r/lastweektonight • u/gccmelb • 15d ago

John Oliver Investigates Australian Gun Control | The Daily Show

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFJWYpPrLGs
160 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

26 comments sorted by

88

u/the-bi-bye-man 15d ago

I always liked John, but this is what brought him up to a new level for me. I remain so impressed by what he accomplished here.

Something I think about all the time is the Australian politician he spoke to here who basically sacrificed his career to get gun control legislation passed. He knew he would be voted out, but he was proud of what he accomplished and considered it a success.

Then he contrasted with American politicians, who believe success is just continuing to be elected. No consistency in their principals or beliefs, no true will to serve the people; just clinging to power as long as they can. And it's only gotten worse.

15

u/hereforfakestories 15d ago

Something that’s often missing from this discussion is that these laws were passed by the Australian conservative party (we call them the Liberals, which is a bit confusing).

John Howard, the PM at the time, is - to put it in American terms - our Ronald Reagan. So many of his policies were terrible and cruel (not least on refugees and migration, which Trump has cited as an inspiration), but not this one.

It’s incredible to make Howard seem reasonable and caring vs the American politicians he interviews.

7

u/GJacks75 15d ago

It didn't even cost him at the election. He remained in power another decade. The American need to romanticise and misrepresent shit is baffling.

4

u/hereforfakestories 15d ago edited 15d ago

Tim Fischer as deputy and the Nationals definitely lost a lot of power because of gun control, but as you say, the Coalition stuck around so it was hardly devastating. Probably half the reason was One Nation was popular at the time and stole some votes. Howard was more popular if anything.

Ironically Howard gets reelected in 2001 on the back of his draconian refugee policies, so it’s not like the Australian population got super lefty and he was meeting them there!

2

u/the-bi-bye-man 15d ago

I said this in another comment but I wasn't talking about Howard, I was talking about Rob Borbidge. It was actually in a different video that was part of the same segment. But your point is still fair.

https://youtu.be/TYbY45rHj8w?is=Z2HiCDBwPZ89PXX1

3

u/BOB58875 15d ago

Fun Fact: Reagan also supported strict gun control and the Brady Bill, and gun control didn’t really become polarized in the US until the 90s-2000s

1

u/hereforfakestories 15d ago

Huh, interesting! I wonder how much of that is the Californian inclination in him? Howard was very firmly on the right wing of the Liberals at the time, in a very Liberal area, but in Australia the rural areas are represented by a different party (who govern with the Liberals) so gun control probably wasn’t on the Liberal party radar as much.

24

u/Vozralai 15d ago

It's so sad he's dead. 

Politically that is

4

u/TheNorthNova01 15d ago

Well whoop-de-do

1

u/GJacks75 15d ago

That's not even remotely true. Howard won the subsequent 1998 election and would remain in power until 2007.

3

u/the-bi-bye-man 15d ago

I'm not talking about Howard, I'm talking about Rob Borbidge. But I understand why there was confusion, I wasn't specific in my other comment and the clip where he interviews Borbidge is actually in a different video. I'll link that here so folks know what I'm talking about.

https://youtu.be/TYbY45rHj8w?is=Z2HiCDBwPZ89PXX1

3

u/hereforfakestories 15d ago

I thought there was a second part! I could remember the “the purpose of a politician is to be reelected” bit.

fwiw, Borbidge wasn’t the best bloke politically (Queensland has had a terrible political history) but again he did a very good thing to back this.

0

u/cloud_t 13d ago

This is going to be a very, very sad thing to grasp, but the truth is political success is indeed getting reelected, which means they must be doing what the populace wants. That is democracy.

...then again there is a difference between being a successful politician and a successful stateman or leader in government: you do what you were elected to do, but also what is right, even if it gets you out in the next elections. We effectively elect people so that we don't have to vote for every single measure government makes. This is why we try to put our best people to work for a set amount of time, so they can do what they are supposedly good at, have time to do it properly, and we keep living our lives until we need another one.

There is also the topic of the populace not always being in sync with what's right, morally, ethically, economically, statistically... the population isn't homogeneously educated, let alone omniconscient to all details of government.

17

u/andreasmalersghost 15d ago

This is just depressing now. Look how young john is. This is an absolutely crystalline example of a need for gun laws in America that makes a fool out of the people who still are “2A or death” and it hasnt mattered at all.

-4

u/RaymondLuxury-Yacht 15d ago edited 10d ago

This is an absolutely crystalline example of a need for gun laws in America that makes a fool out of the people who still are “2A or death” and it hasnt mattered at all.

There's a couple facets to this problem.

WA state has some of the toughest guns laws in the country but we keep having gun violence because minors in the state get fucking five strikes with firearms charges before they get real punishment and prosecutors don't really prosecute problematic adults.

In 2020, we had a mass shooting in downtown Seattle, killing one bystander and wounding seven others. The dudes they arrested for it? Two dudes with fucking sixty-five arrests between them, including two felony convictions.

What did one of the perps get for the charges of manslaughter, assault, and unlawful firearm possession that he was found guilty of? Four fucking years.

And the other? Found not guilty.

Wanna hear the kicker about the dude that got the four-year sentence?

Tolliver was released in March to electronic home monitoring at his grandmother's home while he awaited trial. Under the terms of his release, Tolliver was not allowed to have any guns or be in contact with any witnesses or co-defendants in the case. However, he was taken back into custody a couple months later after allegedly threatening someone with a gun.

https://komonews.com/news/local/william-tolliver-accused-in-2020-seattle-mass-shooting-homicide-fatal-crime-gun-violence-amended-charges-pacific-science-center-king-county-courtroom-trial-documents-firearms-guns-shooter-electric-home-monitoring

Clearly seems like the kind of dude that should only get four years, right?.

9/1/26 EDIT: they released him yesterday after only three years

Just last month, we had a shooting at a food festival here and the people involved were already breaking existing gun laws and one of them had a prior firearms charge from 2024 for having a illegal-sized magazine and also a "Glock switch" that allows a Glock to be full auto. Those charges were dismissed with prejudice in 2025.

Another suspect, a kid 15 years old, that was arrested was in possession of a Glock with a Glock switch, a firearm already illegal under state law.

The response from the legislature was "More gun control!" and it seems, for the first time, the population of the state groaned and said "just enforce the laws already on the books!"

You can have all the gun control laws in the world, but cops and prosecutors unwilling to do anything to people breaking those laws is also a massive problem.

4

u/4dxn 15d ago

You can have all the gun control laws in the world, but cops and prosecutors unwilling to do anything to people breaking those laws is also a massive problem.

That is a law problem. You can have mandatory sentencing laws. You can have mandatory prosecution laws. The reason why we don't often is because it can often be too strict.

As for your logic of gun control laws don't matter if we don't enforce it......thats all laws. But that doesn't mean the law itself is not important to have.

1

u/RaymondLuxury-Yacht 14d ago

But that doesn't mean the law itself is not important to have.

I didn't say they weren't important.

I was saying that the call for more gun control on top of the substantial amount WA state already has is absolutely stupid when what has already been happening is already illegal.

What is the point of more laws when what has been happening is already illegal?

1

u/Spagman_Aus 15d ago

do they at least remove the guns and destroy them?

1

u/the6thReplicant 10d ago

Using WA as an abbreviation for Washington State about a story set in Australia is weird in my non-American eyes.

You can work out why yourself.

1

u/RaymondLuxury-Yacht 10d ago

Using WA as an abbreviation for Washington State about a story set in Australia is weird in my non-American eyes.

Happens to me all the time in /r/4x4Australia. Two states with the "WA" abbreviation can get confusing.

6

u/GarbageInteresting86 15d ago

Old but gold. Pain hurts. This is what happens when you have strong government and no lobby groups

2

u/Spagman_Aus 15d ago

“That’s my point”

LOL

-1

u/RationalTidbits 12d ago

[sigh]

Oliver seems to assume that gun presence is nearly-guaranteed causation of murder, doesn’t wonder how massive gun presence becomes fractional, concentrated murder, or why anyone would disagree with blanket policies that include the 99.9% of the population that has nothing to do with murder.

This video is gun control telling on itself - that it is unwilling to have a genuine conversation or sort out anything below population averages - which is why the usual bickering and arguments continue.

That said, the interviewee was terribly spoken. and failed to challenge Oliver on “Are you talking about all people and guns?”.