Brian, do you really think that if women started arming themselves against a would-be assailant there would be fewer women harmed or killed?

Pointing a gun without the intention or the willingness to fire it at a threatening person only means that said gun will be taken off the women and used against her.

If not that, why would a man intent on harming a women and knowing women are very possibly armed not take that in account, get an extra buzz at disarming someone who thought they were powerful and shoot her first?

I have no problems at all with guns owned by sporting shooters or for work reasons, but I have enormous problems with people thinking that guns have a place in self protection in a country like Australia.

Next we'll have American style stories were the hapless pizza delivery boy who knocks on the wrong door late at night gets a bullet through the head because the householder felt that he had to 'protect' himself from an invader on 'his property'.

Guns are for sport or work, not for pointing at other humans. It is the constant mantra of the 'right to protect oneself' by killing them with a gun from some within the gun lobby that gives many the heebie jeebies.

While Brian has not made his case at all well, I think this 'bad guys will just take the gun off a woman' cliche is rather contemptuous of women. People who carry guns must be properly trained to never produce a gun without good reason, and anyone who lets a bad guy take their gun is potentially abetting a murder - possibly their own. No-one tells a girl taking karate lessons that she should just give up karate and never resist a violent rapist.

Produce your statistics to prove this happens routinely in real self-defense situations, yvonne. Or are you just stereotyping women to support your prejudice?

As for rstuart, the $500M was to 'make Australia a safer society', and the authors specifically said that it would NOT stop mass killings. What stopped mass killings cannot be the gun laws per se.

It is more likely that the media and activists stopped telling everyone we would have a massacre in Tasmania because it was easy to get guns (and this is how to do it), and instead sent the message that gun laws were effective, because they stomped on decent gun owners so hard.

If you rely on Simon Chapman to pretend the confiscation of 600,000 low-risk rabbit guns stopped massacres, the least you could do is point out his personal reasons for needing it to be true. Our media are quick to tag pro-firearms researchers with implications of bias, but never say 'but these researchers are actually activists responsible for a 20-year campaign against gun ownership, part of it funded by government research funds.'

CrisPer, licensing is not only to stop easy access and 'prevent mass murders'. Licensing requirements, be it for driving motor vehicles, motorbikes, semi-trailers, owning guns or having a liquor license, also upholds the idea and sends a clear message within our society that in order to be able to do any of the above things you have to be worthy. There is a certain level of responsibility required. There is an idea of privilege, not an automatic right.

As for your statistics request. Why is it so unbelievable to expect a criminal to be even better armed if there is a good chance the victim will be armed? Your karate analogy makes no sense whatsoever, karate and guns are no comparison.

I don't know if you have ever lived in the USA. I have. The thought that the American ideal of 'the right to bear arms' for self protection might ever take hold in Australia is petrifying.

Guns are dangerous. Especially in the hands of untrained and/or irresponsible persons. They certainly have a place in sport, hunting or work, but not for 'self-protection'. The pro gun people love the adage 'It is not guns that kill, it is the person pulling the trigger'. Well precisely. You should endorse and support the notion of licensing. It is a privilege to pull that trigger, not everyone can be trusted with that power.

In case you missed it, we have a police force and we have professional soldiers. If you are worried about being helpless in the unlikely event of an invasion, please join the army reserve. You'll get called up and get a big machine gun to spray the bad guys with.

Strict license requirements to own a gun is the least any community should expect.

I prefer to think of guns as a right, not a privelege. The moment you start calling things priveleges is the moment you are in danger of becoming an elitist or someone who doesn't support democracy. The problem is they are so damned dangerous in the hands of idiots and aggressive, immature people.

yvonne,
Did I say I wanted to stop licencing? I don't. I think the parts of the national firearms agreement that actually help are the low-cost parts, that is a proper background check and firearms license, and the safe storage requirements. Genuine reason and genuine need are 'reasonable regulation', in my opinion. They help filter the showoffs that would (possibly) be more likely to misuse.

But I see no reason why, when I already hold a license and own a number of historic arms, I should have to wait 6 weeks for an application for an 1880 antique rifle, on a collectors license (that means I can't use it at all anyway). And the rabbit rifles I used to own, now gone, that are effectively banned, were wastefully destroyed, to generate smug for the uninvolved and ignorant.

Do I sound patronising? Your post certainly does. I have served in the Reserves (just after Vietnam ended), and I became aware that guns were dangerous if not handled with constant attention to safety as a teenage target shooter before then. So, thanks for the infomation! It shows that some people think their imagination is a reality to enforce against other people's freedom.

ChrisPer. The gun laws were introduced, and then gun related behaviour changed. The obvious explanation is the introduction of laws caused the changes. The theories posited in the link you gave seem very far fetched in comparison.

Some of the changes were expected, like the reduction in gun related deaths and injuries. Some were unexpected, like the compensating rise in suicides by other methods, and the elimination of mass shootings. You seem to be keen on cherry picking the good and bad, and assigning their cause to whatever side suits the point you are trying to make.

Although Brian hasn't posted links, I trust him to get it right when he says the number of murders hasn't changed since the introduction of gun laws. It hasn't effected suicides either, at least in here Queensland (but why restrict the study to just Queensland?). This is all very disappointing. On the positive side, I expect the number of accidental gun related deaths and injuries has dropped. After all, while someone may look for an alternate way of committing suicide, its unlikely they are going to seek out an alternate way of having an accident.

You seem to have a problem with the $500 million being miss-spent. Maybe it could of had more effect elsewhere - its hard to say. But it did have an the intended effect. Our government recently spent around $200 million on purchasing Australia wide licenses for internet porn filters. They were made available for free to you, I, and everyone else. But guess what - no one was interested, stuff all people downloaded them. If you want to hassle our pollies about wasting money you need look no further. This $500 gun buy-back was positively good value in comparison.