In my country, to own a gun, you need:
- a membership from a shooting range
- you need to be active in the shooting range (at least a dozen times a year)
- you need to take an exam every 5 years
- you need to pay extra tax every 5 years
- your doctor needs to sign a weaver that you are capable of owning a gun
- you need a special cage to store your gun
- you need a signature of every person over 18 years old, living in your house
- certain calibers are just illegal, no normal civillian can own them... Period (it's pretty hard to own a firearm other than caliber 6 and 9 mm)
- the amount of ammunition you can own is limited (i think you can have 10.000 cartridges as a private citizen)
So it's basically almost impossible to own a gun legally (many people own guns illegally tough). However, gun related deaths are pretty low.
EDIT: even after all these thing, the government can change gun controll laws whenever they want. If you stop complying to the new laws, you have to turn in your firearm with the police for free, even when you bought it legally... (this actually happened on two occasions the last couple of years)
this seems overkill. but tbh, i'm torn on the subject. on one hand, i'm generally for minimal government control. on the other hand, i think the pro-gun culture where i live (u.s.a.) is very destructive and contributes to the significantly higher gun violence here than other places.
i don't have a problem with guns, per se. my problem is with the mass of idiots that worship them and believe they are part of their own identity.
The image of the redneck with his confederate flag in the back of his F150 being the biggest gun buyer is not flying anymore...