>
>I think it's more a cultural thing, rather than a factual thing. I
>definitely feel safer in most places in Europe, and I never even saw a live
>gun until I went to the US for the first time. There it didn't take two
>days until I had a few of them pointed at me :)

In my whole life, I've never had a gun pointed at me in anger, and I only know one person who did.  He was in a gun store when an attempted holdup went down. He was carrying, and he was a good part of the reason that this was an attempted holdup, rather than a successful holdup.  No shots fired.


>I'd rather confront an unarmed burglar without a gun than
>an armed one with a gun...

Be sure to post this on your door, so they will respect your choice.
:)

>This is not to say that I think gun bans would change anything, on either
>side. But a culture that is less focussed on guns probably is a safer one.
>But then again, guns are only a part of the story.

Have you no murders then, or serious assaults?


I understand your point on the gun escalating the severity of the punishment, we have that here as well.

When I first went to taiwan, I heard on the radio that two bank robbers, and an accomplice, had been sentenced to death. (it wasn't a long drawn out affair like it would have been here in the US)..  The two robbers tried an armed robbery, but it was the accomplice's part that got my attention. HE LOANED THEM THE BULLET.

Taiwan also has compulsory military service, so I would assume every healthy male can handle a firearm properly.

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