CJ, important points but you dodge a couple of issues. I agree that knowing how to pass or avoid the requirement for a gun licence was part of both episodes; but in both cases the NCGC provided instruction in the media to the extent that the Tassie Coroner found that a man acted on their script when he travelled to Tasmania to get a gun and suicided with it. The timing of buying the AR15 by Bryant strongly suggests he was influenced by them, though he already knew a dealer who was willing to break the law to sell to him.

Your claim that the number of international massacres have not been attended by copycats is disingenuous - because we don't count the five people shot at Monash as a massacre (only two were killed). The Washington sniper media frenzy was at its height when he acted, and there are plenty of commonalities with US school shootings. Definite imitation there. Incidentally, his Chinese background may have become an imitation factor in the later 'mentally ill asian student' shooting in the US.

I agree that the tightened laws are a factor in reducing mass shootings, but only in that the media frenzies hyping the looseness of gun laws first created the series of massacres, then after the new laws created the widespread view that guns were either completely banned or 'fixed' by the tightness of the laws.

On the note of ad hominem, your choice to mischaracterise fellow debaters as dangerous and mentally ill is pretty clear cut. And the item about Professor Chapman may be expressed a touch critically, but he has examined the same data as several other reserach teams and reached contrary conclusions - like tobacco-funded researchers, his self-interest in his claims is relevant.

Have a nice weekend CJM.

Your repetition of 'odd social misfits who join clubs where they shoot at pretend people' still shows your complete ignorance of shooting sports. How can a roughly diamond shape or a rectangle with concentric ellipses equate to 'pretend people'? Not even a 'sociopath' would think so.
'how many massacres like Port Arthur or Hoddle St have we had since the current regulations concerning firearms were implemented in Australia?' - only a fool would think that the tightened regulations have prevented such. A legal 38 is as deadly as a prohibited 45 or 40 cal. A legal pump action rifle can be as fast as a prohibited semi-auto rifle. No legislation will stop the wrong people having guns criminals, bikers etc.
You rightly point out that the perpetrator of the murders at Monash University was both mentally ill and had owned and purchased the five handguns he used in his murders legally. Pity that you never mentioned that he was (and still is) the ONLY licensed shooter ever to have committed gun crime. Don't let the facts get in the way of your theories, eh?
Your lack of knowledge and wild claims in this subject further prove that the anti-gun lobby hasn't a clue on shooting but wants it abolished. Remember your idol, Brown Bob, who spoke of people driving around with 'machine guns in their gloveboxes'? How ridiculous and uninformed.

Have to go now, it's the shotgun match today.

Austin P:"Pity that you never mentioned that he was (and still is) the ONLY licensed shooter ever to have committed gun crime."

Not so I am afraid. You might be mixing it up with the old 'No deaths ever in legitimate target shooting clubs.' This has slipped I believe due to a couple of suicides sneaking into the system to get access, especially at commercial ranges.

About 15% of gun murders are by legal owners. Just think though -
that means that of the million or so gun owners the murder rate is order of 0.2 per 100,000, compared with 1.8 for the whole population and about 18 for the population in the disadvantaged US urban black population.

ChrisPer, 'About 15% of gun murders are by legal owners'.

What is your source for that statement? Can you name a couple of these licensed gun-murderers? If you can, I will retract my statement as, at the time of the Monash shooting, the general word going around shooters and the media was that the perpetrator was the first licensed shooter to use a gun as a murder weapon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_politics_in_Australia
gives details, under 'Monash University Shootings' of what I claim to be the only murder by a licensed shooter. I would amend my statement to 'since 1996' if that helps. The article rightly does not mention any other licensed gun-murderers. Why would it?

Austin P, I am a co-author of that Wikipedia article.

2001 National Homicide Monitoring Program: "Ms Mouzos said only 10 of the 68 offenders were licensed to own a firearm and six used a registered firearm. One offender was killed with the victim's own gun."
"Robbery murders on the rise AAP 26mar02"

See also http://www.aic.gov.au/publications/current%20series/tandi/141-160/tandi151.aspx The licensing and registration status of firearms used in homicide.

But note that dishonest researchers like Alpers or Chapman use the idea that some legal shooters have committd murder to imply all legal shooters are 'at risk'; but that is an activist talking and you cannot trust them. Think about it; even if EVERY gun murder was a legal shooter with a licensed gun, it would have nothing to do with th epotential guilt or innocence of the 850,000 who did not commit any crime whatever. How about the scum who kill families in drugged and drunken driving and car chases; almost all their cars are REGISTERED. Does it mean anything?

Anti shooter thinking, even by people with research credentials, is loaded with this kind of category error and non-sequitur thinking.