In the battle over statistics and gun control, there is one crucial but invisible statistic that will never be reported.
Tragedy that doesn’t happen because of a gun (owner).
Ernestine Aldana owns a grocery store near the corner of Muskego Avenue and Becher Street in Milwaukee. On Dec. 14, Aldana was working in the store when a man entered the store and pulled a knife on her.
“I was really scared,” she said.
But as the man reached for cash from the drawer, Aldana pulled a gun from underneath the counter.
“I didn’t think,” she said. “I didn’t remember what was being said. I just took a step back, grabbed the gun and that was that.”
As the gun came out, the man ran away.
Nobody is dead. Nobody is shot. And a crime was prevented. Yes, a gun did that. Rather, a gun owner did that.
January 11, 2013 at 5:18 am
Isn't attempted robbery still a crime?
January 11, 2013 at 11:56 am
How about the statistic that in other Western countries with strong restrictions on guns the murder rate and crime rate with guns of all sorts is much much lower?
January 11, 2013 at 12:31 pm
Rationalist, you're not your namesake. What about the violent crime rate universally in those anti gun countries? gun crime rates might be lower, but crime is higher because law abiding citizens don't have guns to defend themselves. easy prey.
January 11, 2013 at 12:36 pm
Unknown,
I know you think you are clever, but reading comprehension and logic may not be your strong suit. Just saying.
January 11, 2013 at 3:36 pm
When attacked, humans defend themselves. To surrender our persons, our children, our dignity to the whims of an attacker would be a moral failing.
January 12, 2013 at 12:08 am
Actually, Rationalist1, the only country in the world where gun control did not cause a massive spike in violent crime is Japan. The UK's rate of every violent crime is between 5 and 8 times what the US's is, and the Home Office stats don't even count crimes with victims under 16. Australia saw its violence-rates spike hugely after passing gun-control.
Incidentally, 95% of counties in the US have 1 or fewer murders per year. The remaining 5%, which account for over 99% of the national murder rate, are generally the counties containing major metropolises—nearly all of which have municipal gun-control measures on par with European countries.
"When guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns" is not merely a slogan; it is a chirpy way of expressing an empirically verified fact. People who are willing to rob, rape, or murder are not going to blink at having to steal or smuggle guns.
And as I have said before, the Win Button of this debate: Mexico has all the gun-control measures that people want here.