Any civilised society can be divided into three groups; the ruling political class (including police and armed forces under political control), the criminal class and the people. Gun controls only affect the people. Criminals ignore laws, the ruling class is "above the law" as it both makes and enforces laws.
Disarming the people always has two particular effects, one working short term and one long term. While these effects are inevitable, their timing and severity depends on various social factors.
The short term effect is an increase in criminal violence. Criminals can more easily prey on people unable to defend themselves. British politicians have disarmed the people and also criminalised acts of self defence, even within one's own home. Increases in UK violent crime can be clearly mapped to increasing gun restrictions since the first firearms act of 1920. The 39 US states which enacted gun "right to carry" laws have all seen dramatic reductions in violent crime. Switzerland, with the highest rate of private firearms ownership worldwide, has extremely low rates of violent crime. The recent Australian gun ban was predictably followed by escalating crime, especially in rural areas.
There is no case in recorded history where increasing gun controls reduced criminal violence. There are many examples of increasing crime with more gun laws and decreasing crime with less.
The long term effect of gun control is a reduction in freedom with a corresponding increase in political control, repression and eventually dictatorship. Indeed, effective gun controls are essential to a dictatorship. The Holocaust could not have happened if Europe's Jews had been armed. The Muslims at Srebrenica could not have been massacred in the so-called "UN safe areas" in the summer of 1995 if they had not been disarmed first (a process aided by the UN).
Politicians know full well that disarming the people will lead to more crime and associated costs. If politicians do know this, then why do they still want to disarm the people? There is only one reason; that is to protect those holding political power from being forcibly expelled by the people. David Lloyd George, the Liberal Prime Minister who passed the 1920 UK Firearms Act, wanted to register all guns so that guns could be confiscated from political opponents and given to political supporters in the event of a revolution. He was afraid that the people suffering post-war hardship would revolt against his government by force of arms and he didn't want to recognise the democratic right of the people to remove the government of the day.
Gun control is the greatest modern evil worldwide because it allows whole peoples to be repressed, tortured, subjected to violent crime, kept in poverty or even murdered while the armed, ruling (often military) class lives in security and luxury. Democracy is only possible if the people have the power to remove their leaders, normally at the ballot box but by force if they refuse to go.
Britain has become a nation of people without guns, ruled by people with guns and preyed on by armed criminals. Nutters like Michael Ryan or Thomas Hamilton who shoot at random can kill so many only because nobody present is able to shoot back. Violent crime rates in disarmed Britain now exceed armed USA in almost every category. USA rates are decreasing, UK rates are still increasing. Now you can't say you don't know why this is so.
If you dislike guns and don't wish to have one for self defence, I respect your choice. Please respect my choice to have arms to defend my family, my property and my right to a peaceful life.