Australian Gun Control Activists Propose Boycott Of U.S.

[Blackrook]

I can't see the day when Americans are going to allow the government to go door to door, confiscating weapons.

 

[Mr. H.]

I was eating out Mrs. H.'s vaginal cavity when I nonchalantly commented "my, but you do have a big pussy".

She inquired of me "why did you say that twice".

Is there an echo in here?

 

[Mr. H.]

I can't see the day when Americans are going to allow the government to go door to door, confiscating weapons.

Behave yourself.

Let me lead you by example.

 

[DigitalDrifter]

I can't see the day when Americans are going to allow the government to go door to door, confiscating weapons.

There would be many government officials, sheriff's, etc that would refuse to go along with the order. There would also end up being a lot of people shot, both gun owners and officials that come to take them.

 

[AvgGuyIA]

I've wondered for quite some time when we would start to see pressure from the outside.
Not that it's any of their business, but it will be interesting to see if we see a serious threat from our trading partners.
Just as a side note, this is what would have finally killed slavery had the country not gone to war with one another over it.

As we struggle to wrap our collective heads around yet another mass shooting here in the U.S. — after the tragedy in Oregon — we're not alone in wondering what can be done to prevent them. President Obama raised the examples of successful gun control legislation in the U.K. and Australia during his speech this week. Some Australians agree we should follow their lead — or face the consequences.

This wasn't the first time Australia in particular has been discussed as a model. In response to a mass shooting in 1996, the country's parliament passed a major reform of its gun laws. The National Firearms Agreement banned all "semi-automatic, self-loading, and pump-action longarms" and resulted in the surrender of more than 660,000 weapons. Studies showed that the rate of death by firearm fell by 50% after the laws went into effect, though not everyone agrees on whether that's due to the NFA or an already dropping homicide and suicide rate.

In this country, the Second Amendment and a vastly decentralized government prevent us from getting anywhere close to the level of gun control Australia and other countries have achieved, but on Australia's Today Show, ThinkProgress reports that Gun Control Australia director Samantha Lee proposed something rather drastic to spur American legislators into action. She said that Australians should boycott all non-essential visits to the United States until we do something about gun violence.

"I believe we have a duty to respond to this tragedy in the U.S.," she said.

In 2014, 1.2 million Australians visited the country (not 2.1 million, as Lee stated in her interview) according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, so that could make a bit of a blip on the economy. It would be much bigger, however, if other countries started doing the same. Last year, international visitors spent about $220 billion in the U.S. That's a bit more than the $31 million the gun lobby gave to Republicans in 2013 and '14, according to the

Would An Australian Boycott Help Americans Pass Gun Control?

Would A Nuclear Expolosion Over Sidney Tell Austrailians To Fuck Off?

 

[Old Rocks]

Ah yes, having the record of the most mass shootings of any industrial nation is something to be so proud of. Not only the record, but the record by a couple of orders of magnitude.

Now as a person that has owned guns for 60 years, I can see that the NRA and you gun nuts are going to prevent and kind of preventive measures, until the killings hit critical mass with the voters, and there will be some draconian laws concerning even the mechanical action guns that I have. If you want to keep your silly war guns, and semi-auto pistols, you had better get cracking on some ideas about how to stop this epidemic of killings.

 

[Dr Grump]

I like the Ozzies, but they've become damned stupid of late.

Says the guy who lives in a country that has mass shootings every other week and has its head in the sand when reasonable measures are mentioned on how to address this blight on your society...

....and seriously, any country that not only voted in a dimwit like Dubya twice - and even contemplated giving the keys to the treasure chest to the likes of Palin and Trump - has no right to call any person from another country stupid.

 

[Two Thumbs]

I've wondered for quite some time when we would start to see pressure from the outside.
Not that it's any of their business, but it will be interesting to see if we see a serious threat from our trading partners.
Just as a side note, this is what would have finally killed slavery had the country not gone to war with one another over it.

As we struggle to wrap our collective heads around yet another mass shooting here in the U.S. — after the tragedy in Oregon — we're not alone in wondering what can be done to prevent them. President Obama raised the examples of successful gun control legislation in the U.K. and Australia during his speech this week. Some Australians agree we should follow their lead — or face the consequences.

This wasn't the first time Australia in particular has been discussed as a model. In response to a mass shooting in 1996, the country's parliament passed a major reform of its gun laws. The National Firearms Agreement banned all "semi-automatic, self-loading, and pump-action longarms" and resulted in the surrender of more than 660,000 weapons. Studies showed that the rate of death by firearm fell by 50% after the laws went into effect, though not everyone agrees on whether that's due to the NFA or an already dropping homicide and suicide rate.

In this country, the Second Amendment and a vastly decentralized government prevent us from getting anywhere close to the level of gun control Australia and other countries have achieved, but on Australia's Today Show, ThinkProgress reports that Gun Control Australia director Samantha Lee proposed something rather drastic to spur American legislators into action. She said that Australians should boycott all non-essential visits to the United States until we do something about gun violence.

"I believe we have a duty to respond to this tragedy in the U.S.," she said.

In 2014, 1.2 million Australians visited the country (not 2.1 million, as Lee stated in her interview) according to the U.S. Department of Commerce, so that could make a bit of a blip on the economy. It would be much bigger, however, if other countries started doing the same. Last year, international visitors spent about $220 billion in the U.S. That's a bit more than the $31 million the gun lobby gave to Republicans in 2013 and '14, according to the

Would An Australian Boycott Help Americans Pass Gun Control?

aside from beer

do we import more from them or do they rely on us for much of their economy?





don't bother, the massive economy of ours would crush anyones if they chose not to trade with us

fucking socialist just prove how little they grasp economics

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

I like the Ozzies, but they've become damned stupid of late.

Says the guy who lives in a country that has mass shootings every other week and has its head in the sand when reasonable measures are mentioned on how to address this blight on your society...

....and seriously, any country that not only voted in a dimwit like Dubya twice - and even contemplated giving the keys to the treasure chest to the likes of Palin and Trump - has no right to call any person from another country stupid.

I don't subscribe to your magazine, and we all say what we like over here.

There is certainly enough evidence to support my contention.

 

[Dr Grump]

I don't subscribe to your magazine, and we all say what we like over here.

There is certainly enough evidence to support my contention.

Such as?

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

I don't subscribe to your magazine, and we all say what we like over here.

There is certainly enough evidence to support my contention.

Such as?

Such as the idea that gun laws will change human nature and prevent violence. Think the bad guys turned in their weapons?

The Port Arthur massacre in 1996 transformed gun control legislation in Australia. 35 people were killed and 23 wounded when a man with a history of violent and erratic behavior beginning in early childhood opened fire on shop owners and tourists with two semi-automatic rifles. Six weeks after the Dunblane massacre in Scotland, this mass killing at the notorious former convict prison at Port Arthur horrified the Australian public and had powerful political consequences.

The Port Arthur perpetrator said he bought his firearms from a gun dealer without holding the required firearms licence.

Prime Minister John Howard immediately took the gun law proposals developed from the report of the 1988 National Committee on Violence and forced the states to adopt them under a National Firearms Agreement. This was necessary because the Australian Constitution does not give the Commonwealth power to enact gun laws. The proposals included a ban on all semi-automatic rifles and all semi-automatic and pump-action shotguns, and a tightly restrictive system of licensing and ownership controls.

Some discussion of measures to allow owners to undertake modifications to reduce the capacity of magazine-fed shotguns ("crimping") occurred, but the government refused to permit this.

The Howard Government planned a series of public meetings to explain the proposed changes. In the first meeting, as a stunt Howard wore a bullet-resistant vest, which was visible under his jacket. Many shooters were critical of this.

Some shooters applied to join the Liberal Party of Australia in an attempt to influence the government, but the Liberal Party barred them from membership. A court action by 500 shooters seeking admission to membership eventually failed in the Supreme Court of South Australia.

The Australian Constitution prevents the taking of property without just compensation, so the federal government introduced the Medicare Levy Amendment Act 1996 to raise the predicted cost of A$500 million through a one-off increase in the Medicare levy. The gun buy-back scheme started on 1 October 1996 and concluded on 30 September 1997. The buyback purchased and destroyed nearly 1 million firearms, mostly semi-automatic .22 rimfires, semi-automatic shotguns and pump-action shotguns. Only Victoria provided a breakdown of types destroyed, and in that state less than 3% were military-style semi-automatic rifles.

After the buyback program, the risk of dying by gunshot in Australia dropped by over 50% and hasn't risen since. The buyback also resulting in a drop of 80% in firearm suicides.

An estimated 250,000 semi-automatic rifles were not handed in and remain in the "grey market" in Australia. The pump action shotgun used by Man Haron Monis in the Lindt cafe siege was sourced from this "grey Market".

The National Agreement on Firearms did reduce the deaths by firearms in Australia, however some note that the overall murder rate did not drop.

The law has been judged a failure by The Liberal Democratic party, which has a policy to scrap the National Agreement on Firearms and allow law abiding shooters to once again legally own semi-automatic centrefire rifles.

 

[Dr Grump]

The law has been judged a failure by The Liberal Democratic party, which has a policy to scrap the National Agreement on Firearms and allow law abiding shooters to once again legally own semi-automatic centrefire rifles.

So there's a mass shooting, the govt bans certain types of weapons and makes it harder to get guns, hasnt been a mass shooting since, and some how this is a failure? Really? The whole point of the buy back plan was to stop these types of tragedies occurring, and it is has. I'd call it a resounding success. Don't forget, although Port Arthur was the worse mass shooting, in the previous decade there had been a half dozen or so. I live in Oz, and I feel very safe down here. More than happy that there are stuff-all firearms available.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

The law has been judged a failure by The Liberal Democratic party, which has a policy to scrap the National Agreement on Firearms and allow law abiding shooters to once again legally own semi-automatic centrefire rifles.

So there's a mass shooting, the govt bans certain types of weapons and makes it harder to get guns, hasnt been a mass shooting since, and some how this is a failure? Really? The whole point of the buy back plan was to stop these types of tragedies occurring, and it is has. I'd call it a resounding success. Don't forget, although Port Arthur was the worse mass shooting, in the previous decade there had been a half dozen or so. I live in Oz, and I feel very safe down here. More than happy that there are stuff-all firearms available.

"The National Agreement on Firearms did reduce the deaths by firearms in Australia, however some note that the overall murder rate did not drop."

I'm glad you are happy in Oz. I am happy here, except for the current government, and the busybodies and control freaks supporting it.

What happened in Oz will never happen in America. There would be no compliance with any such attempts.

 

[Dr Grump]

"The National Agreement on Firearms did reduce the deaths by firearms in Australia, however some note that the overall murder rate did not drop."

I'm glad you are happy in Oz. I am happy here, except for the current government, and the busybodies and control freaks supporting it.

What happened in Oz will never happen in America. There would be no compliance with any such attempts.

The point is that more people feel safer without the plethora of guns (not that there were that many here in the first place anyway). You guys seem to feel safe with a lot of guns floating around.

It could happen in the US. You have an amendment process with your constitution. Of course it would be political suicide to even go near it, but it is still possible, though remote.

The current govt is pretty good IMO. Certainly a step up from the previous administration.

 

[Billy_Kinetta]

"The National Agreement on Firearms did reduce the deaths by firearms in Australia, however some note that the overall murder rate did not drop."

I'm glad you are happy in Oz. I am happy here, except for the current government, and the busybodies and control freaks supporting it.

What happened in Oz will never happen in America. There would be no compliance with any such attempts.

The point is that more people feel safer without the plethora of guns (not that there were that many here in the first place anyway). You guys seem to feel safe with a lot of guns floating around.

It could happen in the US. You have an amendment process with your constitution. Of course it would be political suicide to even go near it, but it is still possible, though remote.

Not in any forseeable lifetime.

 

[Dont Taz Me Bro]

They can vacation in their outback(anyone see the movie wolf creek) or the cesspool that is Europe... It's their loss.

Europe is a cesspool? LOL. I can see you've never been there.