On 26 Oct, 23:41, "Ron Purvis" wrote:
"Doctor Drivel" wrote in message
reenews.net...
-8- snip -8-
That is why you pay taxes. Notice, apart from the odd plantpot, all the
people from the UK on this thread are firmly against guns and the police
being armed. While the Americans are the opposite. Why? Because our
society doesn't need them for us to walk around safely. If your society
entails that you need a gun to safely go to the shops for some milk, then
start looking at your society and aim to change it at the root level. Aim
for the best.
The truth is that you and the others who feel this way are either misguided
or stupid. It doesn't take long for you to verify that there is the same
crimes happening in the UK as there is in the US. According tohttp://www.nationmaster.com/graph/cri_rap_percap-crime-rapes-per-capitayou
can see that the UK is number 13 for rapes in the world, which is only 4
places down from the US. Doesn't seem like you are a whole safer than the US
when you look at the number of rapes per capita. You just gave up the right
for your women to defend themselves. There isn't all that much difference in
the rate of other violent crimes either if you bother to look on the same
site. I mean the UK is only two spots below the US in assaults per capita.

If you look at the burglaries, there is about twice as many per capita in
the UK as the US. That could be because criminals here in the US realize
that there is a bigger chance of getting shot. If you look at robberies, the
US is safer there as well. As a matter of fact, total crimes per capita, the
UK is worse than the US.

What does this all mean? That you and the other elitist out there that think
that there country is so much better than the US are all morons.

Please forgive me for coming late to the party, but I'm just reading
through this thread for the first time...

While I understand that you were challenging the slur on your country
- and I agree that anyone who thinks their country substantially
better than any other is generally a bit of a moron - I have to
challenge your view on crime. First up, there are significant cultural
and population differences between the US as a whole and the UK that
make such comparisons slightly pointless - not least of which is that
the UK is a significantly more densely populated place than the US.

However: what you have shown, while trying to shout down those
"morons", is that the US and the UK are broadly similar in most crime
statistics; a glaring exception being violent crime, gun-related and
otherwise, where the US outstrips the UK dramatically (source: your
referenced site). Hardly support for the idea that guns make for a
safer society, is it? Personally, I'd rather have a higher incidence
of burglary than a massive increase in violent crime...

Note that I am not in favour of our current gun legislation. I think
it has done little or nothing to make us safer and has succeeded
primarily in affecting sport shooting only. Nor, in fact, am I totally
unsympathetic to the left-pondian gun-lobby. However, I do not think
that an impartial observer can ignore the fact that those nations that
are awash with guns have more gun crime.