Is this true that England has 3x the crime rate of the US?

[SUBMAN1]

Reading this article about gun laws in England and I find that statistic rather amazing. ANyway, this is a good read.

-S

There's Only One Way To Protect Ourselves - And Here's The Proof
By Richard Munday

Today, 96 years ago, London was rocked by a terrorist outrage. Two Latvian anarchists, who had crossed the Channel after trying to blow up the president of France, attempted an armed wages robbery in Tottenham. Foiled at the outset when the intended victims fought back, the anarchists attempted to shoot their way out.

A dramatic pursuit ensued involving horses and carts, bicycles, cars and a hijacked tram. The fleeing anarchists fired some 400 shots, leaving a policeman and a child dead, and some two dozen other casualties, before they were ultimately brought to bay. They had been chased by an extraordinary posse of policemen and local people, armed and unarmed. Along the way, the police (whose gun cupboard had been locked, and the key mislaid) had borrowed at least four pistols from passers-by in the street, while other armed citizens joined the chase in person.

Today, when we are inured to the idea of armed robbery and drive-by shootings, the aspect of the "Tottenham Outrage" that is most likely to shock is the fact that so many ordinary members of the public at that time should have been carrying guns in the street. Bombarded with headlines about an emergent "gun culture" in Britain now, we are apt to forget that the real novelty is the notion that the general populace in this country should be disarmed.

In a material sense, Britain today has much less of a "gun culture" than at any time in its recent history. A century ago, the possession and carrying of firearms was perfectly normal here. Firearms were sold without licence in gunshops and ironmongers in virtually every town in the country, and grand department stores such as Selfridge's even offered customers an in-house range. The market was not just for sporting guns; there was a thriving domestic industry producing pocket pistols and revolvers, and an extensive import trade in the cheap handguns that today would be called "Saturday Night Specials." Conan Doyle's Dr. Watson, dropping a revolver in his pocket before going out about town, illustrates a real commonplace of that time. Beatrix Potters' journal records a discussion at a small country hotel in Yorkshire, where it turned out that only one of the eight or nine guests was not carrying a revolver.

We should not fool ourselves, however, that such things were possible then because society was more peaceful. Those years were ones of much more social and political turbulence than our own: with violent and incendiary suffrage protests, massive industrial strikes where the Army was called in and people were killed, where there was the menace of a revolutionary General Strike, and where the country was riven by the imminent prospect of a civil war in Ireland. It was in such a society that, as late as 1914, the right even of an Irishman to carry a loaded revolver in the streets was upheld in the courts (Rex v. Smith, KB 1914) as a manifestation simply of the guarantees provided by our Bill of Rights.

In such troubled times, why did the commonplace carrying of firearms not result in mayhem? How could it be that in the years before the First World War, armed crime in London amounted to less than 2 percent of what we see today? One answer that might have been taken as self-evident then, but which has become political anathema now, is that the prevalence of firearms had a stabilising influence and a deterrent effect upon crime. Such deterrent potential was indeed acknowledged in part in Britain's first Firearms Act, which was introduced as an emergency measure in response to fears of a Bolshevik upheaval in 1920. Home Office guidance on the implementation of the Act recognised "good reason for having a revolver if a person lives in a solitary house, where protection from thieves and burglars is essential." The Home Office issued more restrictive guidance in 1937, but it was only in 1946 that the new Labour Home Secretary announced that self-defence would no longer generally be accepted as a good reason for acquiring a pistol (and as late as 1951 this reason was still being proffered in three-quarters of all applications for pistol licences, and upheld in the courts). Between 1946 and 1951, we might note, armed robbery, the most significant index of serious armed crime, averaged under two dozen incidents a year in London; today, that number is exceeded every week.

The Sunday Telegraph's Right to Fight Back campaign is both welcome and a necessity. However, an abstract right that leaves the weaker members of society - particularly the elderly - without the means to defend themselves, has only a token value. As the 19th-century jurist James Paterson remarked in his Commentaries on the Liberty of the Subject and the Laws of England Relating to the Security of the Person:

"In all countries where personal freedom is valued, however much each individual may rely on legal redress, the right of each to carry arms - and these the best and the sharpest - for his own protection in case of extremity, is a right of nature indelible and irrepressible, and the more it is sought to be repressed the more it will recur."
Restrictive "gun control" in Britain is a recent experiment, in which the progressive "toughening" of the regulation of legal gun ownership has been followed by an increasingly dramatic rise in violent armed crime. Eighty-four years after the legal availability of pistols was restricted to Firearm Certificate holders, and seven years after their private possession was generally prohibited, they still figure in 58 percent of armed crimes. Home Office evidence to the Dunblane Inquiry prior to the handgun ban indicated that there was an annual average of just two incidents in which licensed pistols appeared in crime. If, as the Home Office still asserts, "there are links between firearms licensing and armed crime," the past century of Britain's experience has shown the link to be a sharply negative one.

Britain was a safer country without our present system of denying firearms to the law-abiding, is deregulation an option? That is precisely the course that has been pursued, with conspicuous success in combating violent crime, in the United States.

For a long time it has been possible to draw a map of the United States showing the inverse relationship between liberal gun laws and violent crime. At one end of the scale are the "murder capitals" of Washington, Chicago and New York, with their gun bans (New York City has had a theoretical general prohibition of handguns since 1911); at the other extreme, the state of Vermont, without gun laws, and with the lowest rate of violent crime in the Union (a 13th that of Britain). From the late Eighties, however, the relative proportions on the map have changed radically. Prior to that time it was illegal in much of the United States to bear arms away from the home or workplace, but Florida set a new legislative trend in 1987, with the introduction of "right-to-carry" permits for concealed firearms.

Issue of the new permits to law-abiding citizens was non-discretionary, and of course aroused a furore among gun control advocates, who predicted that blood would flow in the streets. The prediction proved false; Florida's homicide rate dropped, and firearms abuse by permit holders was virtually non-existent. State after state followed Florida's suit, and mandatory right-to-carry policies are now in place in 35 of the United States.

In a nationwide survey of the impact of the legislation, John Lott and David Mustard of the University of Chicago found that by 1992, right-to-carry states had already seen an 8 percent reduction in murders, 7 percent reduction in aggravated assaults, and 5 percent reduction in rapes. Extrapolating from the 10 states that had then implemented the policy, Lott and Mustard calculated that had right-to-carry legislation been nationwide, an annual average of some 1,400 murders, 4,200 rapes and more than 60,000 aggravated assaults might have been averted. The survey has lent further support to the research of Professor Kleck, of Florida State University, who found that firearms in America serve to deter crime at least three times as often as they appear in its commission.

Over the last 25 years the number of firearms in private hands in the United States has more than doubled. At the same time the violent crime rate has dropped dramatically, with the significant downswing following the spread of right-to-carry legislation. The US Bureau of Justice observes that "firearms-related crime has plummeted since 1993," and it has declined also as a proportion of overall violent offences. Violent crime in total has declined so much since 1994 that it has now reached, the bureau states, "the lowest level ever recorded." While American "gun culture" is still regularly the sensational subject of media demonisation in Britain, the grim fact is that in this country we now suffer three times the level of violent crime committed in the United States.

Today, on this anniversary of the "Tottenham Outrage," it is appropriate that we reflect upon how the objects of outrage in Britain have changed within a lifetime. If we now find the notion of an armed citizenry anathema, what might the Londoners of 1909 have made of our own violent, disarmed society?

[Skybird]

I just used Google for "Richard Munday". Seems he has a long record in propagating free arms for free people. Don't know but wouldn't be surprised if he has connections to firearms industry, or something like that.

I thought that crime rate on streets in Britain has decreased, due to the intense monitoring of public places by surveillance cameras. At least that is whyt they say on TV again and again, and what British police is confirming in interviews occasionally, too..

[Kapitan]

nope in fact america has more crimianl activities than the UK and its crime rate is greater in saying that crime rate has gone up in the last few years

[Kalach]

Here in Australia we have a lot of gun restrictions. I know no one who owns a gun, and no one I know has been shot by one either. You can watch a story on the news about someone robbing a store or bank and almost all the time everyone survives.
When the police arrive to stop an armed suspect all they normaly have to do is get out the pepper spray or club and the offender will drop their cricket bat/knife without any violent shootouts taking place.
Not long ago there were some large riots going on in Sydney, cars and buildings were burnt down and there was violence in the streets, but there were very few (if any) deaths. I would hate to see what could of happened if everyone there at the time were carrying guns on them.

Just my opinion anyway, the only way to know for sure if it would work out for the best is to try it.

[August]

Originally Posted by Kapitain

nope in fact america has more crimianl activities than the UK and its crime rate is greater in saying that crime rate has gone up in the last few years

Care to back that up or is this the man-in-the-street opinion in St, Petersburg?

[Kapitan]

and you think im going to ask my step dad to unlock the door at this time of night


NO!

[TteFAboB]

Statistic is the art of twisting numbers to prove your point.

Therefore, statistics are irrelevant.

However:

Originally Posted by Skybird

I just used Google for "Richard Munday". Seems he has a long record in propagating free arms for free people

This attack on the author is confortable as it makes unecessary to refute his statistics at all, not that any statistic is worth to prove a case.

Last I heard the British police has deep connections to the British government too and are happy with their firepower superiority, can they be trusted either?

Originally Posted by Kalach

Here in Australia we have a lot of gun restrictions. I know no one who owns a gun, and no one I know has been shot by one either

And this is a very good way to start a post, declaring "I don't know" twice, what else you don't know? What you know is that the restrictions in Australia happened after a moment of public commotion, populism at best, instead of investigating the Men who go berserk, ban his instruments and let's all pretend the problem is solved and nobody else will ever go insane again, as people go insane because they are affected by mental waves irradiated from firearms.

Originally Posted by Kalach

Not long ago there were some large riots going on in Sydney, cars and buildings were burnt down and there was violence in the streets

Hooligans? Did they passed by a firearms store by any chance to get affected by the mental waves to get mad? We also have riots over here in Brazil and violence too, busses are burnt with people inside and a young girl got 40% of her body severely burned, our least violent "city" is more violent than Sydney, yet, in our riots nobody dies or gets injuried by firearms either, and we have narco-gun-dealers at hand, illegal guns can be acquired for as low as US$ 25 to US$ 50.

Anyway, statistical comparisons between the USA and European countries usually border the realm of stupidity or bad intelectual faith, it is more appealing to the random uninterested man to be fed a statistic so he can feel satisfied with it.

Most statistics are of very low quality, they don't tell who got shot or why, they don't tell if the person died in the hospital or instantenously, they don't tell who the shooter was, was he a petty robber? Was he a drug-dealer? Did he suffered from any mental disease or were using drugs at the time? Are these deaths/crimes highly focused in specific regions? Were the crimes solved and the criminals arrested? What's the background of the criminal and the victim (socio-cultural-financial, etc..)?

Sure, monopoly of power by the state is not glorious, but Britain is a private club, like many European nations are, it is true the crime in America was reduced in the past decades, but that's not specificaly related to the amount of firearms sold, just like if the crime rises in Britain that is not specificaly related to the amount of firearms not sold.

[SUBMAN1]

Not sure where some people get the statistics, but our violent crime rate in Washington is nose diving. Kapitan - care to share your source of info?

I'm going to ask one of my friends in the UK for his opinion. Maybe we can see what someone on the other side of the pond has to say about it.

-S

[SUBMAN1]

Originally Posted by Skybird

I just used Google for "Richard Munday". Seems he has a long record in propagating free arms for free people. Don't know but wouldn't be surprised if he has connections to firearms industry, or something like that.

I thought that crime rate on streets in Britain has decreased, due to the intense monitoring of public places by surveillance cameras. At least that is whyt they say on TV again and again, and what British police is confirming in interviews occasionally, too..

Hahaha! I just watched a 60 minutes on how public monitoring in England with video cameras actually increased crime! You know what the cameras were used for by their operators? Voyeristic uses only!!! Oh - and to stop teenage loitering. They took a hidden camera into the operators room and all the guys did nothing but rate how big the boobs were from one girl to the next! And to make matters worse, every monitoring station they went to was using the cams for the same thing! Nice use of cams!!! Anyway, they went through the statistics on where people were monitored and the stolen vehicle rate even increased - right in front of the cameras noses!!! I hope you feel safe over there now!

Now the Ironic part - places that were not monitored saw a decrease in crimes, including vehicle theft. Now how the hell does this happen? Seems the cams are not good for much other than gov control, if you ask me.

-S

PS. The vehicle theft increased right after the cams were installed too! And it continually incrased! Maybe its a high to steal a vehicle right out from under the noses of the cameras! Might be a teenage thing.

[TteFAboB]

Yes, cameras can have a Big Brother aspect, but again we come to the same conclusion as before, a camera by itself, like a gun by itself, means NOTHING at all!

You can fit 30 cameras in one short street and it won't do any good if they aren't used properly by human beings at the other end, filling streets with cameras is not enough, you need trained, dedicated, honest operators and a honest government that is not going to use them for Orwellian purposes.

Yet another reason why statistics can be dodgy is the fact that crimes may not be reported or crimes that weren't noticed before can be suddenly discovered.

For example, you could have tons of pickpockets operating in Trafalgar square but because many people may not notice they were stolen (could think they simply lost their itens) or decide not to report to the police as the iten stolen was of little value or the victim doesn't believe the police can return their itens, the official statistic of pickpocketing in Trafalgar square will be low.

Suddenly you attach dozens of cameras in the area or people start reporting more and the official statistic rise up to the sky, such a statistic would be a fraud, pickpocketing never increased in reality, it was simply artificially low before.

Then, let's say the cameras scare pickpocketers off together with increased police activity (prevention, arresting, etc.), the statistic may fall down again, BUT, if the pickpocketers were not all arrested and didn't decided to stop their criminal activities, they might aswell simply switch to another area with less cameras and less police, so, this would be another statistical fraud, while the level of pickpocketing in Trafalgar square would seem to be lower, if the criminals simply start operating in another area nothing was solved at all as they continue to rob and will continue to migrate wherever it is easier for them.

Criminals will always exist no matter the amount of cameras or guns in any society, surely these factors can have positive effects just like they can have no effects at all or even negative effects, it all depends on the capacity of the human beings to enforce intelligent policies properly, can you have low crime in a society with American gun control laws and no security cameras? Yes. Can you have low crime in a society with British-like cameras and utterly restricted gun control policies? Yes. It all depends on the particular case and in the human beings, and this is why I don't appreciate transnational statistical comparisons, even if they were not too drastically twisted, realities may be far too different to have any legislative meaning.

Indeed, cameras alone should not make anyone safer or even feel safer, you need to count on highly professional operators and an efficient police ready to respond, as it is useless to know the government is watching you get robbed if they can't send you decent help or at least use the footage to arrest the bugger.

[Kapitan]

@subman one

violent crime gone up normal crime gone downish not alot but gone down

still annoying cause if i carry a weapon for defence i get arrested yet if i hit punch or threaten my attacker in anyway i still get arrested oh and probly put in prision for assualt and affray.

if i defend my property from burglers and i hit one same thing im the one that gets done not the guy trying to steal my stuff he is free to go no charge.

PAFU**INGTHETIC

[Skybird]

Nive. In Germany there is a strong tendency to push public monitoring by cameras, due to the "good examples they had with it in Britain". Should we expect a massive raise in crime over here as well after the cameras got installed?

Discussed with a guest of my parents yesterday, ex-something-scientist. He described an experiment someone did, some time ago. He assembled specialists from all disciplines, politics, science, sociologists, philosphers, economists, ecologists, artists, etc, and they were given a theoretical freedom to construct the ideal, most well-balanced society. The data was entered in a computer model. All nice and well, there was a lot of reasonable thought, and in the early beginning, everything improved. but just a short time later the variables turned bad. Crime went up, economy went down, ecology worstend, sociological variables worstend. So they tried to correct the communal misdevelopements and repair social life. The attempt only held for short, soon after that things were worse than before. To cut it short - the whole thing went down the drain, every improvement as if by magic sooner or later turned into it'S opposite and created side-effects that messed it up, some times to a degree that things were worse than before.

Participating experts were said to have felt to be brought back to earth very much.

"Where you say "up",
You thereby create "down",
Where you say "left",
therby you define "right".

[lesrae]

I'd say its difficult, if not impossible to accurately compare the two countries, with the difference in laws, penalties and attitudes. But IMO there's probably not much to call between the two, we have a roughly similar range of social strata and class distribution and we're lucky enough to be '1st world' countries.

You can use the stats here: http://www.met.police.uk/crimestatistics/ to see what change there's been in the London area of the last few years, but even that's skewed as they frequently change the way the stats are recorded.

[TteFAboB]

How convenient, I just heard an interview with a police Col. from Rio de Janeiro, yes, they installed cameras following the British example, there are few right now but "soon" there should be over 300 cameras covering the entire coast of the city.

He considers these cameras as a mere accessory, he believes they can be usefull to spot and identify criminals and help direct the police response but he doesn't believe they can replace physical police activities for "prevention", there are no statistical studies yet to verify the results of this new surveillance, but given the scandalous bathing suits and even topless women at the beaches I would estimate the "voyeurism" rate is 10x higher than in the British system.

[DangerousDaze]

Stating that CCTV makes crime worse is disingenuous. Check out this report conducted by the UK home office into the impacts of CCTV on crime based on the findings of 22 separate pieces of research.

The key conclusion is:

Of the 22 included evaluations, half (11) found a desirable effect on crime and five found an undesirable effect on crime. Five evaluations found a null effect on crime (i.e., clear
evidence of no effect), while the remaining one was classified as finding an uncertain effect on crime (i.e., unclear evidence of an effect).

Nick