Matt Damon on Australia's gun confiscation...I wish that could happen in my country

when Cincinnati passed a stupid "Assault weapon ban" and required residents to "register" the firearms so to take advantage of the "grandfathering" provisions, less than 100 were registered. at the time I had access to the records of two major league gun dealers who were only a few miles outside the city limits (almost no real gunshops existed in the city limits due to their idiotic laws but residents of Ohio could buy in any shop in Ohio). And I knew for a fact that those two shops alone had sold thousands of those scary weapons to people who's zip codes put them in the city limits. The compliance rate was less than one in a 100

 

If you have access to a weapon that will reliably kill another human being at a distance of 800 yards on in, you have an effective way to resist whatever another human being can try to do to you. Tank Crews cannot live in a tank 24/7. Same with a helicopter crew. and the people giving the orders generally are not heavily armed or immune to say a 30-06 bullet

 

Stupid Anti-Gun suggestions made by Anti-Gun Advocates.

 

Well, a lot of us have a access to 800 yard plus guns with rounds more powerful than 30.06. We haven't even touched making IEDs, or weapons obtained by those from the LE and military to aid in any resistance to tyranny.

 

I have a couple of issues with that list

A) it is inconsistent with inclusion of serial killings i.e. The Milat murders are not included pre 1998
B) includes all shootings not just those that fit the FBI definition of a mass shooting - and seems to be weighted to incidents happening after 1998

 

It could very well be his country. Apply for Aus. citizenship and denounce Amer. citizenship, voila his country is as he wishes it to be. Without a sensible talk to boot!

As for sensible talk, I am fully behind people being educated as to their constitutional rights and the history that made it imperative to include and protect enumerated rights in the US Constitution.

Back in the day Americans citizens sent firearms to British citizens so they could defend their homes from a potential WWII Nazi invasion...why? Because the British government had confiscated civilian firearms a couple of decades prior and made it a challenge to obtain a certificate to even own a specific firearm. A grand deterrent to firearm ownership. The American Committee for Defense of British Homes formed and sent arms to their disarmed civilian citizen brothers across the pond. The article (address below) is an interesting read about a particular rifle sent to a WWII English home.
https://www.americanrifleman.org/articles/2012/8/23/the-hession-rifle/

 

How nice of them since at that time America was not going to get involved otherwise

 

my late great (DSC, Silver Star, Croix De Guerre, Purple Heart, AEF, WWI) sent several firearms to the Brits including an A303 he had and a Mauser 98 he had liberated from a German who was on the losing side of an encounter with his soldiers.

 

You may not realize how the collective wounds and memory of WW-l was still fresh in the Countries memory, and even the Civil War was a distinct horror.

America simply did not want to be in another War.

 

And the Aussies had been sacrificed at Gallipoli by the British but we still turned up

 

The US was a neutral country an the late 30's leading up to the salient event resulting in abandoning neutrality.

 

Well, the US showed up for you folks to keep you from speaking Japanese.

 

Apparently, he has no concept of rights. Sheep usually don't.

 

I wonder where he would draw the line if it started happening in his house, to all of his possessions that someone else might find dangerous or offensive, and ending in his bank accounts.

 

Great family military service history. Were the firearms returned?

 

Those firearms were later destroyed.

 

BB, this was the effort of American Citizens not the American Government. I'm sure the Brits who received these weapons were appreciative of this American civilian effort. If my memory serves, there were Americans who went North to start their WWII service in the Canadian Military, prior to the Pearl Harbor attack. A debate raged between isolationism and becoming involved in WWII, however America did show up.

Have spoken with American Vietnam Combat Vets who, to a man, had nothing but praise for the Aussies they encountered and served with in Southeast Asia. No doubt that experience and appraisal was a common one with a long history.

 

Say it ain't so!

 

The difference between Australia and America is simple.

Australia, as a nation after Port Authur, implemented gun control with broad public support. No mass shootings since and gun related homicides and suicide fell and other violent crime did not rise.

America, after Columbine, VT, Sandy Hook, and Orlando (I am still missing several), decided not to support gun control and the mass shootings continue.

If anyone wants sources, look for yourself, I am not here to spoon feed you information.

 

not that I am aware of. My late father had two siblings His older brother was KIA, at Okinawa as a Carrier based fighter pilot-his sister died when I was 22-she had two children but I know there were no weapons that were passed down from my grandfather other than

1) his Colt 1911-I got as his oldest grandson
2) a parker 20G hunting shotgun that my brother has
3) my late uncle's Winchester pre war 70 series in 22 hornet-I have
4) and my grandmother's Browning 16 A5 (I never saw it-I believe one of my cousin's have it). My late Uncle and Aunt were never into hunting or shooting.

I suspect if my grandfather had got the several guns he sent over there back I would have had them. I don't think any of the stuff sent over there came back from what I was told

 

what most people miss is that mass shootings were about as common as rocking horse poop in Australia before the silly gun ban so to claim it has stopped something that almost never happened prior to the ban is really specious. and to claim our "mass shootings" continue because we didn't engage in a collective bed wetting and drowned out our rights, is equally stupid

 

I agree with the point that Australia never had a problem of the scale of the US but there were thirteen mass shootings in Australia in the twenty years prior to gun control legislation but none in the twenty years following.

Could there be other reasons for this? Yes, but to argue that these laws had a negative effect on crime rates, and specifically gun related crime, in Australia is an outright lie.

EDIT: The point made about the small amount on mass shootings in Australia prior to 1996 further makes the point for gun control as Australia already had gun control before 1996 and the laws (passed by one of the most conservative governments in Australian history) only served to strengthen the already existing laws.

 

The difference between Australia and America is simple- The right to keep and bear arms is not a Constitutionally Enumerated Right in Australia?


I find it interesting that some people will accept murder by weapons other than firearms while promoting the usurpation of authoritative self-defense with a firearm from the citizen. In England recently, a knife wielding Muslim terrorist was shot dead with a firearm (not before murdering and injuring many). Please explain why the use of a firearm was chosen (because it is bad?) and not another weapon to stop this just-stopped-short-of- a-mass-murderer (or did he qualify for that title, by definition?).

The firearm can place grandma (or any other aware citizen) with a firearm in a more advantageous self-defense posture when confronted by an aggressive, hell-bent thug.


I know people like to argue statistics and demographics about violence, guns and self-defense, however when you get down to it, violence is a very personal and individual experience and study data means nothing when you are a victim or target of a violent criminal. Personally I'd rather make my own choice in the matter. At least one American court has decided it is the responsibility of the individual to protect him or herself.

 

I am willing to spoon feed you, howecer, in the interests of accuracy. The number of murders was actually higher for four of the next six years after 1996, sexual assaults spiked and armed robberies increased almost 80% over the next five years.

http://www.aic.gov.au/dataTools/facts/vicViolentCol.html

You also need to account for the Monash University, Hectorville, Hunt Family and the Logan shootings.

 

First, in regards to the crime statistics, when taken on a percentage of the population the higher murder rate represents a 0.1 increase per 100,000. The sexual assault figures are more significant but the rate per 100,000 people remained relatively stable between 1996 to 1999, only in 2000 does the rate jump, a full four years after the passage of the debated gun laws. Only sexual assault and kipnapping remain at or above 1996 levels; however homcide and armed robbery rates are below 1996 levels. Furthermore, number of murders by firearm have never reached 1996 levels again and robberies reached their peak in 1997 and have fallen since

Second, Monash shooter bought his guns legally, Hunt family murder had his guns seized by police and then returned so therefore legal, Logan shooting guns were all legal, Hectorville shooter had to steal his dad's gun. So, how is that a failure on gun control when none of the weapons were illegally purchased.