Thread: Diane Sawyer's Sensationalist Crap

Just a couple of comments.

1. I think most of us know what is meant by assault weapons. Although in the technical sense they may be classed as rifles amongst all kinds of other rifles, the average person is generally thinking of a single shot or semi-automatic long barrelled weapon, typically designed for hunting, when you say rifle. They are generally not thinking about fully automatic weapons designed for soldiers to kill large numbers of enemy soldiers with in a short space of time - i.e assault weapons. To claim that categorising them seperately is somehow deceptive requires that one deliberately ignores a clear distinction in category based on functionality and capability that separates the common (and hence the audience's actual) understanding of the terms pistol, rifle and assault weapon.

2. After the admittedly convincing arguments to the effect that mass killings are really actually blips on the radar when it comes to actual homocides going on, I realise that the fact that the last mass killing I can recall in Australia was twelve (12) years ago is actually irrelevant. What I should remember is that the total murder rate is roughly identical in the U.S. and Australia....for all other kinds of homocides other than firearm homocide. But the firearm homocide rate alone is roughly 8.5 times higher in the U.S than Australia, meaning you're ultimately about 4.3 times more likely to be murdered in the U.S. than you are in Australia.

Maybe those extra murders all take place in the worst part of the cities, but hey, I've lived in the worst parts of cities for a good 15 years when I was younger. To this day I've still never seen any person with a gun anywhere in any of the major cities of Australia who wasn't a police officer. The only times other than that I've ever seen guns in my life is the odd rifle ( the single shot type, not AK47s) on the farm, police officer's sidearms and at army bases.

And maybe that's not very exciting and sure, guns are cool. I'm happy for you guys in the U.S. to feel safer having firearms, and I'd probably even feel safer myself if I were living in the U.S. if I was armed to protect myself under those circumstances, but give me a choice, personally I'll take our restricted access to guns over here and you guys can keep your 4 and a half times the murder rate.