Japan’s Gun Laws Worked So Well They Need to Ban Crossbows
TOKYO—It’s been said that if you outlaw guns, only outlaws will have guns—but that’s not true in Japan, which has some of the strictest laws on the books forbidding the possession of guns, and imposes even harsher penalties for using them. If you fire a gun at someone here, you’re likely to spend more than 20 years in jail. The severe penalties even deter the yakuza, Japan’s organized crime syndicates, from using firearms. In 2017, there were only three people killed by gunshots in the entire nation.
But human beings will always find ways to kill each other and, as it turns out, when you outlaw guns in Japan outlaws will resort to other deadly weapons—like crossbows.
Thwack.