http://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2013/...ublic-unaware/
Gun Homicide Rate Down 49% Since 1993 Peak; Public Unaware
Pace of Decline Slows in Past Decade
Despite the attention to gun violence in recent months, most Americans are unaware that gun crime is markedly lower than it was two decades ago. A new Pew Research Center survey (March 14-17) found that 56% of Americans believe the number of crimes involving a gun is higher than it was 20 years ago; only 12% say it is lower and 26% say it stayed the same. (An additional 6% did not know or did not answer.)
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." - Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776
So solid majorities of people believe that gun crime rates have gone up in the last X number of years.
Here's the funny bit: most people believe that gun crimes are going up or at least staying level, but the percentage of the population that owns guns is going down.
What does that tell you about the modern American mindset?
"PLAN FOR YOUR TRAINING TO BE A REFLECTION OF REAL LIFE INSTEAD OF HOPING THAT REAL LIFE WILL BE A REFLECTION OF YOUR TRAINING!"
What it says to me is that many people are increasingly willing to outsource their personal safety to government, which implies in turn that they are willing to outsource many of their other personal issues to government.
Think about it this way: people believe that crime increases or stays level, while at the same time people in more and more households are foregoing exercising their right to defend themselves.
This is scary to me. I was just thinking about this overreliance on overstretched police forces in the context of horribly violent sections of inner cities. The cops are unable to be everywhere at once but the good citizens have ceded their communities to the dirtbags.
The citizens of Northfield, Minnesota wouldn't have stood for that.
"No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms." - Thomas Jefferson, Virginia Constitution, Draft 1, 1776