It's not apples and oranges at all. Poverty correlates strongly with crime, drug addiction, lack of education, violence, yada yada yada everywhere in the world. Including Canada.
You claimed in a prior post that demographics doesn't have anything to do with this, but yet, poverty, race, culture - it all comprises demographics, which directly shapes a community.
I'm not suggesting that you haven't seen poverty, crime, drug addiction, etc. in your own country. I challenge that there are likely variances in culture.
What's unique about the US is that INSTEAD of implementing public policies that are proven to alleviate poverty, many if not most Americans seem to believe everybody should pack a gun around to defend themselves against the poor. What's the point, when the poor have guns too? All you're going to do is get more people killed.
First of all, you're not making sense. If
MOST Americans were of the mindset that we needed to protect ourselves from the poor and should pack as a result, it's not reflected through action, as less than half of the US owns guns. A single gun owner may own multiple guns, but, if he or she is a responsible gun owner, how are they any more dangerous than the criminal who is packing an illegally owned weapon that will not be accounted for in statistical data?
A minority of Americans own guns, but just how many is unclear | Pew Research Center
Analysis: Fewer U.S. gun owners own more guns - CNN.com
Second, I have not used verbiage to stigmatize or demean low-income Americans as you seems to be implying through your choice of verbiage.
Third, you may want to educate yourself on the plethora of workforce type programs offered in conjunction with social welfare and other community programs throughout the United States, both non profit, government based and otherwise. There already exist programs to support those who are determined to end cycles of poverty. Before you start projecting that Canada's solutions will fix all of America's problems, you need to first educate yourself on all 50 states and their local workforce engagement programs in addition to whatever federal assistance programs we have available.
Then, we can make comparisons.
I don't buy the argument that the US is "more diverse" than Canada. In Toronto - our largest city, the population is fully half visible minorities. Half of those are first generation immigrants - these are people from all over the world, including refugees from extremely violent, extremely poor countries.
I think it's very challenging to continue to compare our countries and quite frankly, I really don't want to. My point was that demographics influence crime and I think we're on the same page.
What we DON'T have is sprawling ghettos where the poor are all swept into a corner together and forgotten about, then blamed for their own misfortunes when those areas become hotbeds of crime, ignorance and violence. *
Oh yes. I mean, seriously, the poor aren't capable of critical thinking and when you have six babies by 30 and have trouble keeping a job, it's not your fault at all.
I understand the mentality that you're emphasizing here, but, don't present as if the American poor are helpless, neglected people without minds and without hope and without any sort of accountability.
But even in this respect, America is not unique.
Ghettos everywhere in the world are hotbeds of crime and violence. It's just that industrialized nations generally try to
avoid creating ghettos through completely idiotic social, urban planning and economic policies. That works WAY better than guns, believe me. When they fail, as they did in the
UK and
France, surprise surprise!
I'm not claiming that America is unique. I've reiterated the importance of considering demographics when evaluating crime and approaching crime and solutions to problems.
The creation and "maintenance" of the American ghetto is a convoluted mess which is partially attributable to politics, partiallly attributable to greed and also attributable to apathy.
I digress...
It's not that I don't hear you or understand your point. Wherever the poor, desperate and forgotten are concentrated, the streets are not safe. That's true everywhere. I simply disagree with you that the specific issues America is dealing with exist nowhere else in the world, or that the "everybody should get a gun" solution many Americans favour could ever be as effective at reducing violent crime as a reasonable economic policy would be.
*(With the important exception of our reservation system, which is a breeding ground for violence, crime and addiction).
The thing is...I never said this. I never said that these problems happened only in America. I tried to illustrate to you WHY someone might want to own a gun for protection and WHY such a choice could be justified from the platform of self defense given a particular demographical "climate".
I have not said that everybody should get a gun. Who has said that everybody should get a gun. You've projected that most Americans own or support ownership of guns.
Well, no. Most Americans do not own guns. It's often reported that 88 guns can be found to every 100 Americans, but, these are total guns, not guns per person. I grew up in a household where my Dad owned multiple guns. We were taught from an early age not to touch because we would kill ourselves. My husband's family - same thing.
Out of the 80 million + Americans who own guns out of 300,000,000+ Americans, 8,855 died via homicide by firearm in 2012. It's tragic. But, statistically, we're killing each other off faster by automobile accidentally.
FBI — Expanded Homicide Data Table 8
95% of Americans own cars and over 32,000 people died in 2012 in auto accidents.
http://photos.state.gov/libraries/cambodia/30486/Publications/everyone_in_america_own_a_car.pdf
Auto Deaths Down Overall In 2012, Lowest Since 1949, Large Truck, Bicyclist Casualties Increase : Auto News : Auto World News
From a statistical perspective, our cars are more dangerous than our guns, but, we're not knee jerking everytime we read about a tragic car accident. People are losing life for the sake of convenience. That's not demonized. Gun ownership has a stigmatization attached to it, but a much greater percentage of guns are NOT used for violent crime.
