Guns are (not) out of control!

[Isaac]

Total deaths in the united states: 2,468,435 per year (2011) 3

Smoking related deaths: 440,000 5
Obesity related deaths: 112,000 4
Alcohol related deaths: 51,9101,2 (Drunk driving + liver disease + other)
Poisonings: 42,917 6
Auto accidents: 33,687 6



Total gun deaths: 31,672 6

Note: Though there are only about 2000 more auto deaths than gun deaths per year, there are about fifty million more guns than there are cars the the United States.


1. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/alcohol.htm
2. http://www.centurycouncil.org/drunk-dri ... statistics
3. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/deaths.htm
4. http://www.cdc.gov/PDF/Frequently_Asked ... d_risk.pdf
5. http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statist ... mortality/
6. http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/injury.htm

[Spidey]

Yes, something needs to be done about cigarette violence.

I’m not a big fan of reducing people to statistics, people did that after 911, and I still have a bad taste in my mouth because of it.

Guns are tools, and like any tool they can be misused, that is the price of freedom.

[Nightshade]

Issac here has a sudden and rather worrying obsession with guns. Posting polls, dialogue about gun deaths and pictures of his own guns.

Why the sudden spate of posts? There may be some kind of public rationalization going on here for some reason.

I'm certainly supportive of the 2nd amendment- but is there something going on with mister Issac?

[flip]

Your just a big ball of paranoia aint ya?

[Isaac]

None of you can tell my title is sarcastic? I fixed the title for you all...
edit: then I fixed it again, because I put (not) in the wrong place

So, what I've learned about e&c:

1. don't give them any curve balls... at all...

2. never be sarcastic, because that's also a curve ball...

[Will Robinson]

Every time in turn on the lights in a dark room I see a couple of little autos scurrying off to hide in the cracks and three times this week I had to go chase some wild assault rifles out of my wife's garden!

I remember when they used to just sit in their place all shiny and lubed waiting for their masters to come take them out to shoot but its a different world now altogether! And I hear its all those damn Tea Party types who did this...

[Isaac]

I have a bottle of AR15 spray I keep in the kitchen that wards them off.

AR-15s don't actually need bullets. They're so ugly that the contaminated light that touches their surface repels bad guys away.

[DoTheGeek]

autos

You mean automatic weapons, not cars, right?

[Isaac]

semi automatic vehicles

[Heretic]

semi automatic vehicles

My vehicle is fully automatic.

[Isaac]

Mine is bolt action, five speed.

[DoTheGeek]

I drive a jeep.

[callmeslick]

I own a dog.

[Isaac]

An automatic dog?

[DoTheGeek]

An automatic dog?

What does it matter, it's a deadly weapon.

[callmeslick]

nah, a fully manual Eskimo. He is sort of a revolver, when dog treats are involved.

I do, also own two bird guns, but they are in a safe in VA for use in duck blinds. Not for self-defense.

[Isaac]

I don't know, you gotta watch out for those scheming ducks.

[callmeslick]

hell, if I was much worse of a shot, the decoys would be in play.

[Isaac]

Did that decoy just threaten me?

[callmeslick]

you know, I've often pondered the ethics of duck hunting. I mean, the poor ducks are flying south, minding their own business, when they spot what appears to be a small group of distant relatives bobbing peacefully on the Chesapeake Bay. Nearby a clump of marsh bushes emits quacking sounds which apparently sound like the words, "come on and join the party" to a duck, and then 'Blam!!', their whole day is ruined. Seems a bit unfair and mean.







.....then again pan-seared or roasted duck is extremely tasty.

[Isaac]

Yeah, I've never been into hunting. Though I have hunted paper targets for a while. They're crafty... arts and crafty.

[Will Robinson]

At least duck hunters hit a moving target. They do don't they? The phrase "sitting duck" just came to mind!

Deer 'hunters' around here put a pile of tasty food down and camp in the tree above it!
Where's the "hunt" in that!

Hell, I might as well call Dominos and hide in the bushes by my front door...jump out and club the goof for a hot pizza and change for a twenty! At least there is some sport in that because he might be armed or know karate or something.

[Isaac]

Tried that once. He only had mail. Tasted terrible.

[Jeff250]

Total deaths in the united states: 2,468,435 per year (2011) 3

Smoking related deaths: 440,000 5
Obesity related deaths: 112,000 4
Alcohol related deaths: 51,9101,2 (Drunk driving + liver disease + other)
Poisonings: 42,917 6
Auto accidents: 33,687 6



Total gun deaths: 31,672 6

Not all deaths are the same.

1) Some are less personally preventable than others. If I don't want to ever die of smoking, then I won't smoke. What lifestyle choice do I make so that I won't ever get shot?

2) Some deaths take more years from one's life by disproportionately affecting the young versus the old. Over 70% of people who get lung cancer are at least 65, whereas victims of gun deaths are disproportionately younger.

3) Some deaths are simply more evil than others. It's enormously tragic when people die of lung cancer, but those deaths weren't caused by the moral depravity required for those gun-related deaths that were murders.

This is why gun-related deaths are a big deal.

[Spidey]

I agree with you 100% Jeff, but what saddens me is…where were the voices like yours when people were comparing 911 to the same kind of statistics.

If I remember correctly Goob and I were just about the only ones to see the difference.

[Isaac]

Jeff, my numbers were total gun deaths. Not total gun murders.

[Jeff250]

So for point (3) when I say "for those gun-related deaths that were murders," only think of the 11,101 gun deaths[1] in the U.S. that were murders and not the 20k or so that weren't.

[1] http://www.gunpolicy.org/firearms/region/united-states

[Duper]

An automatic dog?

LMAO. +1 for Isaac.

3) Some deaths are simply more evil than others. It's enormously tragic when people die of lung cancer, but those deaths weren't caused by the moral depravity required for those gun-related deaths that were murders.

Well, I call that an enormous lack of wisdom. Death from smoking takes a very long time, especially emphysema or heart disease that is smoking related. Accidentally or intentionally shooting someone or yourself is also enormous lack of wisdom. Like Spidey said, it's a tool. It requires a person. Now, if they were selling Volcanoes!... that would be a different story.

Yes Issac.. automatic volcanoes. ...well.. they ARE automatic on their own, aren't they? ...er unless you think aliens in the center of the earth are controlling them to slowly terraform the earth for their own selfish desires. .. um... please tell me you're not....really...

[Isaac]

Jeff, for Point (1) ~20,000 are personally preventable.

Duper, we need to ban volcanos for hunting use.

[callmeslick]

wait a minute......If I had a volcano, I could hit WAY more ducks.

[Isaac]

You might be a better shot with one, but it's really hard to conceal carry.

[Jeff250]

Jeff, for Point (1) ~20,000 are personally preventable.

How do I avoid being accidentally shot by a gun? If we wanted to, we could try to further improve the number for point (1), but I think that even 11k murders is already more than enough to make my case. If not, then what is the magical threshold of how many people have to die of something before you're allowed to think that it's important that we do something about it?

[Will Robinson]

Jeff, for Point (1) ~20,000 are personally preventable.

How do I avoid being accidentally shot by a gun? If we wanted to, we could try to further improve the number for point (1), but I think that even 11k murders is already more than enough to make my case. If not, then what is the magical threshold of how many people have to die of something before you're allowed to think that it's important that we do something about it?

Close to 20k are killed by drunk driving every year. Roughly half are not the drunk that dies. And that number has been brought down 38% in the last decade by public awareness campaigns NOT by trying to outlaw alcohol.

So I suggest we try to turn the debate into realistic solutions instead of Prohibition revisited. The fight to ban or not ban is counter productive and a ban, even if instituted, wouldn't really remove guns. Putting the focus on who is murdering and why they are murdering would lead to positive results whereas the current focus on the political fight does very little to address the actual problem.

The public will respond to focusing on safe storage, cultural propensity for murder, guns related to criminal activity and the proper response in the justice system, etc. much more willingly than they will to accepting the premise that the good guys must unilaterally disarm themselves.

[Isaac]

Ok, Jeff, I'll play...

20,000 is personally preventable by practicing gun safety and not committing suicide.

~ 11,000 to 15,000 are a mix between murders and self defense (which is probably only a few hundred).

Compare that to every other way you'll probably die and the chances of getting shot suddenly look pretty improbable.

[Jeff250]

Ok, Jeff, I'll play...

20,000 is personally preventable by practicing gun safety and not committing suicide.

~ 11,000 to 15,000 are a mix between murders and self defense (which is probably only a few hundred).

Compare that to every other way you'll probably die and the chances of getting shot suddenly look pretty improbable.

My point there was that people can use guns to accidentally kill other people, so I could die from someone else's accidental gunshot without actually getting murdered.

I don't want that point to drown out my main point though: your argument that we shouldn't care about gun deaths because more people die from smoking is bogus. In my previous post, I showed that not all deaths are the same and that some deaths are worse (less deserving, take more years, more evil) than others. So it can make sense to care about one kind of death more than another if the one kind is worse than the other, even if fewer people actually die from it.

I think that there's another factor to take into consideration and that's how easily these types of deaths can be averted. With smoking-related deaths, I think we've hit a wall in terms of how much more effective public awareness can be in getting people to not smoke. We might want to put more money into medical research, but after a point we get diminishing returns ("nine women can't have a baby in one month"). I don't know how easy reducing gun-related deaths would actually be, but many people have ideas that they are very confident about, including people in the E&C.

Close to 20k are killed by drunk driving every year. Roughly half are not the drunk that dies. And that number has been brought down 38% in the last decade by public awareness campaigns NOT by trying to outlaw alcohol.

In my state at least, DUI's were reduced by increasing the penalties for driving while drunk and by actually enforcing those laws with, e.g., checkpoints and increased patrolling. I doubt that the state's lame public awareness campaign had any effect. But even though we toughened penalties and the enforcement of laws, people can still drink as much of whatever they want, as long as they don't drive, i.e., there was no alcohol prohibition.

So I suggest we try to turn the debate into realistic solutions instead of Prohibition revisited. The fight to ban or not ban is counter productive and a ban, even if instituted, wouldn't really remove guns. Putting the focus on who is murdering and why they are murdering would lead to positive results whereas the current focus on the political fight does very little to address the actual problem.

The public will respond to focusing on safe storage, cultural propensity for murder, guns related to criminal activity and the proper response in the justice system, etc. much more willingly than they will to accepting the premise that the good guys must unilaterally disarm themselves.

I agree that unilateral gun prohibition is out of the question, but I also suspect that we can do more than just a strong leaflet campaign.

Two ideas that I've heard are toughening laws selling guns to people with histories of mental illness and to better enforce background checks at gun shows. Personally, I don't really know enough about either proposal to know whether these ideas are practical and effective or not.

[Spidey]

Wouldn’t the better idea be….trying to reduce murder…period?

The obsession with the method used is really a huge disservice to the real problem.

[Isaac]

Jeff, let me see if I understand your points before I try to debate.

Jeff's points:
1) The annual 900 guns accidental deaths are a huge problem, because you have no control over accidents.

2) Guns kill quicker, so they're a worse kind of killing medium, ignoring shot placement, so that a gun can be effective.

3) Other kinds of deaths can't be compared to gun deaths, even if more probable ways to die apply to everyone.

4) Gun deaths are harder to avert, if we exclude gun suicides, gun accidents, and ignoring motor vehicle deaths.

Do I understand you correctly, jeff?

[Will Robinson]

I shouldn't have chosen "public awareness" as the title for the kind of measures I was talking about. I meant to mirror the tactics taken to reduce drunk driving. Certainly all the public service commercials help to put it out in the front of everyone's mind, it encourages your peers and children etc to speak out against any violation you might be guilty of "Daddy, don't leave the gun out of the safe" but stiff enforcement and new laws to attack negligent storage transfer/sales. Stiff sentencing for criminal possession. Mandatory sentencing....you can stop letting thugs with guns get off easy etc. all that would be a part of the program.

If gun owners thought that was the focus instead of outright bans they wouldn't resist...the NRA would shrink back to its former apolitical functions and politicians would be forced to address gun violence at the source of the offender instead of the source of the hardware the offender used.

[Jeff250]

Do I understand you correctly, jeff?

No. My point is that only comparing the number of smoking deaths to the number of gun-related deaths is naive because some deaths are worse than others. You shouldn't find this controversial at all. Which is worse: an accident where the drunk driver dies and the child survives, or an accident where the drunk driver survives and the child dies? If you can't pick, then I don't know what to say. But if you think that the second case is worse, then let's break down some reasons explaining how some deaths can be worse than others and apply this to smoking deaths versus gun-related deaths.

1) Some deaths are less personally preventable than others. If I don't want to die of smoking, then all I have to do is be responsible and not smoke, whereas there's no amount of personal responsibility that will nullify the risk of me getting shot.

2) Some deaths take more of one's life than others. Over 70% of people who get lung cancer are at least 65, having already lived most of their life, whereas most people killed by guns are younger, having a lot of their life to live. This is even a commonly given reason by smokers for why they accept the risks of smoking--if they get lung cancer, they will already be very old.

3) Some deaths are simply more evil than others. When someone dies from smoking, that's bad, but it doesn't have the kind of evil behind it that murdering someone with a gun does.

These are the reasons why the average gun-related death is worse than the average smoking-related death.

As far as yearly death numbers applicable to each point, since there seems to be some confusion,
1) >11k gun-related murders + # of gun accidents that weren't self-inflicted + # of gun accidents involving children
2) >34k gun-related deaths
3) >11k gun-related murders

[Isaac]

1) Some deaths are less personally preventable than others. If I don't want to die of smoking, then all I have to do is be responsible and not smoke, whereas there's no amount of personal responsibility that will nullify the risk of me getting shot.
...
1) >11k gun-related murders + # of gun accidents that weren't self-inflicted + # of gun accidents involving children

Explain the hundred million gun owners that don't shoot themselves every year.

2) Some deaths take more of one's life than others. Over 70% of people who get lung cancer are at least 65, having already lived most of their life, whereas most people killed by guns are younger, having a lot of their life to live. This is even a commonly given reason by smokers for why they accept the risks of smoking--if they get lung cancer, they will already be very old.
...
2) >34k gun-related deaths

A gun can only kill you if you get shot with it, otherwise it takes none of your life at all.

3) Some deaths are simply more evil than others. When someone dies from smoking, that's bad, but it doesn't have the kind of evil behind it that murdering someone with a gun does.
...
3) >11k gun-related murders

Cigarette companies aren't evil?

These are the reasons why the average gun-related death is worse than the average smoking-related death.

So what you're saying is, if you had the choice between magically removing all cigarettes or guns, you'd pick guns, even though you'd be saving hundreds of thousands of more lives removing cigarettes...