My understanding is that Canadians have fewer laws restricting guns and more gun owners per capita than the US. They just choose not to shoot each other. Anybody have better info?

The US also has more people behind bars per capita than any other country, so that doesn't seem to be working either. 

Hi guys,

I live in Canada. I’d say your assessment is totally and completely wrong about our gun laws, restrictions and ownership, although you are right that we prefer not to shoot each other.

Rather than statistics, let me offer a few personal observations.

I’ve been here for many, many years. Recently, I read a story in our paper about a guy from the US who was stopped by Canadian Immigration. They said, ‘You have a loaded .38 in your glove-box!’ He just said, ‘Yes, I do’ and then couldn’t understand why they wouldn’t let him bring it into Canada.

In all my years in Canada – living in a city - I’ve met only one person who owned a gun. Neither I nor any of my friends can imagine why anyone, except a rancher or farmer, would want one, particularly a hand-gun. I’ve never wanted to kill an animal, although I have killed mice, and even then I disliked doing it.

I have family and friends in Ohio. A couple of years ago in that area, they were getting ready to vote on a referendum of some kind that would allow people to carry concealed weapons on their person in public. At a party, I found myself actually trying to explain to a guy (he was an accountant, obviously they are a blood-thirsty bunch) why people in Canada would think that was a nutty idea. It was a surreal conversation. No doubt he thought I was the nutty one.

In return, I’d be interested in some of your personal experiences.

YC,

Thank you for your reasoned and interesting reply. I wrote what I did because I find the level of debate on this subject is usually very, very low. I offer as evidence some of the posts in this thread. I think US citizens don’t always realize that people in other countries, including myself, find it particularly offensive and disrespectful to read suggestions that countries that aren’t wide open to guns are dictatorships or close to it.

I understand your reservations about whether stricter gun control is the answer. However, ‘I hold this truth to be so self-evident’ that I don’t really know how to even start to try and convince you, particularly since I can see that you have given it a lot of thought.

Two countries so close, and yet so different in various ways!

Anyway, thanks again for your comments.

Clive

Hi YC,

I hope you'll excuse my naive questions, and that you won't consider them impertinent.

As an American, do you know a lot of people who have guns?

Can I buy an automatic weapon in the US? I think so, but I'm not sure. If so, how on earth can anyone defend such a thing?

I seem to remember seeing on TV a place, in Florida I think, where you could go, pay money and rent an automatic weapon to blast apart targets such as an old car? Do you think that's true?

I'm asking, firstly because I have the opportunity here to ask an American, and secondly because such things, if true, seem at odds with your earlier comments about how it is reasonably difficult to get a gun in the US.

Best wishes,

Clive

"As an American, do you know a lot of people who have guns?"

Off the top of my head I can think of three people I know who own guns.  However, those three own quite a few guns as they are avid hunters/gun collectors.  The vast majority of people I know do not own guns, or at least have never mentioned it to me.

"Can I buy an automatic weapon in the US? I think so, but I'm not sure. If so, how on earth can anyone defend such a thing?"

No, you absolutely cannot buy automatic weapons in the US.  Many people are confused however, because people often refer to semi-automatic weapons as "automatics."  To the best of my knowledge, you can buy many guns which in there normal states are fully automatic, but in order to be sold legally to civilians have been converted to semi-automatics.  Many "assualt rifles", which were sold as semi-automatics, have been made illegal largely because people assumed them to be fully automatic.

"I seem to remember seeing on TV a place, in Florida I think, where you could go, pay money and rent an automatic weapon to blast apart targets such as an old car? Do you think that's true?"

I highly doubt that is true, and it's certainly not legal.  See, part of my problem with those who support gun control (at least in the US) is that they so often resort to propoganda and scare tactics.  They prey on people's worst fears rather than trying to appeal to their sense of reason and logic.  That's why I believe there are so many misconceptions about gun ownership in US, both from within and abroad.