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Running Head: UNIT 5: CRITICAL THINKING ESSAY
Unit 5: Critical Thinking Essay
Criminology CJ200
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UNIT 5: CRITICAL THINKING ESSAY
Murder Rates and Concealed Carry
Violence and risk surrounds all us even in the places we consider the most safe and
sacred. From events such as what has recently occurred in Aurora, Colorado to the tragedy in
Newtown, Connecticut people all over are questioning how safe we really are. Occasionally in
the realm of over reaction, we look at the tool or device as the offender of such events, here is a
look at how those tools or devices appear to be used in the rest of the world and how I feell
accessibility to them doesn’t impact rates or statistics.
Lets look at gun ownership percentage per 100,000 people as compared to the murder
rate percentage per 100,000 people. While it’s not exact, the overall point is the number of guns
owned by a population does not necessarily affect the murder rate in a society.
Slovenia, for example, has a gun ownership rate of 5% per 100,000 people and a .001%
murder rate per 100,000 people. We would think that with a higher rate of ownership, the rate
would be higher; however the rate does not appear to rise with the number of guns owned. On
this list, Moldova has the highest rate of murder (.008% per 100,000 people), where-as it also has
the one of the lowest gun ownership totals at 1% per 100,000 people. The same relation, or lack
there-of can be identified in the other points on the graph (Kates & Mauser, 2013).
There are numerous examples of the same that lack of relation between these two number
here in the United States. For instance, North Dakota has one of the lowest mortality rates due to
firearms, and, but has some of the relaxed gun laws in the nation. Conversely, New York has a
very strict set of gun laws, ranked fourth strictest in the country, was also in the top 10 of firearm...