this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
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I don't think you mean it to be, but everything you're saying is total bollocks.
https://prateekdasgupta1.medium.com/stop-comparing-american-gun-culture-with-switzerland-if-you-are-not-willing-to-do-what-the-swiss-do-e3e765189d15
Particularly the part about guns per capita
The Swiss aren't perfect, mind. They didn't let women vote until the 70s ffs. My point being that these kinds of comparisons simply don't work. The US has a unique problem. But the problem is still solvable through gun control, because gun control can pervade culture, as demonstrated by many other countries.
So, there's a problem with those statistics; they're looking at civilian arms per capita. In Switzerland, a large number of the firearms that are in 'civilians' hands are military arms. The Swiss--in general--have to serve a term in the military as conscripts, and then have the option of taking their issued rifle home with them. That's not a "civilian" weapon though. I strongly suspect that once you account for the assault weapons--real, select-fire assault weapons, not assault-style firearms--that the numbers go up sharply. Likely not to American levels. But much higher than they are listed.
Those rifles are transferred to civilian ownership once they are discharged from the military.
Happy to see a source that says otherwise but it's illogical that because you previously served your gun is somehow "still in the military". Especially given that virtually anyone is free to own a gun once they've discharged.
Up until recently, you were given a block of ammunition for the gun that you were supposed to keep sealed in case of the militia being called up. So you were given gov't ammunition for a civilian weapon? IDK.
It seems like the numbers are getting fudged somewhere, partly because the Swiss don't keep any kind of official records. I saw one claim that put the number at roughly double the one cited, so...?
Dog there is 1.5 guns per american
Yay! I get to be above average in at least one thing!
Seriously though - the numbers and averages don't really give a good picture of gun ownership in the US. Something like 40-ish% of US households have at least one firearm. But then somewhere around 1-5% of people in the US have something like 50% of all of the guns in the US (I'm pulling these numbers out of my ass, but it's pretty stark). If you get into competitive shooting, it ends up being really easy to have a lot of guns. So while the average might be 1.5, lots of people have no firearms at all, and a relatively small number of people have, like 20 each.
So most countries have 70% less guns, but 100% less shootings.
Math still doesn't math.
For a non-linear graph of gun deaths x guns, it absolutely does.
Huh, it must have been an outdated info that Switzerland has the most guns per capita. But still, they have large amounts of guns per person nonethless and yet very virtually no mass shooting.
As an aside, the Swiss women's suffrage is constantly brought up as Switzerland not being democratic and being late in the modern world. I'm not trying to justify it, but that is always misconceived. Every Swiss canton in 90s but one kept rejecting the women's suffrage in their local referendums, because that canton is overwhelmingly populated by couple of hundreds of old rural people stuck in their ways. It took the Swiss Supreme Court to force that canton to finally allow women to vote. Because of that one canton, everyone outside of Switzerland thought the entire country did not allow women to vote until the 90s, which gave the country a bad historical reputation and myth.
What I said isn't a myth though. They weren't allowed to vote until the 70s. All suffrage movements start and end somewhere and there's ended later than most in Europe. Over 50% of men in Switzerland voted against women voting just ten years prior to them getting it.
Which lends exactly to my point: if we're to pick something to judge Switzerland by, it's something like that. Not misinformation about guns per capita.
Like I said, it is just one canton. People make it as though the entirety of Switzerland did not allow women to vote until the 90s when it is just one canton. It is essentially a myth. I'm not defending what happened, I'm saying it is a misconception and a myth at best.
This isn't a myth and saying "it's one canton" doesn't absolve the people who voted overwhelmingly against women being able to vote.
The result is right here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1959_Swiss_referendums#:~:text=The%20first%20was%20held%20on,approved%20by%2062%25%20of%20voters.
I just can't figure out for the life of me why you want to defend this or keep calling it a myth.
Oh you're talking about the 70s. Most people talk about the 90s when that one Swiss canton still did not allow women to vote on federal level, making as though entirety of Switzerland did not allow women to vote until the year 1990.
But sorry to be pedantic (and I am being one because I am a historical nerd and annoyed by perpetuation of historical myths), but it is Liechtenstein which is the last European country not to have allowed women to vote until 1984, not Switzerland.
I didn't say anything about them being "last". You make a lot of stuff up for someone who cares about facts.
I misread the previous comments.
In any case, voting rights has nothing to do with gun policies. Switzerland is pretty conservative, but it can't be denied that their gun policies and culture is sensible. American conservatives, usually the proponents of looser gun regulations, could learn from the Swiss. Give credit to where it is due.
I didn't say they had anything to do with each other, I specifically used it as an example of where Swiss policy differs from international consensus, much as American policy on gun control does from the rest of the world.
I accept your agreement on the other parts.
How likely do you believe it is to bring about the constitutional amendment necessary to ban firearms? To gain support of 2/3s the states in addition to a 2/3 majority in Congress?
That aside, you could argue symptoms could be addressed through such extremes if it were possible to do so, but you couldn't argue such measures address underlying issues - solve problems.
Yeah I'm not arguing for a ban, not even for the reasons of political support; it's simply unworkable due to the "genie being out the bottle".