LogFAQs > #903056677

dancer62 posted...

So why does it work so well in Israel? Everybody is part of the militia, everyone is trained, everyone has an issued submachinegun: minimal terrorism besides being a such a fat target, no school shootings.

This is 100% wrong, as Israel itself has attempted to explain to the NRA nuts who attempted to make this same point. First off, the idea that everyone is issued a submachine gun is complete horseshit and is not even a little bit true. Israeli gun laws are significantly tighter than American gun laws. There is no guaranteed right to bear arms. Private ownership of weapons is restricted to those who can prove that their professions or places of residence put them in danger. Weapons ownership requires licensing that must be renewed every three years (and renewals can be denied - about 80% of all gun license applications in Israel are rejected). Licensing includes background checks, mandatory training (above and beyond their mandatory military service), and medical exams, including a mental health assessment, all of which must be repeated every three years to get the license renewed.

Consequently, there are only ~4.17 privately owned guns per 100 people in Israel, putting Israel at #81 in terms of levels of gun ownership worldwide (the US, by contrast, is #1 at 101.05 per 100, infamously being the only country in the world with more guns than people).

If you're going to argue this point, do yourself a favour and back up your arguments with facts rather than bullshit.

Kyuubi4269 posted...

That explains every country with guns (most) without school shootings.

I don't think you quite understand the scope of the problem.

The US has more guns than anyone. And not just by a little bit either - the next runners up are Serbia and Yemen (at 58.21 and 54.80 per 100 people) and those two countries are the only ones who have more than half of the US's gun ownership rate (#4 on the list is Cyprus, with "only" 36.4 guns per 100 people).

But perhaps more worryingly than raw numbers of guns is the laws surrounding those guns. Most countries in the world where guns are common have legal infrastructure in place to support gun ownership, including licensing, registration, background checks, medical exams, mandatory training, and mandatory wait times; US laws on the subject are almost comically threadbare, and America seems to be the only country that thinks it's a good idea to hand out guns to anyone who wants to plunk down the money to buy one without doing any more than the bare minimum to make sure those guns don't wind up in the wrong hands.
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