Another shooting in the USA. Remind me about the reason for having guns again. - by SubJeff
jay pettitt on 31/8/2012 at 09:50
Indeed, the torturing of innocent data.
If there was a robust evidence based case for gun ownership - given that it's such a big topic stateside and there's bazillions of dollars invested that way - then I can't help thinking that'd it'd be an easy story to uncover. But as the arguments seem to be the logically fallacious and statistically whiffy bullshit of Penn & Teller and good arguments are conspicuous by their absence (the Lott stuff might be interesting, but the criticism his analysis gets is pretty stinging) - then I'm guessing that the data to support a strong pro gun argument isn't actually there.
That said, I don't have a dog in this fight - I suspect there are cheaper and easier ways to make America safer by investing in poor areas and young people and there's probably very little enthusiasm for strong gun controls. America has a bunch of issues and it has guns. You'd probably be better off addressing the bunch of issues.
I did a quick search on goolge scholar, and it doesn't look like there's much done on public health / gun controls either way.
Chimpy Chompy on 31/8/2012 at 10:05
Since I called Viv out on this I should do the same here - point to specific references, rather than expecting people to trawl the entire site.
[edit]and yeah, I'd expect an inner city area to have more violent crime than a leafy suburb, or some village in the middle of Kansas, anyway. The lower crime in that village won't be because just because of them all owning a stack of rifles, there's a whole load of other socio-economic and population density factors at work.
faetal on 31/8/2012 at 12:04
I don't have the spare time to read the entire thread, but one point did occur:
If guns are just a tool, then you have to assess the psychology behind going to ranges and firing them at targets shaped like people, with scores for areas considered to contain the most vital organs.
Transpose this to someone with a chainsaw or a drill - basically attacking a manikin or similar. I'd give that person a very wide berth. Guns seem to be tied into the notion of personal rights, empowerment, superiority etc... Sure, they have their uses too, but we rightly have controls on anything useful which can also be used to kill too efficiently. Yes a lunatic will still kill with a knife if that is their only option, but you can run from a knife. I'm hearing many arguments about what stricter gun control might solve, but very few real arguments for what harm it could do.
If there is a definitive need for civilians to be able to own weapons which are highly effective at killing, then it would be interesting to hear it.
If I've missed some vital part in the thread, apologies - I don't like to drop a comment without staying the full distance, but in this case, the need to make this point won in my internal conflict.
jay pettitt on 31/8/2012 at 12:57
Weapons are tools for people smiting.
faetal on 31/8/2012 at 14:56
(
http://psych.mcmaster.ca/dalywilson/iiahr2001.pdf) Income inequality vs. homicide
Worth noting that the US has the worst Gini coefficient in the developed world (worse than a lot of the developing world too).
When a nation that wealthy has some of the worst illiteracy, homelessness and preventable deaths (among other international indicators of social health) per GDP, you're going to end up with a state of fucked-upness. A sick society produces sick people - hence the US murder rate being so out of proportion and almost certainly why it has such a high proportion of the serial killing.
(Also worth noting that the UK isn't too far behind and our current government are acting like they are in a race to catch up)
smallfry on 31/8/2012 at 15:30
Quote Posted by Jason Moyer
The vast majority of violent crime does not involve firearms (I'm talking over 60% here)
I'm looking through the data you linked to, but what I think you're referring to is the percentage of gun use in "intimate" homicides. This is what I found: (from (
http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/ascii/htus8008.txt) http://bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/ascii/htus8008.txt
Quote:
In 2008, three-quarters (77.2%) of multiple victim homicides involved guns while two-thirds (65.7%) of single victim homicides involved guns.
And any rate, in addition to what DDL mentioned, there are more things to consider:
Quote:
Most law enforcement officers were killed with rearms [sic], particularly handguns
Quote:
Homicides of teens and young adults were more likely to be committed with a gun than homicides of persons of other ages
Quote:
Among homicides for which the victim/offender relationships
were unknown, the percentage of homicides involving a gun
increased 33%, from 59% in 1980 to 78% in 2008
So yeah, things are a lot more complex than just the number of deaths per year.
CCCToad on 4/9/2012 at 23:27
Some of those are pretty obvious though.
Quote:
Most law enforcement officers were killed with rearms [sic], particularly handguns
Seeing as how most cops carry not only a handgun, but tools designed to subdue an unarmed attacker (tazer, etc), its probably going to take a gun to overcome a cop.
SubJeff on 5/9/2012 at 00:10
Is that really how your logic works.
It's flawed. I'll give some time to think about it.
Renzatic on 5/9/2012 at 01:47
Quote Posted by Subjective Effect
In fact it's clear I'm talking about a place I consider less dangerous than the USA because of the lack of guns.
You have an irrational fear of guns, Sub.
Yes, you are more likely to get shot in the US than in England due to the widespread gun ownership in the States. The chances of you
actually getting shot are just about nil. Worrying about getting shot here is somewhat akin to worrying about getting struck by lightning. Yeah, it could happen. But will it? Pretty doubtful. So there's no reason to live in fear of it.
