From: [web d w] at [cbnews.cb.att.com] (bruce.d.woods)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.guns
Subject: UNTRUTHS
Date: 26 Jul 93 13:26:21 GMT

There are many "untruths" published by magazines, particularly
women's magazines about women and guns.  Following is the untruth
often quoted versus the truth which is often ignored or distorted:

(1)  "Semi-automatic assault weapon"  - There is no such thing as a
semi-automatic assault weapon.  An assault rifle must be capable of
fully automatic fire eg a machine gun.  Leading anti-gunner Josh
Sugarman outlined the strategy of labeling semi-automatic rifles
as assault weapons based on the fact that the general public is often
confused between machine guns and semi-automatic rifles that, for 
instance don't have wood stocks or a traditional rifle's looks.

(2)  "Semi-automatic assault rifles pose a threat to public safety"
- Rifles, semi-automatic or not, are involved in less than 1% of all
serious crimes. (from FBI statistics)

(3)  "Armed criminals are killing police in record numbers" - While
the death of one police officer in the line of duty is too many, the
fact is that in 1980 95 law enforcement officers were killed in 1980;
in 1990 the number was 56.

(4)  "A five day waiting period would have kept Jim Brady and Ronald
Reagan from being shot" - John Hinkley bought the .22 revolver five 
months before the shootings.

(5)  "The Brady Bill will keep guns out of criminal hands" - Waiting
periods apply only to lawful sales; about 93% of violent gun toting
criminals do not obtain guns this way.  (source: DOJ, BATF)

(6)  "The Brady Bill would prevent crimes of passion and drug
related crimes" - Not according to Sarah Brady, who said of the bill:
"It's not going to stop crimes of passion or drug related crimes."

(7)  "Guns are a leading cause of death among children" - Most
statistics used to back up this claim include people up to age 24
as "children."  The customary government defintion and medical
definition is ages 0-14.  Using this definition the rate of gun
related deaths is at an all time low:  96.7% of accidental fatalities
among children do not involve firearms.  The NRA has a very active
gun safety program for children and is working to reduce this number
to zero.  (The figure for 1990 was 236.)

(8)  "The more guns, the more gun accidents" - Since 1930 the number
of fatal firearms accidents has decreased 53% while the population 
doubled and the number of guns quadrupled.

(9)  "Guns are useless for defending your family" - In truth, 9.6
million law-abiding citizens have used guns in self-defense.  Each
year about 645,000 people use handguns for self-defense and 300,000
use rifles or shotguns for self-defense.

(10)  "If you try to use a gun in self-defense, it'll be used against
you" - Less than 1% of all defensive uses of firearms result in the
criminal being able to take the gun away from the victim.