Irrational Arguments and Fearmongering

Anyone believing that gun bans will reduce violent crime is either ignorant of the nature of criminals, or supporting them.

I am neither conservative nor liberal, and it is an intentionally divisive effort to try to force people to choose one side or the other on a debate like this, especially when the facts do not lend themselves to the idea that gun control promotes public safety.

Unfortunately, one side of this debate tends to rely on an emotional argument as a result. "Think of the children" is a common argument in the debate, hoping that few will take a contrary position that makes them appear to oppose things that would make children safer. Gun control, anti-rights proponents tend to rely on irrational arguments and fearmongering, rather than statistical analysis of violence or the actual effects of firearms regulations.

I am a bit of a nerd, looking more into the science and statistics of an issue before making a strong case either way. I would love to live in a world where the prohibition of a thing made society safer, but this is the real world, and we only have to look at alcohol, drugs, assault, and violence to see that despite numerous attempts to get rid of society's problems through law, most people tend to ignore bad laws, and criminals by nature ignore them as well. The difference is that criminals intend to do harm or violate the natural rights of others, and laws are entirely ineffective at changing the nature of criminals. Thornton's book on the subject helps to dispel the idea that prohibition can have more positive benefits than negative costs.

Worse yet, a complex, convoluted, and contradictory network of laws and regulations tends to snag nonviolent people who do not seek to violate the rights of others, criminalizing the acts of those who are obviously not criminals. Most people can name a law or regulation they have recently broken and not feel bad about it, for a victimless crime is not a crime.