Idiots with handguns and the idiots who report on them

[Colin Parkinson]

Which is exactally why the only way to control guns like that is not to make them in the first place.  Which is what I said in my original post. 

A gun is made every 12 hrs in a small shop in a allyway in Pakistan. Any machince shop here could turn out 10-20 Sten gun type SMG's everyday. China is flooding Africa with firearms.

The ownership of firearms and permits has skyrocketed in the US, yet the Homicide rate has generally been falling over the last 10 years.

UK effectively banned guns, yet their gun crime rates continues to climb

What you suggest is about as practical as asking everyone on the planet not to breath for 2 minutes. Also you offer no proof that the absence of firearms will stop homicides, in fact guns are not the favoured choice of killers, knives and blunt objects are.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

:

 

[Roy Harding]

Almost everyone who has posted here has deviated from the original discussion.  ...

Including you.

This discussion is headed nowhere - FAST.

LOCKED, unless someone comes up with a compelling reason to re-open it.

Roy Harding
Milnet.ca Staff

 

[Roy Harding]

The originator of this thread has requested it be re-opened, with the addition of the following:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20071212.wuksamurai1212/BNStory/International/home


Britain to ban cheap samurai swords

Reuters

December 12, 2007 at 6:33 AM EST

LONDON — The government said on Wednesday it would ban the sale of samurai swords because the weapons had been used in a number of serious, high-profile attacks.

The Home Office said the swords would be added to the Offensive Weapons Order from April next year, meaning they could not be imported, sold or hired.

However collectors of genuine Japanese swords and those used by martial arts enthusiasts would be exempt from the ban.

“In the wrong hands, samurai swords are dangerous weapons,” Home Office Minister Vernon Coaker said.

“We recognize it is the cheap, easily available samurai swords which are being used in crime and not the genuine more expensive samurai swords which are of interest to collectors and martial arts enthusiasts.”

The Association of Chief Police Officers said the swords were not a common weapon but they had been used in a number of significant incidents.

In 2000, Robert Ashman murdered a Liberal Democrat councillor at the offices of Cheltenham MP Nigel Jones, who was also seriously hurt in the attack.

A year earlier, Eden Strang seriously wounded 11 people when he went on the rampage with a samurai sword at a Roman Catholic Church near his home in Thornton Heath, south London.

Game on - keep it civil.


Roy Harding
Milnet.ca Staff

 

[DarkFire]

Wow, wouldn't be surprised if five years from now we are seeing articles that go like "Due to the large danger of kitchen knives being used to injure or kill by criminals, the government has unanimously decided to ban... etc." Seems like any crime is now being blamed on the object used, instead of the person who using it. 

 

[neilinkorea]

 
This is the British idea of a ban?  All I have to do is say that I'm a martial arts enthusiast, and be willing to pay a bit more for one, and would still LEGALLY be able to own one. That would be like making all handguns illegal, unless you REALLY want one!  Most places already have laws about the length of a blade which can be legally carried in public( I don't know for sure but these swords are probably already illegal to carry in public under those laws) and flat out bans on some knives.   In Canada switchblades are illegal. They are not legal to sell, buy, trade, carry or otherwise possess.  You don't hear a big fuss from the switchblade lobby.  A switchblade is a concealable version of a useful tool which can more easily be used to do wrong by those who would.  So, it is fair to say that a switchblade is to a knife as a handgun is to a rifle.

The real problem is that bans on any weapon are usually undertaken as a publicity stunt by a government.  They are enacted at a time of hightened conern about a particular weapon and made in haste with little or no thought to implimentation and follow through.  The gov't wants to be seen doing something.  So the real, sole goal of these bans is not to ban the weapon.  Which is why, I think, they don't work that well.  After the fuss dies down the gov't forgets about the bans and it's business as usual.  A half a**ed ban on anything just provides a huge market for criminals to fill the void. I am not pro gun or anti gun.  I just think that if something is going to be banned, you should do it right, or dont do it at all.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

You realize that the ban on switchblade also refers to any knife that has any form of assist and that many people have their knives seized because Customs can’t decide what is and isn’t illegal?

The ban on cheap swords is a prelude to a complete ban, this is always the way. The Liberals promised that the registration of firearms would not lead to a ban on firearms, so what did they do? They promised to ban all Handguns. In fact the CPC is the only party that does not plan on banning firearms.

Once the PC crowd is finished with us, they will come for you.