Gun Crime in the UK

Living in the city nicknamed "Shottingham", reputed to be the "gun crime capital of the UK" (copyright - lazy journalists who live in London of all places and can't be bothered doing any thinking, let alone research), I do sometimes wonder what Americans would make of the current angst about gun crime in the UK. As the BBC reports, 58 people were shot dead in the UK last year, but notes

Compared with the US - where 14,000 murders involving firearms were committed in 2005 - the UK is a safe haven.

Meanwhile, in the vicious streets of Nottinghamshire, newspaper reports from August contain lurid headlines of how the gangsters are terrorising people with air rifles (Daily Mirror, 28th August), starting pistols (Nottingham Evening Post, 14 August) and are even shooting a window (Nottingham Evening Post, 13 August). That's "window" as in pane of glass, not widow.

No, I really would not like to be shot in the back with an air rifle. But equally, we could perhaps do with some sense of perspective on this, rather than allow the media to generate another panic to fill their headlines.