Bowling for Columbine...

[Kramerman]

i saw the movie shortly after it was released. I found it to be somewhat biased, but i htink it made some good points. One of the conclusions about the movie was the fear factor in explaing the rampant violent crime rate in the US. It made a fairly good arguement for this point, but i dont like of it seemed to focus on it, like that was the root cause, or even only casue of America's crime ailment.

overall it was an ok movie tho, even if it was a little biased.

[Kramerman]

i usually only lock my doors when im away form my house. i feel quite safe in my home, as i am quite able to defend myself and my home (or at least i feel this way... fotunately ive never had to test myself)

[gsmoove23]

I don't know why hes got such a bad rep here. The US needs liberal Limbaughs, if only to spice things up a bit. Its completely true, his arguements are as solid as swiss cheese, same goes for his latest book, but hes hilarious.

I was actually startled that he seems to be for gun ownership in this movie and then doubles back and protests K-Mart for selling ammo(a completely sensational part of the movie and pretty pointless IMHO but at least he seems to have made those kids' day). I couldn't believe that he doesn't even mention that Japan and Britain have extremely strict gun laws and almost no gun crimes.

The most unbelievable part is during the Heston interview he gives Heston the answer he needs right before he asks him if he didn't think it was crass to go to Columbine and Flint shortly after those events. The whole movie hes been showing that guns really aren't the problem but fear may be and he tells Heston as much. Heston could have simply answered that after events like these gun ownership and the peoples right to own guns is wrongly singled out as the problem and as the president of the NRA he would have been remiss to cancel these NRA conventions, it would have seemed like he was agreeing with the premiss that gun ownership had to do with these horrible events. Instead of simply saying something like this he gets up and storms out.

As to the supposedly racist comment I've gotta say that I thought it hinted at him being racist too and if Heston is as pro-civil rights as people say then that was a pretty crappy thing for Moore to insinuate. However, when people talk about Heston's history in civil rights they talk about his involvement in the struggle 20 and 30 years ago. Its not unheard of for people who fought for civil rights back then to have changed their mind on the subject in the intervening time. Well, I don't know either way.

Anyway, Moore's arguements are usually pretty inconsistent but I only came to this conclusion after I had watched the movie and thoroughly enjoyed it.

[gsmoove23]

Oh, and I always lock my doors whether I'm inside or leaving, but I'm from NYC(though it is a pretty nice neighbourhood).

[Kropotkin]

Originally posted by DanS
Growing up in rural Ohio, we never locked our door, whether we were at home or not, and even when we were on vacation. The doors to the cars were always unlocked and the keys in the ignition.

But since I'm in the city, I lock the door at all times. Better not to offer the occasion to sin...

Yes, sounds resonable. However, as You've seen the film I guess you remember that he just didn't chose places to test his 'theory' ar random. He walked around that canadian city just north of Chicago. Now, I don't know what vital information, if any, he's keeping from the audience about any differences about this city and Chicago but at least it seems to take away a number of other variables that could explain a difference. Like that of rural Ohio for example.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Guynemer
A lot of people seem to think that the film was a pro-gun control propaganda piece... I wonder if people actually watched the film.

Moore went out of his way to show that Canada has the same gun control laws and an even higher gun ownership rate than the U.S., but has a much lower crime rate. He basically says that the guns are not the problem, but merely a symptom of it, whatever that problem may be...

Bravo... glad to see someone got the message.

In fact, Moore omitted many facts that could have made the film into a "Pro-Gun control" piece. The vast majority of Canada's weapons are rifles and shotguns. Most of America's weapons are handguns. He left these facts out, which I found interesting because they could easily be used to support a handgun ban stance.

[Kropotkin]

That the americans use their liberty to buy handguns instead of hunting rifles might in some sence be a sign of a underlying problem than the root of the problem itself even if it's something that possibly can turn into a vicious circle.

[Traianvs]

Originally posted by Sava

Bravo... glad to see someone got the message.

In fact, Moore omitted many facts that could have made the film into a "Pro-Gun control" piece. The vast majority of Canada's weapons are rifles and shotguns. Most of America's weapons are handguns. He left these facts out, which I found interesting because they could easily be used to support a handgun ban stance.

Exactly my thoughts! Even though quite biased, some examples were still quite freaky, the "gun-for-a-bankaccount" was very 'unusual' and I don't think it was a fake scene.

I don't live in the USA, but at home or anywhere else we lock the door when we leave the place, which is quite natural, as there are many expensive pieces here , and thieves know, apparently, as we've had several (failed) "visits" already

But when you're at home it's annoying to lock the door and unlock it again every time you want to go out for a short while...

[Carolus Rex]

I followed the link given by Wraith above. I haven't taken the time to check all the sources, but some of the things mentioned there disappoint me if they're true (more on this below). But some of it doesn't make sense either.

First of all, it doesn't require a PhD in mathematics or statistics to find the official figures on gun homicides and population for various countries and compare them without any bias. It does, however, require time , which is scarce, so I just took the link's figures at face value. Note carefully what this means: the following calculations are done with the critical link's own figures, it may or may not be accurate figures! Also note that I make the worst case for all countries except for the US, where I make the best case.

The site reports the following gun homicides (population) figures:

Australia: 123 (19 000 000), NB! Here I took the highest gun homicide figure for a single year during 1980-1995.

Canada: 165 (31 000 000)

Germany: 1476 (81 000 000), NB! Here I took Germany's figure for all homicides in 1995, not just gun homicides. The figure is thus grossly exaggerated.

US: 8480 (285 000 000), NB! This is the lowest figure for the US and is said to be the gun homicides in 1999.

Gun homicide per million inhabitants (not per capita in order to get rid of a lot of zeroes) becomes:

Australia: 6.47
Canada: 5.32
Germany: 18.22
US: 29.75

Note that the US has about 5.6 times more gun homicides per million inhabitants than Canada and 1.63 times more than Germany (the runner-up), whose figure was calculated using all its homicides. Rates or absolute values, it doesn't matter, the site's own figures are crystal clear. Again, I've calculated the figures above with the "worst" figures for all countries except the US, for which I chose the most favourable ones. Again, I do not say that these figures are the accurate ones. I've just used the same figures that the site uses to criticise Moore for making "wrong/biased" international comparisons.

Dr Strangelove is right on the money about Switzerland. But this only strengthens the original question that Moore asks. In fact, as others have noted above, that's what the comparison with Canada is intended to point out.

As I said in the beginning, I haven't checked all the site's criticism and some of the things brought up would disappoint me if true. I guess that remaining objective is a difficult balance for any journalist, but that's not Moore's intention. Still, just because others are biased and use shady methods does not justify you to do the same thing.

Why couldn't the bank give each customer a bouquet of flowers to bring to the better half instead?

Carolus

[Kramerman]

Why couldn't the bank give each customer a bouquet of flowers to bring to the better half instead?

'cuz, gawdoggit! I aint open'n no fancy shmancy bank account 'less i get me a gun! yeeeehaaaaw! They got my business!

[Chemical Ollie]

I haven't seen the movie yet, but I have seen some of his TV shows. While I don't share all his opinions, I really like his humourous and offensive ways of expressing them. He could be a real pain to those he choose to offend.

I have lived in areas where it really was a good idea to lock the door even when I was home. Sometimes I forgot to lock and then had to use force to remove some drunkie-junkie who thought my apartment was his. In the house where I live now, a locked door wouldn't make any difference. A burglar could easily break a window on the backdoor, unlock it through the hole and walk right in.

[Dr Strangelove]

Originally posted by JohnT
Where do you live? And, do you not have Blockbusters?

Lynchburg, VA. None of Mr. Moore's work has ever reached this town, not even our Blockbusters.

[monolith94]

Strangelove - netflix Roger & Me - I think that you'd LOVE it. It is even better than Bowling For Columbine.

The left says Moore is unequivocably right, the right says he's unequivocably wrong: the truth, as usual, lies somewhere in the middle.

I've seen BFC twice in theatres, and the second time some parts of it worked more and others less. It's a flawed movie, but important if at the very least than to spark debate.

[monolith94]

A mighty bump

[Carolus Rex]

Originally posted by Kramerman

'cuz, gawdoggit!

My redneck vocabulary is a little rusty , what does gawdoggit mean?

Carolus