> And yet 20 years it hasn't devolved into authoritarianism. In fact their rates of gun violence have dropped significantly.

Hasn't it been devolving into authoritarianism though? They have banned books and all sorts of things. I've read where lots of people have disagreed with the govt's new laws for censoring the internet and keeping data on people, yet the gov there still does what it wants without worry.

Australia and USA have so many differences that any comparisons are moot. It saddens me to see people trying to compare what happens on that island to what is going on in the states.

I understand there may be less guns there, but from the stories I've seen about violence at bars in parts of Australia leading the gov to shut down parts of the cities earlier just shows that the strong violent abusive people are comfortable engaging in criminal behaviors including assaults and battery, they are not being controlled by gun laws.

It also seems apparent that the weaker, vulnerable people plead for protection, and instead get shortened hours of access.

> Australia and USA have so many differences that any comparisons are moot. It saddens me to see people trying to compare what happens on that island to what is going on in the states.

The US is different but not a special snowflake. The US is not Australia. The US is not the UK. The US is not Germany. The US is not..... The same reasoning means no country can learn from any other country unless they are virtually identical.

But how about Canada? Being similar to the US in many ways, why are their rates of gun violence much lower comparatively?

> I understand there may be less guns there, but from the stories I've seen about violence at bars in parts of Australia leading the gov to shut down parts of the cities earlier just shows that the strong violent abusive people are comfortable engaging in criminal behaviors including assaults and battery, they are not being controlled by gun laws.

And they have much fewer guns to use when acting on impulses, limiting the amount of harm they can cause. Do you think America is less violent? Remember when a single person killed 59 people and wounded 500+ more from a hotel room?

> The US is different but not a special snowflake. Just California alone I think would qualify. The weather, the girls, the agriculture, the money...

kidding aside... could it be that Canada is only worth about $39 billion for drug sales and the US is about $109 billion per year?

I only have one neighbor (that I know of) who would kill for under a thousand bucks, however if there was a million dollars sitting downtown in cash I am guessing there would be more.

I don't know enough about Canada to say, only a few minutes of edited tv here and there, but from what I had seen - people there appeared to be more willing to help people in need - on the street, and via the govt.

The people I saw in the cities also appeared to be very comfortable and not so angry / intimidating - which may mean you can coerce people there without threatening with a gun or shooting up a block. If you can bully large groups with just a scowl, there is no need for guns and shooting.

I'm just guessing though, I am sure there are many factors.

The lack of help here in the states puts a lot of people on the street with lack of access to healthcare and shelter - that kind of creates environments for crime.

I also think people here are more willing to stand up and fight for what they have or what they want. Not sure that's a geography thing (are people more willing to be shitty to others around them about keeping their 70 degree all year california weather as opposed to the snowy mountains up north?

I'm not sure they actually have fewer guns per capita available up there, but I think they have less reason to fight and kill.

Maybe it’s the US’s prison to no vote and no job pipeline, not sure Canada has the same thing?

Could it have to do with things like the US has 58,000,000 latino / hispanic Americans and Canada has 700,000 ? The US has 10 million illegal immigrants and Canada has 100 thousand? Canada has a million black people and the US has 38 times that many?

I don’t mention these things because I think these people are bad or good, it’s just something that makes USA and Canada different.

Again I am not an expert, just seen a couple of shows and a few searches online. These are some ideas about things that may be factors in the differences. I’m sure I am ignorant in these areas and more. Could it be that people in the US spend more time outside throughout the year comparatively and so more fights break out down here? All kinds of things.

I looked into moving to Canada, but I don’t qualify to move there, I could try to sneak in and be an illegal immigrant, but I would not get the healthcare and votes and other experiences I assume – so I may visit one day, but I don’t expect to actually get a lot of first hand understanding of how different it is unfortunately.

Just piping in to say, that, demographics of a city DO have an effect on violent crime. And a lot of it stems from inequality - you can actually see it literally on the roads. In areas where you get tailgated, music bumpers, and just all-in-all too different kinds of people sharing the same spaces, you have a LOT of latent anger. And anger rubs off on everyone. It's kinda like the theory of a single happy person rubbing off on others and makes them happy. Well in these urban areas filled with inequality, I've generally just seen mostly the anger spread.

It's an enormous problem that essentially stems from the wrong kinds of people living with each other. The fix? Don't change the people, change the inequality.

I agree that better social programs, decreased inequality, and drug decriminalization would be a much better approach to preventing gun violence than more people having guns.

> Australia and USA have so many differences that any comparisons are moot.

I hope you stick to the same standard next time someone says "$(Policy X) is how you end up being like Venezuela!"

People also tend to forget about Switzerland[0] entirely where guns are also legal, and yet you don't have the same issues. The problem with guns is gun education, the problem with murderers is psychological, if they can't use one weapon they will turn something else into a weapon.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Switzerland

I think Switzerland is an important consideration to show it's not just gun policy or ownership that determines the use of lethal weapons in a country.

I would add that some of the problems with murders are economic, some are lack of spiritual guidance, and there are other factors. If you consider that many families in the US do not get the kind of health care that they could in other places - these issues tend to spiral affect other areas of the family that sometimes spill into crimes in the community.

Certainly some of it lack of character in general. Some of the problems in the US stem from Mexico and Honduras and other places being connected by land.

There are so many factors. I hate seeing some statistics used to paint a picture and then compares the apples to oranges of other places. People who would ban / restrict gun ownership don't really get that most of the statistics and news stories are issues where people are breaking the law and are not going to follow any laws that are made.

New gun laws just make it harder for poor people to get access to defend themselves, and multiple options and training and practice. The drug dealers, gang bangers and rich people can absorb the costs of new laws no problem. The middle class and poor are the most affected.

In Australia, homicide has decreased by nine percent since 1990 and armed robbery by one-third since 2001, but recorded assaults and sexual assaults have both increased steadily in the past 10 years by over 40 percent and 20 percent respectively. Crime was already decreasing in Australia before the 1996 ban, however since that time violent crime overall has increased significantly.

For those curious to do their own investigation, all these numbers are on wikipedia (and for Australia will mostly be sourced from the Australian Bureau of Statistics where you can freely access the original reports). All things in context though. A 9% decrease over 30 years doesn't sound very impressive, but when you consider that the per-capita homicide rate in Australia is ~5x lower than the US it doesn't sound so bad.

The sex crime example is interesting, because it's a raw count and does not take into account increasing reporting and investigation rates as a result of social change. Over the past few decades Australia has had significant public awareness campaigns for domestic and sexual abuse which are suspected to have significantly impacted reporting rates: https://aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi359

Statistics can be bent to show whatever you when when you assume your audience won't actually think critically. This is a very common problem on both sides of the gun debate unfortunately and I don't think leads to anything productive.

Downvoting because you have not provided references for your statistics and because sexual assault is unrelated to gun violence.

I'm not the author of the message, but I wonder why the downvotes?

Is the message factually incorrect or you think it's irrelevant?

It's the misrepresentation of the data, sexual crimes are on the rise because of increased reporting, not necessarily because of increased occurrence.