In London, someone grabs your phone, threatens to take your watch with a machete, or tries to rape your child. In New York someone marches down the street wanting to punch anyone that gets close. You let yourself be victimised and then report it.
In Texas, they generally don't do these things because they might get shot. People defend themselves.
In exchange, we accept there will be some unwanted violence. Kirk made an analogy here: we don't want road deaths, yet we don't ban cars. We don't want school shootings, but we don't ban guns.
South Africans in London have similar perspectives regarding being able to defend themselves.
But the rest of the UK is extremely safe. Compared to the US? Very! And we don' have guns to defend ourselves. How does that work? And it is the same in many, many countries that don't have guns - a lot safer than the US.
So that argument for guns just doesn't work. There must be something deeper to it. It must really be something that triggers a deeper response in people.
I also visited Austin Texas and spent a night staying in the center on 6th street and didn't feel safe. Aggressive black guys shouting and stuff. I googled that location when I got to the lodging and someone was shot there a year earlier.
I guess it depends the area but I wouldn't say guns have made Texas a haven of peace.
So picking these incidents and citing them as a reason for owning guns, while ignoring the whole picture strikes me as dishonest.
The US has a lot of violent cities, I live in NY (in a very good area) and there’s still more street violence than you’d expect in a similar area in London. But that’s a coastal city. People don’t have guns here.
If someone walked down the street in Austin threatening to kill people that wouldn’t happen. Honestly.
Check the statistics[1] with regarding to robbing, knife crimes, homelessness, and so on. Perhaps that is a better starting point?
I have been told by many locals to not wear an expensive watch around designer stores, or touristic hotspots because robbery happens on a daily basis, it depends on the time of the day and which day it is, of course.
I have watched many YouTubers visiting London as well and they tell quite the story, too.
[1] See my comment here: >>44914081
In any case, I think the argument that was brought forward in favor of guns does not hold true universally for every places. For example, in Hungary, you do not need guns as a deterrent.
Perhaps London would benefit from it, I actually have no idea and I do not know if I could have any way of telling.
I’m not sure if I have an answer one way or the other - I’d like it if I could buy milk in NY without someone threatening violence, and don’t think it’s right for jihadists to stand in the middle of London saying they’ll kill all the jews without the police doing anything, but I also don’t want to live somewhere where someone snaps and they have access to an automatic weapon.
That the US is safer than other places because it has guns? I guess you can sincerely believe that, but the facts say something else.
It is a cherry picked example and has nothing to contribute to the overall argument that gun ownership makes the US safe. Otherwise I can point to the many mass shootings in the US and say that would never have happened in the UK.
I live in the UK. It is objectively safer to live in the UK where we are not allowed to own guns. To us, it is absurd to claim we need guns to be safer when we look at what actually happens in the US as a result of guns.
I don't think this is really a controversial take.
That is why the argument for gun ownership actually happens at a deeper level in the psyche.
It obviously makes the argument that Texas isn’t New York or London and has little street crime, as a result of gun ownership. You wanted to understand the mentality? That’s the mentality. No road men in Austin.
> Otherwise I can point to the many mass shootings in the US and say that would never have happened in the UK.
Yes you can. That’s a fine argument, I agree with it. I’ve made comments about not wanting to die because someone had a bad day earlier in this thread supporting exactly this argument. You’re arguing with someone else rather than reading my responses.
I do not think it is that difficult to grasp either. Do you understand now?
I am Eastern European, no guns here either, and as I said, it may not universally apply to all countries, or even cities within one country.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-r...
Check out both tables and you will see that the facts do not say what you think they say, at all.
Homicide rates by firearm per 100,000 inhabitants (2017):
Jamaica - 47.857
United States - 3.342
Serbia - 0.415
Jamaica - 8.8
United States - 120.5
Serbia - 39.1
It shows that Serbia has loads of guns, yet barely any firearm-related homicides, whereas Jamaica has much less guns, yet homicide rates by firearm are way higher than the US.
Thus, the statement that "More guns -> More gun-related violence" is evidently false.
Sure, I can read English, I can understand the actual English words you're typing and the point you're trying to make. I just think it isn't true, and an honest reading of statistics would show that.
But I don't think we're going to get honesty here.
This does not imply what I said though, it just confirms that more guns does not imply more gun violence.
You did not leave an answer to "If people (thieves, criminals) think "this guy may have a gun", then others are less likely to rob him to avoid getting shot." though.
You wanted to know the mentality behind it, and this is the mentality behind it, so now you know why people say and believe these things. As I previously have said, this probably cannot be universally applied to all countries, but it theoretically could be, especially if we consider the fact that "more guns -> more gun violence" is just simply not true. I have a feeling it is a cultural thing. How come Serbia (among other countries) have lots of guns yet no firearm-related violence? Many other countries have much less guns per 100 people (as per statistics), yet gun violence is through the roof. We have to look at it from many different aspects. We need ask ourselves "why?" or "why that is?", what are the differences? What are the cultural differences?
Just to be sure, I am not in favor of guns, but I do believe in that guns can be a deterrent in some places at the very least, and we know that more guns do not lead to more firearm-related homicides, so theoretically it could work in some or many places. I do not know much about Serbia. I wonder how come they have lots of guns yet barely any related crimes.