Only changes I would like to see is all guns needing to be registered to an owner and private sales must go through a licensed dealer who checks for the owners eligibility.
Handgun ban supported by majority of Canadians: Nanos survey
- Thread starter Charlemagne
- Start date
Except no one has pointed out what the flaws were in this survey, just that surveys are flawed in general.
It would be quite interesting to see our electoral process develop a system that only those aware of the issues and stances were allowed to vote. I'd be willing to bet that Doug Ford wouldn't be happy with those results.
But sorry, if the poll is on public opinion then all opinions are counted. If you want to fund a follow-up survey that includes a pre-test on Canadian gun laws then go ahead.
Excellent observations. Surveys are definitely there to generate revenue for the pollster. They're not the government conducting the census.
Silly as it is, if the pollsters really wanted to have a truly random sample then they'd need to drop surveys from a plane and hope people respond.
I do not dispute the bulk of your post. I wonder, though, why would one assume or even question that a company like Nanos does not conduct a poll in a scientifically accepted manner such that their results are closely aligned with the opinions of the general public. Unless one knows of any specific flaws in their protocol for carrying out a poll, questioning their results is a gut feeling as opposed to something based on fact.
They tried that with the Long Gun Registry and messed it up. If implemented correctly legitimate firearms owners would have no issue registering their long guns.
As for private sales for non-restricted firearms as per the Firearms Act the onus is on the seller to examine the purchasers PAL and ID. A record of the sale and who the sale was to should be kept. For sale of restricted firearms the transfer of ownership must be registered with the RCMP who also validate the purchasers eligibility and handover should not happen until the new registration paperwork has been received.
But yet again this is legislation that would purely affect legitimate firearms owners and users and not the criminals. They aint gonna follow the rules, kinda goes with the job description.
Accepting the results is also a gut feeling when not presented with the full analytical data that this poll is derived from. Polling is part of statistics. Anyone who studied stats will tell you that stats can be very manipulative and directional. Example;
1000 people are observed crossing streets. Of the 1000, 100 did not use appropriate cross walks or traffic lights. Of the 100 jaywalkers, 6 where hit by cars. Report put out can read;
"6% of pedestrians are in danger of being injured by moving vehicles in our cities today due to poor urban traffic planning."
A politician trying to push their agenda of spending towards road works would use such a report. This example does not mention that the 6% injured put themselves in harms way in the first place.
I would love to see an auditorium filled with a few hundred random volunteers to sit through an information session of an unknown topic. Once in there, they would be informed of Canada's current guns laws, listen to some short speeches from both sides of pro and not. Then take the poll from these people.
Your example has nothing to do with polling. It's an instance of counting actual occurrences and projecting/forcasting an outcome for the entire population from the count. Polling depends on choosing a small sample of individuals from the population, questioning them, then projecting the opinion of the entire population based on how representative your sample was and how meaningful the questions. Two extremely problematic concepts that any reader should look at skeptically, before considering the numbers. Does someone who 'talks' to a robo-caller by pushing buttons on a cell-phone really have anything in common with thoughtful human beings, like you and me?
That stuff's far more difficult than simply counting accidents at street corners.
Not that that's easy, either. In your example, 6% is the percentage of jaywalkers hit, not pedestrians, and it would be quite appropriate to use that number to justify a proposal to improve crosswalks and to create more, in order to bring down the number of jaywalkers who put themselves in harm's way, due to poor urban traffic planning. If you were opposed, you might argue that only 0.6% of all pedestrians would benefit, as the other 99.4% do just fine with the crosswalks we have.
Either way, you still get six funerals. The real question is how many is too many? That answer we determine by debate, not counting.
And handguns...
Which is what I see as the flaw. Add in that if all guns were registered, the private sales would have to be as well.
From what I understand, straw purchases are on the rise in Canada with people buying guns then reselling them to criminals who's records won't allow them to get licensed. A gun registry would allow the government to easily track the source of guns and prosecute in cases where the resellers are complicit.
Polling companies typically provide the full methodology for surveys including the specific questions and the results to each question.
http://www.nanos.co/wp-content/uplo...t-Gun-Violence-Populated-report-with-tabs.pdf
Care to point out what the flaws are with the methodology or analysis?
And do you have a background in stats/polling that you can state where their methodology is wrong? In any area, unless I am privy to some indisputable evidence to the otherwise, that the experts know more than I. Please tell us why you know more than they do. I don't think that a GUT feeling is terribly scientific.
So instead of telling us how polls about pedestrians may be flawed, please tell us how this one is actually flawed.
I would like to admit I did not read the article until now. Nanos did seam to be somewhat thorough. What is not explained is if all those polled where asked the same questions. When I interpret the results in the article it would seem that if you combine the 3 topical survey results, most Canadians support more spending and support towards mental health, crime punishment and increased law enforcement funding. Only one of the 3 support total handgun band.
To answer your question; "Care to point out what the flaws are with the methodology or analysis? ". Today's method of polling is automated through a list of available phone numbers. I understand that this is a business like any other and this method is most cost effective. I would like to see surveys that analyze the data as such; of those polled...results are as such from those who are not fully aware of the laws (or fully educated in the topic at hand), are aware of the laws or topic at hand, live in highly populated cities, or do not, etc.
I agree with you in your sarcastic point "I don't think that a GUT feeling is terribly scientific". When I stated "Accepting the results is also a gut feeling when not presented with the full analytical data that this poll is derived from." My statement was in rebuttal of your comment "questioning their results is a gut feeling as opposed to something based on fact."
As for my back ground in stats and polls...Only University classes, not professional occupation. Same question of professional credentials can be posed to anyone who has an opinion and is contributing to the discussion of hand. Sooooo.....what is your background and credentials to let us know your opinion and thoughts have more validity than any of us?
ALL handguns are classed as Restricted Firearms or Prohibited Firearms in Canada and all legally owned Restricted or Prohibited (If you have an exemption) firearms are registered with the RCMP. If a legitimately acquired restricted or prohibited firearm is used in a crime by someone other than the registered owner the resulting investigation is very thorough and penalties very steep.
I will have to find it, but after Tory and the Toronto Police Service said they had seen a spike over recent years in legitimately acquired firearms being used in gun crimes a Freedom of Information request showed that cases of legitimate firearms being involved in gun crime has actually steadily declined from just over 170 incidents in 2007 to just over 70 in 2017... and bear in mind this is all crimes involving legitimate firearms, even those crimes that involve the legitimate firearm being stolen from the legitimate owner...
I don't have any and never claimed to and I never stated an opinion on the topic itself. I am debating people who say the study is flawed but have zero facts or statistical analysis to back up their claims. They are simply going by their gut feeling. That is point I am getting at.
The pollsters are professionals in their field and strive for accuracy because whoever gets it close more often is going to get more business than the ones who are way off. So unless somebody has facts to back up their claims of a flawed/biased poll, I will accept the results of a reputable polling company. In this case I believe the poll that says a majority of Canadians support a ban on handguns. Their opinion may or may not be valid, but it is what it is and that is what the poll was looking for. Their opinion.
Thanks for that link. The columnist, Matt Gurney mentions that: …those numbers are publicly available, thanks to Dennis R. Young, an Alberta-based researcher who filed a Freedom of Information request with the Toronto police and published their reply on his website." and then summarizes a bunch of data that perhaps comes from Young, but he doesn't actually say that it does, nor does he link to his sources, or Young's site. Can you supply the reference he failed to?
All I've found is: https://dennisryoung.ca/category/access-to-information/ which seems a bit of a hodge-podge, not directly related.
So you have absolutely no reason to believe that the poll results were skewed to show a higher level of support for bans than currently exist.
