Even the non-firearm homicide rate in the US is 5 times that of Japan. Japanese gun control can't take credit for all that. Personality is more than 50% heritable, and by extension, so is violent behavior. (Case in point: the vegas killer's father was on the FBI most wanted list). Personalitywise, Japanese tend to be relatively meek and inhibited. Even if every one of them owned a gun, their murder rate would probably still be a fraction of the US murder rate.

@jwray are you saying that US citizens are genetically the most violent in the world?

Poor comparison.

Whats a good comparison Bob?

Not sure but comparing a non violent society to a violent society is not quite apples to apples.

Imagine saying this but not making a connection between violent societies and access to machines designed for killing.

"In Japan, there are less guns. Japan has less gun violence."
-- Yes but you can't make that comparison because the US is more violent.

???

I think we could draw from this. How about all US citizens that want to purchase a gun have to take a comprehensive exam that test knowledge not just of the 2nd amendment, but also the entire constitution, branches of government, federalist vs anti-federalist arguments, all supreme court cases directly involving challenges to the 2nd amendment, etc. Throw in a federally mandated mental health check from an accredited shrink and voila, guns are taken from the hands of those fighting erectile disfunction and put in the hands of those that actually care about the nation.

PS: don't go off on a tangent about how then only the bad guys will have guns and then we'll all get murdered like, all the time. That's a bs argument and you know it.

Here, I'm gonna throw you a bone:

http://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2017/10/06/555861898/gun-violence-how-the-u-s-compares-to-other-countries

Scroll down to how the US compares against more violent countries.

Ok, then compared to Pakistan, a violent society with likely more guns per capita, our rate is more than 4 times the gun deaths per capita.
Now what?

Sorry, that's pretty culturally-ignorant thinking right there.

Japanese people are not "meek" or "inhibited" any more so than Americans are. There are different cultural rules about self-expression but there are most certainly loud, aggressive, and flamboyant people here. They just express themselves in different ways than your typically loud, aggressive, and flamboyant American would.

You might think socioeconomic factors were a reason for the lack of crime, but you'd be wrong there too. Japan has a higher poverty rate and lower median income than the U.S.

The low crime rates here can much better be attributed to cultural factors. Every Japanese person is raised with the belief that it is shameful cause problems to the people around them, whether that be family, schoolmates, or co-workers. Getting arrested is about the most shameful thing you could do here. Just being suspected of a crime will likely get you fired from your job, before you are even tried.

And let's not forget the role the justice system here plays. If you get arrested you are almost 100% going to get convicted because the odds are massively stacked against you in the court system. You are basically guilty until proven innocent. Read this for more info about it.

And people here know this. They also know that Japanese prison is hellish. You won't be raped or assaulted there like in the U.S. but you will know exactly what is like to have all of your freedom stripped completely away.

You add to all of this the low unemployment rate of Japan, the high regulation of all weapons (including knives), a robust social system for helping the unemployed (although unfortunately lately a lot of people seem to be falling through the cracks), a nationalized health insurance plan (I pay a $1 co-pay to take my daughter to the doctor and all prescribed medicines are free), a strong social stigma against drug use, and the ability as an island nation to strictly police the borders to prevent the influx of illegal goods (i.e. drugs/guns) and you get the low crime rates in Japan.

tl;dr

There is little incentive to commit crime in Japan because the both social and legal repercussions are extremely severe, and there is little need to resort to crime to survive (plentiful jobs and robust social security). Likewise the opportunity to commit crime is lessened because of the strict regulation of weapons, drugs, and borders.

EDIT: I will say that on more than one occasion I've thought that a career criminal in the U.S. who suddenly found himself in Japan would feel like a kid in a candy store. Because of the lack of crime, people here don't take precautions against it--some people leave doors and windows unlocked when leaving the house, you'll see laptops or iPads left in cars in plain view, and people carry ridiculous amounts of cash on them (I'm talking like on the order of $1000 or more in some cases). On the one hand it can be reassuring but on the other hand I seriously worry about these people when they travel overseas.

@SDGundamX those cultural factors are all true, and none of it contradicts my point. Both culture and inborn personality traits play a role. A place where murderers have been routinely caught and removed from the gene pool for centuries is going to be a place with a lot less genes for psychopathy. Not so much in a frontier society without effective law enforcement for much of its history, like the US. The US isn't the worst in this respect, but it hasn't been civilized for nearly as long as Western Europe or Japan, and this is a source of both genetic and cultural differences.

Uhhh... you are aware of the atrocities Japanese soldiers committed less than a century ago during WWII, right? And I think you're confusing psychopaths (who may or may not be violent) with those suffering from a psychosis (a complete mental break with reality).

Either way, mental illness is a huge problem in Japan and in fact treatment of mental illness is one area where their socialized medicine is sorely lacking behind other countries.

I don't know of any credible studies that say that mental illness rates are lower in Japan than in other developed countries, but I do know that the overwhelming majority of crimes in pretty much any country are actually committed by people who are legally sane.

So, despite what you may believe, "genetic" predisposition is an unlikely factor in explaining Japan's crime rate. Besides which, criminologists agree that whatever role genetics plays in people becoming criminals it isn't nearly the most important factor and is dwarfed by environmental factors (see this for a scholarly article on the topic and <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-29760212>this for a popular news article).

You're trying to paint this as two equal parts of the recipe for crime when in reality it's more like "add two cups of environmental and a dash of genetics/personality/whatever."

Crime does happen here. The kinds of stuff I hear about on a daily basis in the news: crimes of desperation (homeless guy stealing to survive), thrill-seeking crimes (stealing a bike because you're young and stupid and the chances of getting caught are pretty low), crimes of passion (i.e. domestic violence, drunken bar fights, etc.), organized crime (i.e. yakuza), and the big one--sexual assault.

Sexual assault is so prevalent in Japan that there are actual signs warning women of areas where they are likely to be groped or have men expose themselves. There are train cars for women only so they don't have to get groped on the way to work or school. I mean, how fucked up is that?

So it isn't all rainbows and unicorns over here. Crime happens, and unfortunately is much more likely to happen to you if you're a woman. Still, even accounting for that the crime rates here are ridiculously low, for the reasons I stated above.

@jwray I think genetic factors play a role in how aggressive someone is, I just think that in a society as genetically diverse as the US it will be impossible that that is the difference compared to other countries. My guess is that genes only explain a small part of gun violence, and no more than in other countries.

I think the vast majority of the high gun violence can be explained by culture. The US is a dog eat dog world. The mindset of the country seems to be Ann Randish / Neo Liberal / Right compared to similar countries in the rest of the world. The US seems to prefer personal freedom over common good.

In a country with that state of mind, you tend to get that everyone fights for themselves and there is less willingness to compromise. Everyone becomes defensive. Throw in poverty (another part of the same mindset) and guns and you get an explosive mix.

It is a classic prisoner dilemma. Everyone would be better off if they cooperate, yet because of lack of trust everyone defects.

Japan is one of the many places that shows what you can achieve with more social safety. It costs higher taxes and less personal freedom, you get back less death.

@SDGundamX you're confusing psychopathy with insanity. Lots of psychopaths are perfectly sane. Being a psychopath vastly increases the likelihood of committing murder. And it's heritable. And it's a continuum. But it's rare enough to be a relatively minor cause of murder rates. In place of "genes for psychopathy" I should have said "genes for anything that predisposes one to commit murder".

First degree murder is less than 10% of all murder. Most murders are spur of the moment. Having a higher IQ correlates with doing better on the marshmellow test and having greater impulse control to avoid spur of the moment destructive behavior. IQ is a vastly better predictor of criminality than parental SES ( http://akarlin.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/bell-curve-crime-iq.jpg ) Japanese have 7 points higher average IQ than the US. IQ is >50% heritable.

@jwray

*facepalm*

You realize the link you just posted is titled "IQ dominates socioeconomic background data for white men" (my emphasis).

Sure, there is a correlation between IQ and crime and it is hotly contested to what that actually means.

To some, that means only dumb criminals actually get caught (meaning we don't know the true average IQ of criminals because the smart ones get away with it).

To others, it reflects the socioeconomic status of the people most likely to commit crimes (i.e. likely grew up poor in a neighborhood without strong educational opportunities and therefore does not share the cultural values that IQ tests inherently load into the questions and furthermore the test-taker may be openly hostile to standardized test-taking).

To still others it reflects the RESULTS of crime (i.e. leading a criminal lifestyle makes it more likely that you are going to suffer traumatic physical injuries to the head that literally make you dumber).

The 7-8 point difference you quoted is not nearly enough to make a difference on the crime rates. 100 IQ is the normally distributed mean and Japanese people on average, score around 106. For reference, a standard deviation on the IQ test is 15 points, meaning that for all intents and purposes Japanese people are still roughly in the same ballpark as Americans with their 98-point average.

And literally the first Google search result when I looked up Japanese IQ scores was this one, explaining how national average IQ scores correlate with the per capita income and national rates of economic development.

In other words, economic factors correlate with IQ, which correlates with negatively with crime, which seems to further reinforce the idea that socioeconomic forces are a key factor in criminal behavior.

Look, we're getting really far afield of what the video is about. I think it is a no-brainer that few gun crimes are committed in Japan because guns are so heavily regulated. We do have stabbings, in fact we have mass stabbings (which is something you don't see so often in the U.S.). The thing we both agree on is that it is impossible for the U.S. to replicate these crime statistic results, whether that be for cultural reasons or whatever other cause you want to throw out there.

Pakistan are 95%+ Muslime They follow a higher power..
371 murder cases, 28 cases of gang murder, nine of abduction for ransom, 4 terrorism incidents were registered in 2015,
not quite as violent as America.

Then look at who is doing the shooting?
Lone nuts--- insignificant
Pissed off spouses -- insignificant
Inner city gang bangers -- root cause of American gun violence

Inner cities have excessive gun violence. Why is that?
No jobs?
No respect for life?
No desire to educate oneself to get out of the situation?
No real deterrent for gun use?

Would a strict gun free zone in such high gun use are be an OK solution that carries the strictest punishment for those that commit crimes with guns ( as apposed to guns being used to defend)? Ho about a 1 year of PSA on the local media before it goes into effect? then strictly enforced?


Until you can get people to respect life and or use the strictest punishment -- I think this will continue.

Better mental health links to ATF where friends and worker can nark to the ATF? This also might help send a flag to re investigate and or to investigate even more on the background check.

Longer waiting period to give ATF more time to do more thorough background check.



What would you propose?

Wait...your take there is that Muslims are <1/4 as violent as Christians? Did you get whiplash turning around that fast?
What would I propose?
First, more assistance for the indigent, as economic status is far more important than race when determining a person's likelihood to use a gun on others. Remove the desperation, I expect you stop well over 1/2 of gun violence.
Second, recognizing that fighting the advanced military with semi auto rifles is futile, I would ban all full auto and mods, and extended mags with a buy back at market value (granted, a ban doesn't remove them, but stops more from being legally sold).
Don't pretend that, because that wouldn't stop all gun crime, it's useless. There is no silver bullet, that's no reason to take a moonlit walk on the moors during werewolf season. You can't stop all auto deaths, but we still stop people from jogging on the freeway

Edit: I agree with better mental health reporting/testing and better background checks (not necessarily longer, but remove the congressional roadblocks to making it near instant, nation wide, computerized, and more thorough)
Gun free zones are a failed experiment...ask DC. Unless you search everyone and everything entering the zone, it's worse than useless.