"Among the factors determining murder rates, levels of gun ownership is among the most overstated and least reliable... 'There is no empirical support for the claim that gun ownership is related to violence rates'.”
Sounds like a typical NRA quote, right?
Wrong.
Not is the source of this quote a Canadian academic, it's a Canadian academic being quoted in Maclean's, the mainstream media newsmagazine of choice for the Canadian political elite.
More juicy quotes:
"In fact, neither assumption is on the mark. A look at Canada, in the context of international crime statistics and the factors behind them, yields some myth-busting results. More guns, for instance, don’t always equate to higher murder rates. Nor are the streets necessarily safer with more police on the street and more bad guys in jail."
"We (Canadians) have fewer police per capita than about 80 per cent of the world, yet a murder rate lower than Scotland."
"Canadians have more firepower—31 guns for every 100 civilians—than South Africa (13 per 100) Jamaica (8 per 100) or Columbia (six per 100), where murder rates surpass Canada by as much as 20-times or more. Americans are among the best-armed civilians on earth with some 89 firearms per 100 people. Their availability makes them the weapon of choice in 68 per cent of American homicides, and yet even in the U.S. murder rates have been falling."
The next time somebody tells you we should have more "common sense" gun laws like other countries have, point them to this article and watch their heads explode.