@dropbox77177 I did not experience that article as a dig at flyover states. I felt it was complicated, sympathetic, heartfelt, and aching. It showed me how guns are central to some peoples’ lives and identities guns are.
It’s also true that a vast majority of mass gun murderers have a history of domestic violence. We don’t know more about the root causes of gun violence because Congress has banned research on it since 1996.
Re: post #56.
If your stats include only children 0-12 I’d like to ask - aren’t those 12-18 children?
See this AAP (American Academy of Pediatrics) report for stats that bring that % right up: https://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/140/1/e20163486
Some excerpts:
"Nearly 1300 children die and 5790 are treated for gunshot wounds each year. Boys, older children, and minorities are disproportionately affected. Although unintentional firearm deaths among children declined from 2002 to 2014 and firearm homicides declined from 2007 to 2014, firearm suicides decreased between 2002 and 2007 and then showed a significant upward trend from 2007 to 2014. "
“Recent evidence from the National Survey of Children’s Exposure to Violence indicates that 4.2% of children aged 0 to 17 in the United States have witnessed a shooting in the past year.”
" Firearm-related deaths are the third leading cause of death overall among US children aged 1 to 17 years, surpassing the number of deaths from pediatric congenital anomalies, heart disease, influenza and/or pneumonia, chronic lower respiratory disease, and cerebrovascular causes.2 They are the second leading cause of injury-related death in this age group, surpassed only by motor vehicle injury deaths."
Death is not the only end result of childhood trauma associated with guns. Exposure, injury, emotional health, etc. all leave lasting life time effects.
@abasket - you are conflating accidental deaths with intentional homicides. Teenagers in the inner cities are disproportionately impacted by these intentional homicides, which are overwhelmingly committed with handguns and not rifles. The article I was referring to in post 56 discussed accidental shootings.
I finally realized that for many gun supporters, it simply doesn’t matter whether deaths are 500 or 500,000 or 5 million dead kids. Nothing trumps their right to their guns, in their view.
@dropbox77177 I realize that. My point was first of all that “children” usually includes ages birth-18. Secondly, that death is not the only harm from exposure to guns. And third, 1300 deaths is 17x more deaths than the 75 accidental deaths - I for one am concerned about all gun deaths - not just accidental.
I firmly believe there should be punishment for those that knowinly leave unsecured guns around young children, or those that have known mental health problems. Growing up I never came across my Dad’s guns, and I was one to pilfer, because he had enough sense not to leave them lying around. I also went through several years where I did not keep a loaded gun on me because I was more afraid of one of my children getting hold of it than anything else I might be afraid of. Even now I am very careful because they are old enough to shoot a gun(and have) but they don’t always listen and have quite a temper, so I make sure they are not accessible. My ex-husband on the other hand(and his family) leave loaded guns all over the house as well as all kinds of prescription medications.
Speaking of the olympics, we have a young man at school who is only 2 competitions away from being able to compete in the olympics in shooting. He has been trained by his father, who is our school IT guy, his mother is the elementary principal. Very nice and intelligent young man, most people who shoot guns are absolutely no different than pretty much everyone else.
Another thought on reasons for gun use, from a quote that I see often. Teach your daughters to shoot, because a restraining order is just a piece of paper. I think domestic violence and sexual assualts are a prevalent reason for keeping a gun.
@abasket - It should go without saying, but if I had included all “children” aged 0-18 in the denominator rather than simply 0-12, then the percentage figure that I quoted would have gone down by approximately 1/3, meaning accidental deaths to “children” are even fewer than a 0.00016% rate per year.
I am not as concerned about gun suicides as you, as our suicide rate is consistent with other high income countries. Banning all guns - an impossibility anyway with more than ~300 million handguns and ~20-30 million semiautomatic rifles out there - would not in my opinion have an appreciable effect on suicide rates. There is just news this week out about the UK, which has many fewer guns than the United States and yet has significantly higher rates of suicide: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/sep/03/suicides-rates-in-uk-increase-to-highest-level-since-2002
I am sure we can agree about our concern for intentional gun homicide. That is why I support policies like stop and frisk, mandatory punitive sentences for felons in possession of a weapon, three strikes laws involving weapons, mandatory and universal reporting of mental health issues for purposes of gun licensing, etc. If rights need to be curtailed in order to lower gun homicides, let’s start with where the bulk of the problem is. After that, then let’s talk about whether it is necessary to further restrict weapons from the law abiding people who constitute the vast majority of Americans.
Poor Jaxon. He will be greatly affected unless his mother gets therapy to deal with her dislike of him. The article didn’t say anything about the family receiving therapy, and it could since it shared many other details of the family’s life since the tragedy.
No, @heartofdixie, I don’t think shooters are like the rest of us at all. We don’t know people who leave guns around children who, to quote you, have quite a temper and don’t always listen, nor do we expect our daughters to defend themselves by shooting violent domestic abusers. Not in my world.
There isn’t one particular gun culture, there are many cultures, some of which involve guns.
Some people shoot for competition and recreation, just like other people race cars, run marathons, or decorate cupcakes. It’s what they do for fun and entertainment, and when they do it right it involves training and discipline. Why should we have cupcakes? Don’t they contribute to obesity? Sure we have to eat, but all that gluten and sugar and fat? I can come up with a million reason why your hobby is frivolous and mine is useful, but the point is that different people like different activities. And that’s a feature not a bug for humanity. We need different interests and skills.
Some people have guns for protection. In my leafy green suburb crime is low. Some crime is everywhere, like domestic violence, drunk driving, drug use, and infrequent property crime to support drug use by people whose families have learned to lock up the cash and jewelry. But in a lot of urban and rural areas the density of criminals greatly exceeds the reach of law enforcement. If there is no reasonable expectation that you can and will protect your life and property you are at greater risk of becoming a victim. It would be pleasant to think that few people would commit crimes, but visible deterrence, or the knowledge that lethal deterrence is common, keeps people in line that would otherwise be tempted to commit crimes.
Some people like guns because they are bullies. That’s also the reason some people bulk up at the gym, cut you off in traffic, or run for the HOA board presidency. The gun doesn’t make the bully.
There is abundant evidence that the presence of guns does not deter crime. If they did, the US would be among the safest places. The opposite is more likely.
One thing I would like to see tried involving the mass shooters is for the media to treat them with derision and ridicule instead of awe and fear. I’d much rather make potential mass shooters know that they will be remembered, if at all, as weak, and have all their flaws and embarrassing life details picked over and laughed at by the public than have them expect that their exploits will be recounted with fear and horror.
That may sound unfair to victims, and I’m not suggesting we ridicule the crime. Just the criminal. Prevent crime by preventing the outcome the criminal wants.
We have evidence from US states that some kinds of gun laws (that do not involve confiscating all guns), but not others, are associated with reduced firearm homicides. An example of the former is universal background checks, which is supported by 90% in a recent poll, including 93% of gun owners.
I hear this a lot. So, help me understand: How do you explain countries like the UK, Australia, Sweden, Norway, Japan, South Korea, etc., which have close to zero gun deaths? Why do you think that their criminals and mentally unstable people are not getting their hands on guns? Also, how do you explain the situation in Australia?When they enacted strict gun laws, the gun violence rate plummeted.
^Some of those countries effectively banned private possession of firearms. It would be difficult to do that in the US without repealing the Second Amendment.
When it was founded, the NRA membership was largely sport shooters who were interested in improving marksmanship. In its early years, the NRA was highly supportive of responsible gun control, especially during the prohibition era when gangsters were out of control with Tommy guns. The NRA supported the Gun Control Act of 1938 which not only placed high taxes on machine guns and the like but also required owners to register their guns. “I have never believed in the general practice of carrying weapons. I think it should be sharply restricted and only under licences.” (then-NRA President Karl Federick).
Now, fast forward to 1968 when the civil rights era saw riots in the streets. Then, just a few years later in 1971, federal agents shot during a raid a NRA member who was stockpiling an arsenal of unregistered weapons, including guns and grenades. A federal court ruled the shooting justified, and the NRA started to turn its focus.
As the 1970s progressed, NRA membership started to include more gun manufacturers (who, let’s face it, care more about making money selling guns that saving lives), and the new NRA president himself was a former border patrol agent who once shot a man he suspected stole a car. That president, Harlan Carter, was the man who coined the rhetoric “You don’t stop crime by attacking guns. You stop crime by stopping criminals.” Also during the 1970s, the NRA became involved in lobbying and started grading congressmen on how they voted the NRA agenda. Incidentally, the NRA backed its first president in 1980 - Ronald Reagan.
So, that is how we got to where we are today. Thanks to the power of the internet, and people who aren’t interested in digging around to find out how things came to be, the NRA has become a powerful lobby that is scaring its members into thinking that the government wants to take away their beloved hunting rifles. Because the NRA doesn’t have a stake in personal rocket launchers or armored vehicles, they have no financial reason to advocate for them. Always follow the money trail.
Interestingly, data show that the states with the least restrictive gun laws see the most mass shootings per capita, putting the “good guys with guns” theory out the window (https://www.bmj.com/content/364/bmj.l542). Researchers found that “for every 10-point relaxation in a state’s gun laws, the rates of mass shootings in that state increased by 11.5 percent.”
Personally, I live in a gun-friendly state where people hunt. I own a gun and can shoot well enough to at least do some damage if not downright kill them. There is a fine line regarding the Second Amendment. On one hand, you want “the people” to be armed and able to protect themselves from unreasonable quartering from the government (think about the effect of how easily it was for the Nazis to control the Jews once they took their guns away). On the other hand, the law specifically mentions that a “reasonable citizen” has the right to bear arms, which then creates a burden of what is an unreasonable citizen and what are their rights?