CANADIAN GUN CONTROL: DE-BUNKING THE MYTH

[lebel]

Hello fellow gun owners;
I was just recently in India, as some of you know and on returning to Canada I remembered a paper I wrote on Canadian gun control. I’d like to share my paper with all of you and hopefully it proves of some help. The anti-gun lobby in India has been spouting the same misinformed garbage as ours in Canada. I hope to return to Indian again knowing that firearm owners’ rights are more secure.

Lebel

P.S. Remember!
Julius Caesar banned the carry and concealment of daggers within the city of Rome. He was STABBED to death on the steps of the very Senate where the law was passed by men brandishing concealed daggers! A false sense of security is a poor way of spending tax-payers money!

CANADIAN GUN CONTROL: DE-BUNKING THE MYTH
Jamin M. Bolt
University of Saskatchewan
Sociology 111.3 (07)
Yixi Lu

Abstract
In this paper I will argue the ineffectiveness of gun control in the improvement of public health and safety in Canada. I will do so by exploring and countering the arguments of The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control, this being the main lobby group in favor of gun control in Canada. I will also draw on various other sources with information posted on the World Wide Wed (Internet), this ranging from scholars, special interest groups and news media. Gun Control as defined by Merriam-Websters online dictionary (2009) is “the regulation of the selling, owning, and use of guns”.

Key words: gun control, firearm registration, long gun (rifle and shotgun), non-restricted, restricted and prohibited weapon.

History of firearms legislation in Canada:

Canada has had laws restricting the possession and use of firearms since 1877; there was a nationwide permit system for the carrying of small arms in effect in 1892. All handguns have been registered since 1934, and in 1951 a centralized registry for restricted firearms was established under the control of the Commissioner of the RCMP. In 1995 Jean Chretien's Liberal government passes Bill C-68, which will require a licences to possess and acquire firearms as well as registration of all firearms, including long guns. The main catalyst of which was the 1989
Montreal Massacre at Ecole Polytechnique and the shooting deaths of twenty-eight people on its campus by Marc Lepine. Since the shooter acquired the firearm through a licence, gun control advocates have argued that tighter licencing requirements or a complete ban of private firearms ownership would prevent further tragedies.

The sources of illegal guns

The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control states that, “all illegal guns begin as legal guns and strong controls on legal guns are essential to preventing the diversion of legal guns to illegal markets”.1 In a July 7, 2000 BBC news article, reference is made to illegal firearms production in the Phillippines by home based metalworks.2 Further to that, in a January 6th 2009 article in the Wall street Journal titled: Inside UP’s illegal arms manufacturing industry, it showcases the violent effect of illegally made firearms in India on public safety. It speaks of the inability of the law to stop the illegal manufacturing and the frustration of the local populace who are unable to defend them selves3 . This proves what no educated person would deny; once something becomes illegal it becomes a commodity of the black market. Any one who has a background as a machinist knows that there are blue prints and plans available for many firearms, some of which are only as far as a few key strokes away on-line.

Firearms and suicide rates

The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control claims on it’s website that, “Evidence indicates a correlation between the availability of firearms and firearm suicide rates. For example, research has shown that the rate of suicide with firearms in Quebec has tended to vary with the rate of hunting licenses issued. In areas of the province where the number of firearm hunting licenses issued is high, the firearm suicide rate is also high. Therefore, reducing the availability of firearms would seem to be an important part of a suicide reduction strategy”.4 Allan Rock, the Justice Minister, who was responsible for introducing the Canadian firearm legislation, claimed that the reason for the gun registry was to save lives. This criterion is also implied in the 2003 Report of the Commissioner, who stated that the Canadian Firearms Center will work primarily to increase public safety by “helping reduce death, injury and threat from firearms through responsible ownership, use and storage of firearms.”5

The category, gun death, is a mixture of violent ways to die, linked, as the name suggests, only by the tool used for killing the individual. Thus, to the extent that restrictions on firearm availability are effective, people may find and use other tools. Unfortunately, alternative means of committing murder or suicide are all too readily available.6 While it is true that fewer people have used firearms to commit suicide since 1995, it is also true that there has been an almost identical increase in suicide by hanging and other means. Similar trends can be seen in Australia where the firearms laws of 1996 have not had any discernible impact. It is impossible to claim that the gun law has saved any lives by reducing suicide rates.7 As for the parallels between hunting licences and suicides; the Canadian Mental Health Association states, “Late July and August have the highest suicide rates out of all the months of the year. Some studies suggest that the increase is due to seasonal changes and that this period is one that often brings about changes in personal situations as well.”8 In most provinces in Canada, big game hunting season opens in the month of August.

Firearms as a risk factor in domestic homicides

The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control sites firearms as a risk factor in domestic homicides. They state on there website, “International research shows that in industrialized countries, rates of firearm ownership are linked to rates of femicide. The opponents of licensing and registration tend to come from regions where guns are more common, such as rural communities and the West. Ironically, these areas are also where firearms figure most prominently in incidents of domestic violence. It is therefore no surprise that women's organizations from the west and rural communities were prominent in the fight for stronger laws. The 2002 report of the Coroner of Ontario confirmed that access to guns was one of the top 5 risk factors for domestic murder. In Ontario, a province where only 15% of homes have firearms, 55%of the killers of women had access to guns suggesting that a gun in the home dramatically increases the risk of death.”9

This is a definite skewing of the statistics with misleading associations to violence against woman. Professor Gary Mauser (Hubris in the North 2006) states, “Much of the public health research into firearms relies upon the case-control method. The case-control method is a legitimate research methodology for identifying risk factors, i.e., generating hypotheses about what factors might increase the risk of catching a disease. Epistemologically, this is a method for discovering hypotheses, not testing them (Campbell and Stanley 1963, p 12). It is not a confirmatory methodology, i.e., intended to test hypotheses that certain conditions cause the disease under study (Lillienfeld and Stolley, 1994, p. 227). Hypothesis testing is properly reserved to experimental methods. In public health, this typically means subjecting risk factors to clinical trials. All too often public health researchers uncritically rely upon the case-control methodology as if it were a confirmatory methodology. This tendency is particularly evident when firearms are at issue.”10

Gun violence is a very small percentage of violent crime typically under 5%. While gun misuse is important, the more important goal is to reduce the overall level of criminal violence.11 The second largest category of gun deaths is homicide. As with suicide, we can see that deaths involving firearms have declined also in the past decade. Also, unlike suicide, the homicide rate has fallen appreciably. This decline has led some to claim that the firearms program has been successful. Unfortunately, upon closer scrutiny, this argument appears implausible. The first clue is that, as with suicide, the downward trend began well before the 1995 law was operational. It took three years for the regulations to be drafted so the law could be put into effect. Firearm owners were not required to get licences until 2001, and, as observed earlier, firearm registration did not begin until 1998, and all firearms were not required to be registered until 2003. Second, the homicide rate is declining faster in the United States – where there is no firearm registry – than they are in Canada. Again, it does not appear logical to credit the decline in homicide rate to the firearms program.12

Conclusion

The main victim of the firearms debate, in my view, is the truth. The Canadian people are ill-served in terms of public expenditure equaling public safety. We must winnow the emotional chaff from the wheat of fact. We are all impacted emotionally by any act of violence and in this bubble wrapped society we’ve become trapped in the fallacy of enforceable prevention. This is not an issue of wether you personally agree with private firearms owner ship. If you have no interest in firearms, have never used a firearm and there for don’t really know how they work, that is a poor basis upon whichs to tell those who do that they can not posses them responsibly. When this mind set becomes manifested in to public policy, fused with emotion, the end product will not be a logical or self sustaining answer.

References
1.The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control, COMBATING THE ILLEGAL GUN TRADE, first paragraph. Retrieved November 21 2009, from
http://www.guncontrol.ca/English/Home/W ... rev107.pdf

2. July 7, 2000 BBC news, Philippines’ gun crackdown, 5th paragraph. Retrieved November 21 2009, from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/822490.stm

3. Nidhi Bhardwaj, Inside UP’s illegal arms manufacturing industry. Retrieved November 21 2009, from http://www.livemint.com/2009/01/0423420 ... -arms.html


4.The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control,REDUCING SUICIDE, fourth paragraph. Retrieved November 21 2009,from http://www.guncontrol.ca/English/Home/W ... uicide.pdf

5.Gary A. Mauser (June 2005), “Evaluating Canada’s 1995 Firearm Legislation”, page 15 last paragraph. Retrieved November 14 2009, from http://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers

6.Gary A. Mauser (June 2005), “Evaluating Canada’s 1995 Firearm Legislation”, page 16 second last paragraph. Retrieved November 14 2009, from http://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers


7.Gary A. Mauser (June 2005), “Evaluating Canada’s 1995 Firearm Legislation”, page 17 second paragraph. Retrieved November 14 2009, from http://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers

8.The Canadian Mental Health Association, “Suicide Statistics; Seasons”. Retrieved November 21 2009, from http://www.ontario.cmha.ca/fact_sheets.asp?cID=3965

9.The Canadian Coalition For Gun Control, REDUCING DOMESTIC HOMICIDE, second paragraph. Retrieved November 21 2009,from http://www.guncontrol.ca/English/Home/W ... ducing.pdf

10.Professor Gary Mauser (Hubris in the North 2006), page11 last paragraph, page 12 first paragraph. Retrieved November 21 2009,fromhttp://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers

11.Gary A. Mauser (June 2005), “Evaluating Canada’s 1995 Firearm Legislation”, page 14 second paragraph. Retrieved November 14 2009, from http://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers

12.Gary A. Mauser (June 2005), “Evaluating Canada’s 1995 Firearm Legislation”, page 18 entire paragraph. Retrieved November 14 2009, from http://www.sfu.ca/~mauser/index1.html#papers