnic group across all nationalities. I think that this would not only reveal that gun ownership within an ethnic group REDUCES gun related violence, but it would also further support the ethnic nature of such violence.

The bottom line is that there is no evidence whatsoever that higher incidences of gun ownership within an individual ethnic group ever results in a higher incidence of gun related violent crime within that group, especially if that ethnic group is of European descent.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:36 | 6677352 chirobliss
chirobliss's picture

There is obviously no data analysis that the Mises Institute can't totally fuck up.

What utterly moronic crap!

Although, I have always thought that the libertarian holy grail the US should be compared with is Somalia, so I guess, have at it guys!

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:15 | 6677514 Questan1913
Questan1913's picture

"There is obviously no data analysis that the Mises Institute can't totally fuck up.

What utterly moronic crap!

Although, I have always thought that the libertarian holy grail the US should be compared with is Somalia, so I guess, have at it guys!"

 

Thanks for the view from Langley subfloor number four.  It would help if next time you would actually read the article you deign to comment on or be critical of but I understand that GS .01 level qualifications don't require much more than a pulse and weak squiggles on the lowest level of brain activity.  Thanks so much, for checking in at here at ZH and giving us a brief glimmer of tax dullards at work.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:48 | 6677376 Give up. Realit...
Give up. Reality is not scientific nor even mathematical.'s picture

LoL...

Yes absolutely, there are some people in the U.S. that SHOULD NOT have guns.

So, directly to the point of these gun proposed ownership limitations, let's dig out a really revealing graph, the one that shows the number of gun-homicides committed by race...

In fact, when we look at the graph that reveals the numbers of homicides by race in this country, the very next question that should jump to the fore is, how do these race-related statistics compare to the numbers of gun-homicides committed by the mentally ill?

Let's get to the truth in the matter of gun violence.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:27 | 6677548 Zoomorph
Zoomorph's picture

More like: there are some people in the U.S. that shouldn't be there.

If it's OK to punish all gun owners for the crimes of a few, it should also be OK to deport all blacks & mexicans for the crimes of more than few.

Oh right, that's "racist". We're not allowed to do anything that's not in the best interest of blacks & mexicans, and we're expected to do what's certainly not in the best interest of the whites (take away their defenses).

What an absurd world we live in.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:28 | 6677382 sethco
sethco's picture

Wow the USA has murder rates comparable to or lower than a bunch of shithole coutries. Mexico, really? It's a failed narco-state at this point. In what other ways is it comparable to these countries? Is the point of this article to point out that the USA is not exceptional? Aim high USA! haha little gun joke there.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 19:35 | 6677403 Vlad the Inhaler
Vlad the Inhaler's picture

Studies have shown that the strongest correlation with gun deaths is poverty. So of course the US has the highest gun deaths of any developed nation, we also have the most poverty. Gun deaths in America are not high because of Sandy Hook or Columbine, they are high because of Chicago, Oakland, Baltimore, DC. So if you want to stop school shootings then lay off the gun death argument already and hire some damn security guards.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 00:49 | 6678291 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

The United States has the most poverty?  WTF are you smoking?  Have you ever travelled outside the US?  FFS...  The poorest people in the US live better than most of the world's population.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:44 | 6678579 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Correct.  The average hard working "middle class" European lives far worse than even a trailer trash level poor American.  Depends on your priorities I suppose.

The trailer trash will have a big double wide trailer on an acre of land while the European will live in a 500 square foot apartment at astronomically high rents for their entire lives surrounded by Syrians and Africans that pay nothing.  Lots of road noise because there is no space to build away from roads.  Train noise.  People all around you all the time.  No chance to ever own even 1/4 an acre, let alone 1+ acres as that would cost millions and millions of dollars anywhere in Europe.  No chance to ever own a home unless your family left it to you.

Oh, but the European will have better public transportation.  Which is good, because he can't afford a car or the gas to fuel it.  The American poor redneck trailer trash will have a truck and a few recreational vehicles for fun (dirt bike, ATV, camper).  The European will be slimmer due to not being able to afford food and having to walk everywhere due to not being able to afford a car.  But the European will have "free" medical care, which again, is good, because if they are female they are going to be raped dozens of times by Muslims and brutalized in muggings etc.

Oh and most impotantly, the American will have 3+ children while the European will have 0 because they can't afford them.

Europeans are really just caged animals being milked for 60% or more of their productivity so their socialist governments can bring in tens of millions of Muslims and Africans to replace them.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:39 | 6678787 SweetDoug
SweetDoug's picture




“Studies show…”

There’s this neat trick to back up your comments called ‘posting links to your evidence’…

(STFU Swe’Doug! There’s a neat trick called ‘Look it up yerselfs!’

No… No. Actually, it doesn’t work that way.

Correlation and conclusion. I rather doubt poverty produces gun deaths beyond a vague correlation.

Never-the-less, I’m smelling wealth redistribution to fix the problem, then?

•?•
V-V

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:43 | 6678795 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

Bull fucking shit.  I live in one of the poorest areas of America, mostly white. Crime here is almost nill. Home invasions and car jackings are things we hear about from the blue hives.

Round here, kicking a door in gets you dead. Period.

I've lived here 9 years and had not one thing disappear from my shed, from my yard, or anywhere else.

Fuck that liberal bullshit about poverty.

It;s about temperment and genes.  The old sayings "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree' or "chip off the old block" exist for a reason.

People involved in animal husbandry know this well. Temprament is genetic. A mean bull will sire mean bull calfs. A mean rooster will sire mean cockerels. A mean dog et al.

Since humans are animals evolved from the same ecosystem, and closely related to other animals, how can we not be subject to the same environmentally imposed constraints?

Only liberals seem to think that what applies to 99% of mammals does not apply to humans.

You can't fix stupid.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:24 | 6677541 Nolde Huruska
Nolde Huruska's picture

Here's a stat too look at. First subtract all gun suicides (yes they are in the total), then subtract all righteous self defence shootings of all types. Now from that number subtract the total of the top 11 violent cities in the US, all of which are democrat controlled socialist utopias. You know what? There is no gun violence problem. White people shoting other white people is a statistic outlier and that number is in line with or lower "developed" countries.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 22:40 | 6677985 Vlad the Inhaler
Vlad the Inhaler's picture

You've got the cart before the horse.  Those places are run by a certain party only because even the most poor and uneducated people are still not dumb enough to vote for the other party that would love to see the return of slavery.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:07 | 6678734 Arnold
Arnold's picture

Instead of the slavery they have now you mean?

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:47 | 6678799 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

I don't want slaves.  I don't want to be resposnbile for feeding and housing large numbers of sub 90 IQ morons (we all do that now indirectly and I'd submit to you that those who are paying for it now are the enslaved).

That could be accomplished in the USA by deporting blacks back to Africa (certainly more humane than other things we COULD do if sufficiently motivated).

RIGHT.

FUCKING.

NOW.

White countries for white people.

fuck diversity.

fuck multiculturalism.

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 06:00 | 6681379 mkkby
mkkby's picture

Do not deport them to africa.  There are all ready so many there that the beautiful wildlife is in serious decline.

If you can't stomach extermination, prevent them from ever having kids.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:36 | 6677574 NoWayJose
NoWayJose's picture

Some good points, but too complex for liberals to understand!

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 23:41 | 6678155 Faeriedust
Faeriedust's picture

Nonsense.  I have been called a liberal more than once, but I am fascinated by this.  I'd love to see a further breakdown by state of guns per inhabitant versus murder rate.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 20:54 | 6677631 hannah
hannah's picture

there arent any 'facts' about guns. the powers that be will do what they want....thet is try and remove guns from the hands of people that will use them to effect change or fight tyranny. you can debate til you are blue in the face....

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:38 | 6677769 espirit
espirit's picture

Gun proponents provide defensive arguments.

Gun opponents provide offensive arguments.

Yes, it's a fucked up world. 

(don't go out after dark)

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:48 | 6678800 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

And by all means, avoid the groid

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 23:47 | 6677726 Dr. Bonzo
Dr. Bonzo's picture

Reminds me of a study attempting to compare Seattle and Vancouver back in the 90s. Supposedly Seattle had a higher homicide rate "due to guns," given that supposedly the cities were demographically similar. With one small exception. The black community in Seattle, 12% of the population, accounted for 95% of the homicides. The homicide rates for whites in Vancouver and Seattle were nearly identical, 6.2 per capita in Seattle versus 6.4 in Vancouver. Vancouver's missing ingredient was a small and violence-riddled black community.

I'd be interested to see a national study of white-only homicide figures vis-a-vis other white countries. I'd bet the homicide figures are indistinguishable.

You can't have national "discussions" on anything anymore in the US because facts keep getting in the way.

 

http://www.constitution.org/2ll/2ndschol/130jwr.pdf

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 21:48 | 6677815 painter1
painter1's picture

tl;dr, US is not a developed country. 

I'm anti-gun control but this is a stupid article. 

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:37 | 6678573 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

U.S. is a rapidly devolving nation as it is overrun by Mexicans.

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 22:03 | 6677862 luckylogger
luckylogger's picture

Thanks for the dot plots.....

Everybody should see them

it is just bullshit that they need my guns out here in the sticks of idaho to lower the murder rate in chicago.......

Befor Sanders became a candidate for Asshole in chief, he said gun control needed to be local....

Now he wants aour guns too..........

All the Dems are very scary!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Fri, 10/16/2015 - 22:12 | 6677887 mijev
mijev's picture

The article changed my perspective, which is exactly what a well written piece should do. Strange thing is if you go to the UK/Europe or Australia you'll find out that most people in the US are really well-mannered in comparison, especially young people. OTOH if you visit Singapore or China (both full of ethnic groups, especially in Singapore which is also multi religion) you'll be blown away at the lack of violence. I went out one friday night in Singapore and watched a really good 70s rock band and the audience was noisy and sweaty and drunk. At the end of the evening, I went out to get a taxi and I was almost expecting to see fights breaking out but it was tranquil. Almost disturbing.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 00:46 | 6678290 Teh Finn
Teh Finn's picture

Gun ownership in Australia is greater now than before their "ban".

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 01:32 | 6678346 Minburi
Minburi's picture

The vast majority of gun deaths in the USA are suicides.

The number of deaths in ghetto shootings far outnumber those of the highly publicized "mass shooting" incidents.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 01:48 | 6678362 Cdn1
Cdn1's picture

1) Philippine news recently disclosed that police have been FAKING murder statistics to be much less, so they can get promotions

 

2) I  worked in high crime areas in Boston for many years, and always felt a gun would just make things more unsafe for me. But I am neutral on gun control.

a) If I felt I needed a gun in the house,  I would want the right to have one...and respect others who  feel they need one.

b) Gun carrying topic seems totally bizarre. If things are so bad you feel a  need to carry a gun, radical things need to be done to change your community.

When the 2 nitwit Marathon bombers were running around they shut down  all of Boston. But with many homicides in Chicago, they don't shut down Chicago.??..strange world state to state.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 03:06 | 6678431 Iam_Silverman
Iam_Silverman's picture

"b) Gun carrying topic seems totally bizarre. If things are so bad you feel a  need to carry a gun, radical things need to be done to change your community."

 

Once again, you have formed your opinions on a lack of data.  My mother didn't understand concealed carry either.  She asked why I had a license and carried.  Her opinion was that I shouldn't go to parts of town "like that".  So, I asked her, I shouldn't go HOME?  She didn't "get it" until I showed her that statistically you were more likely to be killed by a burglar already in your home when you arrive than by any other random act of violence.  Now she understands.  You don't have to go looking for crime in order for it to find you.  But if it does come to you, be prepared to defend the lives of the ones you hold dear.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:37 | 6678569 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Not everyone has enough money to flee to the white enclaves of America.  Furthermore, why should whites have to flee ever further?  We build the cities, communities, then the savages come in and destroy everything and drive us out.  It's time to stop running.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sn4mVDtqi7g

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 09:01 | 6678811 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

the 'change in community' you speak of is off the table right now.

But history is a guide as far as making a geographic area safe for one tribe to live in peace, especially when that tribe's elderly, females, and children are being regularly vicitimized by another tribe.

It's called total war. Genocide. Ethnic cleansing.

Want safe streets in Philly? Nogs gotta go. Period. Or maybe be walled in. But something major has to change and taking my guns won't make a goddamn bit of difference.

Who in America is ready for that kind of 'community change"? You?  That's the reality that most whites inherently understand but are deathly afraid to say out loud.

I'm not afraid of the truth.

Since I can't individually  'change my community' as you suggest, I've chosen instead to live amongst my tribe, where the majority of the elderly, women, and children are perfectly safe and need not fear constant victimization by the hostile tribe.

If you choose to live in close proximity to the hostile tribe then you have to take extra measures to keep your weaker members safe, constantly be on guard, buy security systems, cameras, car alarms, and of course tolerate ubiquitous militarized police -- who ironically are more likely to hurt you than protect you.

Until we're ready to confront the real issue and solve it once and for all, nothing will change,  I'll continue to reside in my majority white area, read about blacks constantly victiminzing whites in diverse areas (where the two tribes live in close proximity), and hear the whites from those areas constantly whine about me giving up my guns to make them safer.

I have reached the conlusion that the majority of whites who live in cities are insane. They have lost touch with reality and instead live in a manufactured reality that bears little resemblance to life outside their hive bubbles.

 

 

 

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 10:39 | 6679049 Thick Willy
Thick Willy's picture

Cities have always attracted the refuse of humanity hoping to live off the fat and excess that is found there.  Weaklings, really.  I'm a big guy and it never ceases to amaze me that while I feel like a giant in the cities amongst the rats that dwell there, I am just another man among the millions like me when I go to a gun show in a rural or semi-rural area.  Strong men have little use for cities.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 04:52 | 6678511 mr coffee
mr coffee's picture

I dont see why America should compare itself to other countries ( especially the crap ones ) we are the greatest country in the world. I saw it on tv.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hBIMb5ZAY3g

 

The thing I dont get is if everyone is so tough and the government is the best and its the richest and smartest why do we keep shooting each other?

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 05:52 | 6678590 Expat
Expat's picture

If you compare America's gun death rate to the gun death rate of Polish army officers in April and May 1940 in Katyn, you will find that the US is positively peaceful and safe.

Compared to likelihood of dying from eating a kilo of finelyl ground plutonium, the odds of being shot in the US are remarkably low.

When you consider the likelihood of death by all other causes (100% probability of death!!!!), guns are the least of our worries.

Sarcasm aside, the author, while delusional, may actually be correct in saying that America is NOT part of the developed world at all.  In many ways America is simply a Third-world fascist dictatorship with better television.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 10:35 | 6679042 fishwharf
fishwharf's picture

I don't know about the better television, I quit watching it years ago, but you're certainly correct about the fascist dictatorship thingy.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 17:36 | 6680179 Chief Wonder Bread
Chief Wonder Bread's picture

-- the odds of being shot in the US are remarkably low

which is true, and I agree with most of the other comments (the ones I read). But what appears hasn't been pointed out is that the odds of dying even in violent Venezuela are remarkably low as well. Take 60 by 100,000 is .06 of 1%. If you were a native of Venezuela, and you lived to the age of 75 -- and assuming the murder rate remained constant at today's level (big assumption) -- your chances of being murdered by gun would be 4.5%. In the U.S. for the same 75-yr old, it's 1/4 of 1% overall.

A relatively large percentage of a very small percentage is still a very small percentage.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 06:02 | 6678605 tool
tool's picture

Shit look at Rwanda where you would be macheted to death(much cheaper than reloading a gun) or South Africa where they put a car tyre round your neck and set it on fire.

 

If you have to compare yourself to the absolute extremes to makes yourself feel better your completely lost!

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 09:05 | 6678814 Refuse-Resist
Refuse-Resist's picture

Somebody's projecting!

When you have to compare yourself to the other extreme (IE Japan or Norway) to justify your gun grab, then "your" completely lost.

Fuck off.

Non-anonmyous downvote.

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 08:48 | 6678798 knotjammin2
knotjammin2's picture

Remove the "Black and Hispanic" crime from the stats and the USA would have one of the lowest crime rates in the entire world.  Developed or other wise. We need to stop tap dancing around the real problem and start taking care of it.  Turn off the damn EBT cards and let's get it started!!

Sat, 10/17/2015 - 09:16 | 6678832 Dorothea Binz
Dorothea Binz's picture

And I always thought the Bahamas was supposed to be some Shangri-la.  

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 06:08 | 6681385 mkkby
mkkby's picture

NO PLACE with a large black/hispanic population is safer.  If anyone disagrees, find one and post it.

You won't find any country, city or even neighborhood - which implies it is race that matters, not economic conditions.

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 19:18 | 6683219 Expat
Expat's picture

You first, genius.  Find me a black/hispanic country or state, county, city, or neighborhood in the US where the average income is above the US median and then show me crime stats from there.

And now tell me how good blacks and hispanics have it in America and how the white man is really the oppressed minority. 

Living a racist delusion won't solve crime or economic problems, but it might give you a nice straw man to blame for your own inadequacies and failures as a citizen and as a human being.

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 02:37 | 6681224 buffed
buffed's picture

Even better comparisons have been done which measure ethnicity.  Ex: Japan vs American Japanese, African vs African American, etc.

Sun, 10/18/2015 - 02:34 | 6681225 buffed
buffed's picture

Yeaahhh!  Finally some charts on ZH I can actually understand!

Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site!