My side on the gun debate needs to admit: more guns = more deaths

[Recursion]

There's no avoiding this. Suicides and accidents overwhelm homicides in terms of gun violence.

But I am a scientist. I have Maxwell's equations tattooed on my arm. The data are clear: guns increase mortality, period. Two quick points: safety is not the only goal of law, and outlawing guns does not make them actually disappear. I know both of those. But owning a gun is quite simply dangerous, and we should not pretend otherwise.

[msongs]

1. sorta seems like maybe more gun deaths are from friends n family than criminals nt

[Recursion]

2. Most gun deaths are suicides

Where to go from that?

[NYC_SKP]

3. Effective Suicide prevention is not about removing the tools of self destruction..

It's about discovering and remediating the underlying causes of the depression.

Of course, gun control advocates don't even like to admit that 2/3 of deaths are not by the hands of another, but are instead a symptom of a sick society.

Blaming guns will do NOTHING to cure these problems.

....

[flvegan]

5. Please don't bother "the scientist" okay?

[Recursion]

7. Really? I get quotes of shame?

I actually do science. Seriously, what's up with that?

[Pale Blue Dot]

18. It's like when Scott Brown kept calling Elizabeth Warren "Professor"

In this country, an education is considered something to be ashamed of.

[defacto7]

4. A very reasonable simplification of a complex issue,

and it is true, I believe. I guess this means people need to decide whether they wish to be dangerous, and to whom they wish to be so. Would this fit into a goal of law?

[Recursion]

8. Roughly that's the question I see.

I just don't see it as an easy or simple question.

[99Forever]

6. Careful.

Delicate Flowers aren't pleased about the actual facts. Stop or they'll take away your Manly Man Membership Card.

[Recursion]

9. Yeah I have no worry about that

Thanks, though. More to the point I'm interested in reducing gun violence in actual fact.

[Kalidurga]

10. When my children were young if they were naughty with their toys I took them away...

That eliminated at least that toy that they could bop each other with. Eventually they learned to not hit each other with their toys.

[rrneck]

11. Well, I guess but is that the point?

Yes, guns are dangerous. They're supposed to be. But dangerous for who? That's what people want to know.

Each person that elects to get a gun or not has made a risk assessment. That assessment is unique to each individual. Statistics about whether the average home, city, state, or country are more or less dangerous in relation to guns are meaningless in light of each person's individual risk assessment.

The sad, and trite, truth is that the gun is not the first or primary factor in the chain of events that result in its use for good or ill. Every aspect of a firearm makes it equally useful for offense or defense. It is impossible to change those characteristics to affect one without affecting the other. The presence of a firearm is indicative of an actual or percieved risk which can come from the owner of the gun and from exigent circumstances surrounding that owner, but will not be localized entirely in one or the other. That relationship is part of an individual risk assessment.

Proper risk management has to take into consideration the exigent circumstances surrounding the gun and those who have access to it regardless of its intended use. Thus, a prudent law abiding citizen will exercise due caution and diligence in the use and storage of his firearm, and a criminal will adjust the exigent circumstances of his violent activity to conform to the weapons he has at his disposal and the possibility of apprehension or injury. Those adjustments are part and parcel of the strategies and tactics of human conflict that are as old as the species.

[rightsideout]

12. Having Guns = Higher opportunity for impulsive acts

Yep, most gun deaths are suicide. Guns provide a quick way out.

An impulsive, last desperate act by pulling the trigger ends it all quickly. Guns are the perfect tool to commit suicide.

It's statistical reality and it won't go away. You own a gun, you've increased the chances substantially that an immediate family member will be harmed or will use the gun on themselves. I lost a jr high school friend to suicide. His father bought the gun for protection. Yea, right! Alot of good that did to protect his family.

Not sure why Americans are so into this gun culture. Must be an inherent predisposition to violence.

[The Magistrate]

13. Good For You, Sir

[Paladin]

14. Well Said. (nt)

[Scuba]

15. Thanks. I've come to respect your opinions on this topic, and you've reinforced that with this post.

[hack89]

16. Hold on a second

are you saying that guns cause more deaths compared to a society with no guns?

Or are you saying that as the number of guns in society increases the rate of gun deaths increases?

The first is obvious. The second is false.

[hack89]

17. So if suicides are the majority of gun deaths

what do you think of the emphasis by gun controllers on semi-automatic rifles and magazine size?

Feel good legislation that fails to address the guns that are doing the vast majority of the killing?

[GreenStormCloud]

19. Some people are more dangerous with guns than others.

Living with a violent criminal is very dangerous. After suicides, most gun deaths have a violent criminal involved. By "violent criminal" I mean someone who already had a criminal record for violence at the time of the gun death.

You have heard that when a person is murdered they are most likely murdered by someone they know. That is true, but it doesn't mean that YOUR murderer (If you are murdered) is most likely someone you know - unless you are involved in crime. Most murder victims are themselves criminals, (http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2007-08-31-criminal-target_N.htm) and are likely murdered by a criminal rival. After all, Mafia members know each other, gang members know each other, pimps know their hookers who know their johns, drug dealers know their customers and their suppliers, etc - you get the idea. Even in domestic murders in which a person kills their signifigant other or in love triangles the killer almost always has a record of violence.

Instead of keeping guns away from everybody, try to keep them away from violent criminals and leave the rest of us alone. The rest of us are extremely safe.

Consider these statistics from Texas for the year 2011. From a total of 512,000+ people with Concealed Handgun Liscenses, there were only 120 convictions versus 63,679 convictions for the entire state general population. For murder/manslaugher there were six (6) convictions versus 624 for the general population.

Legal gun owners are extremely safe with our guns.