Ice bullets, centrifugal guns, coilguns?

Mate, I'm done. You're too much.

<according to John Howard himself, [the mandatory confiscation from lawful, licensed owners] was .. "to make Australia a safer place.">

The persistent allegation is that George 'Dubya' Bush's 'Man of Steel' John Howard, aka 'The Lying Rodent' (for his shabby treatment of lawful firearms licensed Aussies), was aimed at 'gun control' (in lieu of risk identification and measured treatments!) by his wife, the real power behind PM Howard.

Howard exasperated LNP ministers and experts with his intransigence in implementing wasteful, discredited political stunts as:

- the 'Steal Back', the mandatory confiscation from lawful owners;

- the 'White Elephant' gun registry, that other countries including Canada found a complete waste of resources;

- the hideous mountain of worthless bureaucratic paperwork; and,

- the close monitoring of respectable, licensed, CRIME-AVERSE citizens that occupy trained police to this day.

Way to go JWH, have police monitoring the licensed pillars of society in lieu of the thugs with the illegal guns, ie organised crime and the drug gangs.

What JWH never accepted, the inconvenient truth, is that offenders do not get their guns from legitimate sources, they don't go to police to get refused for a license (their modus operandi is to break laws!) and they do not register their guns.

In short, JWH's 'gun control' was ill-directed from tors. Political populism and 'gun control' slurs against lawful owners that took attention away from deficiencies in government policy, planning and administration that likely would have been laid bare by any Commission into Port Arthur slaughter. That is, had JWH NOT rushed to prevent such a review. For starters, through differing political idealism, governments of both conservative and left persuasion had sold off mental health and rehabilitation assets, putting all responsibility on their carers. -Arguably, it is why low IQ and disturbed individuals figure prominently in police shootings.

The Port Arthur murderer, his marginal IQ, irrational beliefs etc were known to authorities prior. He unlawfully obtained a restricted gun previously surrendered to police. There is NOTHING in the Howard-inspired 'gun control' that might stop him today. A Royal Commission was needed, JWH!

LEGO,

There's a heck of a lot of mere speculation that you offer up there as evidence.

<<I advocate that the entertainment media is responsible for producing violent action movies that are engineered to appeal to socially awkward young men who harbour grudges against authority.>>

I'm pretty sure the entertainment industry is savvy enough with their marketing strategies to want to gear their action movies to a bigger portion of the population than a few loners sitting somewhere on the autism spectrum. Our do you honestly think they're out to trigger as many massacres as they possibly can?

<<These young men are being conditioned by the media to think that real Men are violent men who mass murder the people who they hold a grudge against...>>

Such as? The only two I can think of is The Crow and The Punisher, and both are based on comic books written decades before them.

Most action movies convey the message that the good guys always win, and that crime doesn't pay.

Your paranoia with regards to the entertainment industry sounds pathological.

<<I submit, that the real reason why such massacres have not repeated themselves, is that the very demographic most prone to this behaviour are very concerned with fragile self image, and they do not want to be associated with a pitiful dumbass like Bryant.>>

Gawd, so now we're a psychologist. That’s a pretty broad generalisation.

I find it odd that someone - whose beliefs about race are so similar to the beliefs of those who've spawned so much death and destruction as a result of them - is worried about the effects of violence in media.

It reminds me of the time I heard that Hitler was a vegetarian because he couldn't stand the thought of killing animals.

<<Let me start by saying how pleased I am with your last disjointed and tossed together post.>>

My attempt to address every one of your uninformed claims may have given my post a chaotic look, but there was nothing “disjointed” about it.

Continued…

...Continued

<<I see that you are up to your old tricks of never plainly stating an reasoned argument which you are prepared to defend.>>

Oh, but I have. Numerous times. I’ve even defended them against your misrepresentations and drawn your attention back to them when you’ve pretended that nothing was said. Simply scroll up and take a look. The “impartial observer” knows to do that.

<<Just make the other guy do all the work and make him verify everything.>>

If you are make a claim, then I am entitled to request evidence for it. It's called 'the burden of proof'. Zeus knows I’ve provided plenty of links in the past to support my arguments for you to not look at.

<<Obfuscate, muddy the water, cast doubt, and deny, deny, deny.>>

Yeah, good luck finding an example of that.

<<You focussed upon Lucy Sullivan...>>

No, I focused on her data.

<<...and suggested that sociologists can't analyse crime statistics because they are not a criminologists.>>

They can try, but they’re unlikely do as good a job of it. Just as a heart surgeon is not going to be able to perform brain surgery as well as a brain surgeon - despite both being doctors.

<<News flash. Most people can grasp simple statistics and graphs.>>

Of course. Apparently they don't always know what factors they need to control for though.

<<We know what is going on when Lucy wrote on page 14 of her book…>>

Yeah, I’ve already addressed her data. Come up with something that negates what I said and I’ll reply.

<<If you are suggesting that "the old days" were no better than today…>>

That depends on one’s idea of “better”. How does one measure “better”? Crime statistics at least suggest things are improving. Certainly since 1993 when the data became more reliable.The world is less violent now than it has ever been before. Stephen Pinker wrote a well-researched book on that. If you consider lynchings, slavery, segregation, racism, homophobia, the oppression of women, world wars, genocide, and murderous despots a good thing, then I guess we are sliding backwards.

There is reason to believe that the sensationalist treatment of multiple murderers by the media that guarantees world-wide public notoriety, follow-up exposure too, could be encouraging possible offenders to see multiple killing, in this case with a firearm, as the very best way, the Gold Standard if you will, for getting attention.

Not all would-be mass murderers are intending suicides, but I rather suspect that many of the young, intelligent male offenders were seeking a way of getting limelight and forcing 'authority', 'government' and the 'public' who have not previously bent to their personal opinion, to take notice of them. It was that way with the young, intelligent Evan Pederick, the Hilton Hotel bomber, who had enjoyed a comfy life and a securejob, but was forever bent on making authority and everyone else bow to his opinion of what he thought was necessary and 'right'.

The cluster effect has been well studied in the case of suicides, but could apply more broadly.

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/media-spotlight/201208/when-suicides-come-in-clusters

http://www.livescience.com/51429-mass-shootings-are-contagious.html

The research of the Labor Party politician who posted the subject OLO article does not appear to have considered the apparent random clustering of mass homicides in Australia in a relatively short period. Relatively quiet before and after the cluster, meaning low incidence not complete absence of incidents. Why is the question, although it could be as simple as randomness.

That being the case, the conclusion that Howard stopped mass murder must be fatally flawed.

That leaves the only reasonable conclusion that there is no compelling evidence whatsoever of any positive effect on mass homicide that is due to the Howard-inspired 'gun control' and the State exercised mandatory confiscations of their property (under threat of State armed force and incarceration!) from lawful, licensed owners.

The Howard-inspired 'gun control' does however provide case examples of propaganda, political cynicism, the downside of party politics, too much power vested in the Parliamentary Executive and lastly but certainly not least, a world class example (sic) of a very HUGE, awe-inspiring(sic) amount of public money WASTED. Taxpayers' money that could have been put to use elsewhere, perhaps mental health?

STEELEREDUX...

I'm unaware of the essential facts touching on Martin BRYANT other than what was in the media. Though prima facie, I'd have to agree, the enormity of Port Arthur - Australia has not seen the likes of it before, and hopefully never ever see it again.

In terms of individual criminals, the most 'dangerous' and I'm not sure what yardstick one might use to determine 'dangerous' ? But in my experience anyway, was/is Archie Beattie McCAFFERTY a killer of extraordinary malevolence and venom towards me and his other potential victims. When younger I could go the biff, (no false hubris either, just a fact) and no doubt I could handle Archie with reasonable ease ?

Nevertheless! I was very wary of him, and yes I'll admit even fearful of the man. Archie's presence somehow inculcated a deep seated dread in everyone (police) who had to deal with him, and I was Case Officer ! Whether one could juxtapose the degree of criminality between Martin BRYANT and Archie McC. I'm not sure ? The only professional measure, would need to come from an experienced forensic Psychiatrist.

Personally, I'd prefer to deal (physically) with half a dozen BRYANT'S, then one McCAFFERTY ? And I know very little of the former ?

Did the government (PM John HOWARD) respond correctly in the wake of Port Arthur ? In my opinion only; with the buy back; yes. With the imposition of mandatory F/A and personal licencing; again yes. With the selection and catagories of F/A's that were subsequently prohibited or heavily restricted; clearly No !

Because the government of the day were being pressured to 'quickly and dramatically' overhaul the F/A's legislation, I believe some of those individuals who were asked to furnish 'expert' advice to government, were clearly erroneous with that advice ? I did know a couple of them, and while their hearts were in the right place, some of their advice unfortunately, was clearly flawed ?