this post was submitted on 30 Oct 2023
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Huh, it must have been an outdated info that Switzerland has the most guns per capita. But still, they have large amounts of guns per person nonethless and yet very virtually no mass shooting.
As an aside, the Swiss women's suffrage is constantly brought up as Switzerland not being democratic and being late in the modern world. I'm not trying to justify it, but that is always misconceived. Every Swiss canton in 90s but one kept rejecting the women's suffrage in their local referendums, because that canton is overwhelmingly populated by couple of hundreds of old rural people stuck in their ways. It took the Swiss Supreme Court to force that canton to finally allow women to vote. Because of that one canton, everyone outside of Switzerland thought the entire country did not allow women to vote until the 90s, which gave the country a bad historical reputation and myth.
What I said isn't a myth though. They weren't allowed to vote until the 70s. All suffrage movements start and end somewhere and there's ended later than most in Europe. Over 50% of men in Switzerland voted against women voting just ten years prior to them getting it.
Which lends exactly to my point: if we're to pick something to judge Switzerland by, it's something like that. Not misinformation about guns per capita.
Like I said, it is just one canton. People make it as though the entirety of Switzerland did not allow women to vote until the 90s when it is just one canton. It is essentially a myth. I'm not defending what happened, I'm saying it is a misconception and a myth at best.
This isn't a myth and saying "it's one canton" doesn't absolve the people who voted overwhelmingly against women being able to vote.
The result is right here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/1959_Swiss_referendums#:~:text=The%20first%20was%20held%20on,approved%20by%2062%25%20of%20voters.
I just can't figure out for the life of me why you want to defend this or keep calling it a myth.
Oh you're talking about the 70s. Most people talk about the 90s when that one Swiss canton still did not allow women to vote on federal level, making as though entirety of Switzerland did not allow women to vote until the year 1990.
But sorry to be pedantic (and I am being one because I am a historical nerd and annoyed by perpetuation of historical myths), but it is Liechtenstein which is the last European country not to have allowed women to vote until 1984, not Switzerland.
I didn't say anything about them being "last". You make a lot of stuff up for someone who cares about facts.
I misread the previous comments.
In any case, voting rights has nothing to do with gun policies. Switzerland is pretty conservative, but it can't be denied that their gun policies and culture is sensible. American conservatives, usually the proponents of looser gun regulations, could learn from the Swiss. Give credit to where it is due.
I didn't say they had anything to do with each other, I specifically used it as an example of where Swiss policy differs from international consensus, much as American policy on gun control does from the rest of the world.
I accept your agreement on the other parts.