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Gun Homicides Down 39%

Let’s see the anti-gun crowd explain this one.

Since the Sandy Hook tragedy, we’ve heard almost non-stop from anti-gun liberals that we need to ban guns to save the children, because gun violence is out of control and getting worse.

Wrong.

Since 1993, the United States has seen a drop in gun violence across the board, from homicides to nonfatal gun crimes.

“Firearm-related homicides dropped from 18,253 homicides in 1993 to 11,101 in 2011,” according to a report by the federal Bureau of Justice Statistics, “and nonfatal firearm crimes dropped from 1.5 million victimizations in 1993 to 467,300 in 2011.

According to the Pew Research Center study, there were seven gun homicides per 100,000 people in 1993, which dropped to 3.6 gun deaths in 2010.

“Compared with 1993, the peak of U.S. gun homicides, the firearm homicide rate was 49 percent lower in 2010, and there were fewer deaths, even though the nation’s population grew,” according to the Pew study. “The victimization rate for other violent crimes with a firearm—assaults, robberies and sex crimes—was 75 percent lower in 2011 than in 1993.”

So in summary:

[styled_table]

Gun Homicides Down 39%
Nonfatal Gun Violence Down 75%
Gun Homicide Rate per 100K people Down 48%

[/styled_table]

Tell me again why we need to ban guns?

Perception vs. Reality

The problem of course is perception vs. reality. We know the reality of the situation – gun violence and homicides are decreasing and have been for more than a decade. Those of us who have been paying attention knew this long before these two studies were released, this is actually not news. The FBI Uniform Crime data shows the exact same downwards trend, which has been discussed here on Monderno and elsewhere on the web.

However, the perception does not match the reality. In fact, the Pew Research Center found that only 12 percent of Americans believe the gun crime rate is lower today than it was in 1993; 56 percent believe it’s higher.

So why the perception that gun violence is out of control? The answer is simple: outright lies and ignorance, whether willful or malicious.

The politicians, generally speaking, are lying to shape public opinion. If you think that Obama, Biden, Feinstein and company don’t know the statistics you’re out of your mind. They know, which means that they are liars. Period. At a political level, gun control has never been about saving the children, it as has always been about controlling a population.

Individuals who support gun control, in my experience, are largely ignorant. I have found that most of them mean well, but simply believe the mainstream media and the politicians. That’s why these new studies are so important. We need to spread this message far and wide and inform the general public of what’s really going on.

You can read more here.

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5 Responses to Gun Homicides Down 39%

  1. Hillbilly Bob May 8, 2013 at 12:04 pm #

    It is about control with the libtards not facts and statistics

  2. morrisdlx May 14, 2013 at 3:05 pm #

    What our Politicians and the News Leave Out on Gun Control…

    The liberal media and our elected representative vigorously work to ignore and discount two issues linked to this discussion and neither of them are being addressed properly.

    First, gun control extremists are using the tragedies from recent mass murders to push the banning of an inanimate object while stating a “hope” that we will reduce the loss of life is misguided and tragically flawed. There is no data supporting their position and fact more data that supports expanding firearms possession. Mass murderers simply see weapons, semi-automatic pistols and rifles, single action firearms, knives, clubs, etc., as a means used to meet their goal. If all semi-automatic “assault rifles” sales were banned; if the millions of semi-automatic weapons of all types were confiscated, these mentally deranged individuals would simply find another means to execute their plan. For example, MSN has reported on a mass murder in China. The weapon… a knife. 22 elementary school children were murdered in a very gruesome and personal attack. If you do some additional research, you see that a knife has been used in several mass murders in China. These children were not protected by the very strict gun laws in China. Can China ban knives, can we? The point is that a ban on a category of firearms, or any weapon for that matter, is the classic showboating quick fix that has become the norm in Washington. We deserve more… Where is the work to assess how we can help these sick people who have a need to hurt defenseless people in “gun free zones”. Where is the work to fix immigration laws to reduce the ability of terrorist organizations. Where is the open discussion and debate on the moral decay and the lack of respect for human life? Personally, I believe we are seeing the results of the past 70 years wherein the population has been told that family, faith, and our founding principles need to be ignored or “Changed”. Many of these sick people lacked the guidance and support needed. Further the problem is compounded by government at all levels failing to establish needed support when family and faith fails.

    So our focus should be on our societal problems not the effectiveness or simple availability of a hunk of metal.

    Second, Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s assertions and the way the news media is framing the debate is a shame. Politicians and the media want to focus us on whether the private citizens needs weapons more potent than hunting rifles, or whether restricted capacity pistols is sufficient to defend ourselves. This is totally ignores the real debate. The reason why we “the people” have a right and need for these tools has been openly and succinctly stated by Judge Alex Kozinski, Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals dissenting from denial of rehearing en banc: Silveira v. Lockyer, 06 May 2003.

    “All too many of the other great tragedies of history — Stalin’s atrocities, the killing fields of Cambodia, the Holocaust, to name but a few — were perpetrated by armed troops against unarmed populations. Many could well have been avoided or mitigated, had the perpetrators known their intended victims were equipped with a rifle and twenty bullets apiece, as the Militia Act required here. See Kleinfeld Dissent at 578-579. If a few hundred Jewish fighters in the Warsaw Ghetto could hold off the Wehrmacht for almost a month with only a handful of weapons, six million Jews armed with rifles could not so easily have been herded into cattle cars.

    My excellent colleagues have forgotten these bitter lessons of history. The prospect of tyranny may not grab the headlines the way vivid stories of gun crime routinely do. But few saw the Third Reich coming until it was too late. The Second Amendment is a doomsday provision, one designed for those exceptionally rare circumstances where all other rights have failed — where the government refuses to stand for reelection and silences those who protest; where courts have lost the courage to oppose, or can find no one to enforce their decrees. However improbable these contingencies may seem today, facing them unprepared is a mistake a free people get to make only once.”

    Do not let the misguided actions of mentally ill people be the vehicle by which we lose our right to defend our nation against the prospect of a tyrannical government. As a “doomsday provision” the Second Amendment ensures that we the people are able to defend ourselves against a far more potent and potentially dangerous adversary, the government.

  3. annalise May 15, 2013 at 4:54 pm #

    Actually, Obama and other politicians said virtually nothing about gun control until Sandy Hook.
    I know that numerous Republicans were convinced that Obama was going to take their guns
    away, but it was NEVER on the agenda. After Sandy Hook happened, the public at large –
    including Republicans – were saying that something has to be done. They were not saying
    take all guns away. They were – and are – saying that more control needs to be put upon
    gun sales. And they are right and the stupid Congress are wrong.

    • Brandon May 15, 2013 at 5:32 pm #

      Really? That’s your best argument, that “they” were right and stupid Congress was wrong?

      This is why we can’t take your side of the argument seriously, you have nothing to back up your nonsensical stance on guns. Gun ownership continues to go up, concealed carry is more popular than ever and soon to be legal in all 50 states, and yet all forms of violent crime involving firearms continues to go down.

      Please come back when you have some evidence to support your drivel.

    • Jake May 15, 2013 at 5:33 pm #

      The derp is strong with this one LOL