[Politics]The Right to Arm Bears in a Crowded Theater

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 12:19 am

Koumei wrote:
Stahlseele wrote: no, it has to be metal/rock music and violent TV and video games!
Personally, I don't think kids should listen to Jazz or Classical music, because they'll be exposed to too much sax and violins.

oi, 5 bucks for the bad pun jar <.<

K · Post by K » Fri Dec 21, 2012 12:21 am

PoliteNewb wrote:
K wrote:It's a myth that alcohol causes violence.
Guns didn't "cause" those shootings, either. Why is a correlation okay with firearms, but not with alcohol?

Because there is causation with guns. By removing guns, we saves lives.

This is not true with alcohol because the link is only correlation.

(Protip: Correlation is not causation.)

PoliteNewb wrote:If you think alcohol is unrelated to deaths, you might want to have words with the WHO, the US DOJ, and the CAMH in Toronto.

Actually read the WHO report because it agrees with what I already stated about how alcohol is merely associated and not responsible for violence. The other two articles are just lists of correlated deaths and are essentially nonsense.

(this last is not about violence, but it is about the fact that alcohol kills people. But Fuchs was discussing what society considers "acceptable deaths", not just violence.)

And that's where he's got the entire argument wrong.

The argument about guns is about preventable deaths, not acceptable deaths. Banning guns will prevent deaths where banning alcohol will not, and we actually have real-world proof of both of these policies in action in a variety of cultures.

Acceptable deaths come into play with things like cars. Those things are crazy deadly, but their social utility is so critical to society that any deaths are seen as acceptable, and the same cannot be said of guns by any degree.

Their full report basically concludes that assholes who are violent drink alcohol, not that alcohol causes violent assholes.

Blaming alcohol is just a cop-out for cowards who don't want to take responsibility for their actions.
The irony of this, coming from someone who wants to ban inanimate objects because they're too dangerous (even though millions of people--billions worldwide--own and use them safely), is staggering.

Seriously? Millions clearly are not using guns "safely," hence the dead babies and preventable gun deaths. Shit man, half a million guns are stolen in the US every year, so you can't even say that the "good" gun owners should have them.

For example, the recent shooting was done with stolen guns.

Secondly, look up the word "irony." You are using it wrong. (Protip: The word you wanted to use in this situation was "hypocrisy," though it would have been a baseless charge in this case because you are incorrectly making two different situations equivalent.)

Darth Rabbitt · Post by **Darth Rabbitt** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 3:06 am

Stahlseele wrote:
Koumei wrote:
Stahlseele wrote: no, it has to be metal/rock music and violent TV and video games!
Personally, I don't think kids should listen to Jazz or Classical music, because they'll be exposed to too much sax and violins.
oi, 5 bucks for the bad pun jar <.<

I personally despise bad puns, but I have to admit that one was actually pretty damn clever.

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 3:25 am

sabs wrote:Well this latest one has NOTHING to do with the School.
A) It's an elementary school.. Oldest kid there is like 11.
B) Adam Lanza never went to that school, even when he was in the right age bracket.
C) Adam Lanza was homeschooled by his mother.

Just an FYI... Apparently, Adam Lanza did attend Sandy Hook when he was in 5th grade.

sabs · Post by **sabs** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 4:18 am

mm, Yeah for 3 months. Still, that was 9 years ago. It seems unlikely it's really related.

Maj · Post by **Maj** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 6:22 am

Agreed. Just making sure facts are straight.

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 7:35 am

FrankTrollman wrote:
Tussock wrote:The rate of suicide by gun is proportional to the number of people who have ready access to guns, not any higher.
This is totally wrong and I have no idea why you believe that.

Because it's fucking true, stop assuming a bunch of bullshit about how "attempted suicide" is even the same thing as suicide, and look up suicide.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... death_rate

US: Death rate by suicide by gun (2009) 6.1 per 100,000.

Which may include all parties in murder-suicides, though that's unclear.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_co ... icide_rate

US: Death rate by suicide all causes (2009) 12.0 per 100,000.

Suicides by gun over all causes (2009) = 6.1/12.0 = 51%

Household gun ownership, 42% of households. Actual people with access to guns is somewhat higher than that, so the number of successful suicides by gun is in proportion to the number of people with access to guns.

Yes, people don't use guns when they want the result to be "attempted suicide". No shit, Sherlock. They also don't jump off skyscrapers as a cry for help.

I cannot believe that you looked at the firearm statistics for even half a second if you came to the conclusion that firearms were not increasing our suicide deaths. Because it's obviously and trivially true that they do.

See, that's your problem. You believe a bunch of "trivially obvious" stuff about guns that simply is not true. Not backed up by the actual figures. At all.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 12:13 pm

tussock wrote:
FrankTrollman wrote:
Tussock wrote:The rate of suicide by gun is proportional to the number of people who have ready access to guns, not any higher.
This is totally wrong and I have no idea why you believe that.
Because it's fucking true, stop assuming a bunch of bullshit about how "attempted suicide" is even the same thing as suicide, and look up suicide.

Seriously, just shut the fuck up.
I'm going to cut off all your attempts to bullshit up some numbers, because your conclusions are bullshit. Your fundamental assumption that successful suicides are successful because they were always supposed to be successful and unsuccessful suicides are unsuccessful because they were always supposed to be unsuccessful is baseless and insane.

Tussock wrote:See, that's your problem. You believe a bunch of "trivially obvious" stuff about guns that simply is not true. Not backed up by the actual figures. At all.

What the shit fuck? Firearms suicides make up less than 2% of the attempts and more than 50% of the successes. How you could possibly conclude that greater access to firearms doesn't increase the suicide death rate is completely beyond me.

-Username17

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:01 pm

So, given:
* ~50% of people in the US have access to guns
* ~2% of suicide attempts use guns
* ~50% of successful suicides use guns

I would consider the following possibilities:
* People with guns who attempt to commit suicide frequently don't use guns in the attempt
* Guns are correlated with a low rate of attempted suicide

Also, what are the statistics on guns for dealing with (large?) aggressive wild animals (probably more in a 'don't want to go outside because that thing looks deadly' capacity than in a 'ohgodthere'sabearinmybedroom!' capacity), and what form of gun is most appropriate for that? (obviously not a pistol or automatic weapon)

Stahlseele · Post by **Stahlseele** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:09 pm

low rate of attempted suicides.
high rate of successfull suicides.
because it's much harder to not manage to kill yourself with a gun than it is to kill yourself with a gun.

Fuchs · Post by **Fuchs** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:14 pm

The Vigilante wrote:Real democracies have structures and rules that prevent minorities from being oppressed by the majority. The US is far from a perfect democracy, but Switzerland really is no better. Stop hailing your country as a haven of freedom and liberty. It is demonstrably not.

What if someone needs a gun for a supposedly religious reason? Is banning guns suddenly oppressing a minority too? Or are certain stupid beliefs more equal than other stupid beliefs? Can we ban nazi symbols without ruining our democracy?

There's not one true way of freedom and liberty. Some people value the will of a majority of voters more than the opinions of a couple judges appointed by politicians. There are arguments for both sides, and in each case, extremes are bad. But again - I prefer to live in a country where the majority of the voters count more than the decision of a judge. Even if, as in the case of minarettes, I don't agree with the outcome of a particular decision.

Fuchs wrote: It's not a perfect country, not by any means, but it's good enough.

Dunno why you'd think that's "hailing my country as a haven of freedom and liberty".

Fuchs · Post by **Fuchs** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:24 pm

RadiantPhoenix wrote:So, given:
* ~50% of people in the US have access to guns
* ~2% of suicide attempts use guns
* ~50% of successful suicides use guns

I would consider the following possibilities:
* People with guns who attempt to commit suicide frequently don't use guns in the attempt
* Guns are correlated with a low rate of attempted suicide

Good questions.

Maybe those who could shoot themselves and opt for a less sure method actually don't want to kill themselves. The clichee "cry for help".

Fuchs · Post by **Fuchs** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:32 pm

Kaelik wrote:
Kaelik wrote:1) What are the negative consequences of banning all the Xs?
2) What are the positive consequences of banning?
3) How feasible is it?
So let us ask those questions about guns and the various things you whine about as being comparable to guns:

Guns:
1) Absolutely no loss of anything, because gun nuts are literally incapable of claiming that owning guns provides any benefit of any kind.
2) Drastically reduce murder rates. Also other violent crime. Also thefts.
3) Yes, totally feasible, because making guns requires skilled labor and fair amounts of capital, and those people would rather not be fucking arrested.

1) A lot of people like guns. Banning them reduces their quality of life a lot. They feel less secure (no matter how much of an illusion that actually is), they have less fun because they cannot hunt or shoot on the range anymore, they cannot collect guns anymore.

2) You are aware that many major cities already have guns more or less banned, or at least had so for years to decades? And murder rates were still not doing that well? Yes, it'll help with murder rates. So would actually stop with all the hard-core "ban ban ban" shit, and actually help people instead of looking for ways to jail your minorities. What would you prefer to spend money on - banning guns, and enforcing it, or providing help for poor people? It's not as if we have unlimited cops and money.

3) Only an idiot thinks they can ban guns. Please, use your damn brain. Do you honestly think the guys who oppose even slightly better controls at gun shows will hand their guns over? Unless you institute searches of all households - and nix that pesky constitution and all, and maybe push all the conspiracy nuts to actually take action against the "evil government" - you're left with lots of now illegal guns still being traded, buried in the backyard, kept in a closet etc., and the regular "I saved my daughter's life with a gun, and now I am going to prison because guns are illegal" sob story on Fox news each time they can drag or make up a case.

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:44 pm

If a method of attempting suicide has a success rate that is considerably above the average (which is 1:11 in the United States, but 1:20 in most of Europe), then that form of suicide attempt is virtually by definition increasing the overall death rate by suicide. If that method is also a noticeable component of the total number of suicides, then it is by definition increasing the death rate by suicide noticeably. Guns represent more than half of the successful suicides in the US. They are a simple majority, which is about as solidly "noticeable" as it is possible to be.

So to recap: In the United Kingdom, where guns are rare and hard to come by, firearms represent only 2.3% of the suicide deaths. Also, the total death rate by suicide in the United Kingdom is low - just a bit over half of what it is in the United States. Meanwhile, in the United States, suicide statistics keepers tell us that there are 11 attempts at suicide for every one success - while in my Psychiatry rotation in Europe the psychiatry department told me that the rate was twenty to one.

Do you not see how these fit together extremely well? If it weren't for the United States' relatively high use of firearms in suicide attempts, we'd expect an overall suicide success rate of 5% instead of 9% like most of Europe has - and then we'd coincidentally have the relatively low suicide rate of the United Kingdom instead of the relatively high suicide rate of Norway or Romania.

These are not small numbers of lives. If people were successfully offing themselves at the rate of the UK instead of at the rate they are currently doing so, we'd save over fourteen thousand lives every single year. People having guns around the house instead of ropes or pills is a catastrophe on the order of a September 11th attack every three months. And that's without considering the monstrous effects on actual homicides, which it of course also has.

-Username17

Ancient History · Post by **Ancient History** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 2:47 pm

Fuchs wrote:
RadiantPhoenix wrote:
So, given:
* ~50% of people in the US have access to guns
* ~2% of suicide attempts use guns
* ~50% of successful suicides use guns

I would consider the following possibilities:
* People with guns who attempt to commit suicide frequently don't use guns in the attempt
* Guns are correlated with a low rate of attempted suicide
Good questions.

Maybe those who could shoot themselves and opt for a less sure method actually don't want to kill themselves. The clichee "cry for help".

No. Those are not reasonable conclusions for those given statistics. No percentage is given for the number of people with access to guns who attempt suicide, or what means those with access to guns who attempt to commit suicide use in their attempts.

What we do know is that:

"Every study that has examined the issue to date has found that within the U.S., access to firearms is associated with increased suicide risk."

http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/means-matte ... index.html

"Although most gun owners reportedly keep a firearm in their home for "protection" or "self defense," 83 percent of gun-related deaths in these homes are the result of a suicide, often by someone other than the gun owner."

http://www.afsp.org/index.cfm?fuseactio ... 3a70de1fda

Fuchs · Post by **Fuchs** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 3:13 pm

If 50% of the population has access to guns, why aren't 50% of the suicide attempts done with guns?

erik · Post by **erik** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 3:24 pm

Fuchs wrote:If 50% of the population has access to guns, why aren't 50% of the suicide attempts done with guns?

Is there some sort of veiled argument in this, or are you just morbidly curious?

Ancient History · Post by **Ancient History** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 3:28 pm

Because the potentially suicidal population does not map evenly with the access-to-gun population, and there is no reason why it should. You cannot say "100% of the population has access to knives, why don't 100% of suicide attempts use knives?" People kill themselves for complicated reasons, and use available methods. When one of those available methods is a handgun, the chances of a completed suicide increase significantly with the attempt.

Shrapnel · Post by **Shrapnel** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 5:17 pm

NRA calls for armed schools. Fun will ensue.

Kaelik · Post by **Kaelik** » Fri Dec 21, 2012 5:29 pm

Fuchs wrote:1) A lot of people like guns. Banning them reduces their quality of life a lot. They feel less secure (no matter how much of an illusion that actually is), they have less fun because they cannot hunt or shoot on the range anymore, they cannot collect guns anymore.

No it doesn't. You don't get to say that it decreases their quality of life "a lot" it decreases it a tiny fucking amount. People who own guns would rather give up their guns than cars. They would rather give up their guns than pay large fees. This is more you pulling bullshit out of your ass.

And of course, as previously established, even with guns banned you can still hunt and shoot at ranges very easily.

So your actual argument is "people falsely believing they are safe is more important than actual deaths."

Fuchs wrote:2) You are aware that many major cities already have guns more or less banned, or at least had so for years to decades? And murder rates were still not doing that well? Yes, it'll help with murder rates. So would actually stop with all the hard-core "ban ban ban" shit, and actually help people instead of looking for ways to jail your minorities. What would you prefer to spend money on - banning guns, and enforcing it, or providing help for poor people? It's not as if we have unlimited cops and money.

1) Yes, when you ban guns inside a specific area, but allow people to manufacture and sell guns in that area, and don't have any method of enforcing the ban, it turns out the ban isn't effective.

But when you also ban the manufacture and sale, and you actually enforce it, and you actually prevent the importation, you get a drastically reduced murder rate, like England, and Australia, countries which really do exist and are not made up by evil anti-gun conspiracies.

2) Hey dumb shit, maybe pay attention to what people are actually saying instead of railing on for hours about crazy nonsense that is irrelevant?

No one is talking about jailing minorities. See if you completely ban guns, minorities won't have access to guns, and then they won't go to jail. Because poor minorities only have access to guns now because they are fucking available.

But sure, come up with another bullshit lie about how all the evil commies on the TGD who also regularly advocate prison reform and societal reform to aid poor people are just trying to jail minorities when they suggest that in addition to those things we should also ban items which regularly result in minorities getting fucking murdered.

It does not take more money than we are currently spending on cops to ban guns. It would take less money, because we wouldn't have to equip cops with guns. Because once you prevent the manufacture and importation of guns, and everyone turns all their guns in to be scrapped, you end up with a gun free country where people don't make or use guns. See, countries that have already fucking done this.

Fuchs wrote:3) Only an idiot thinks they can ban guns. Please, use your damn brain. Do you honestly think the guys who oppose even slightly better controls at gun shows will hand their guns over? Unless you institute searches of all households - and nix that pesky constitution and all, and maybe push all the conspiracy nuts to actually take action against the "evil government" - you're left with lots of now illegal guns still being traded, buried in the backyard, kept in a closet etc., and the regular "I saved my daughter's life with a gun, and now I am going to prison because guns are illegal" sob story on Fox news each time they can drag or make up a case.

A refutation of your entire point in a single image:

http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent. ... ain/uk.gif

But on a funnier point, what was your solution to reducing gun deaths again? Eliminate poverty and create a utopia. Oh yeah, banning guns would be too hard, but eliminating poverty would be hella easy.

violence in the media · Fri Dec 21, 2012 6:26 pm

Shrapnel wrote:NRA calls for armed schools. Fun will ensue.

While this was happening: PA man shoots people.

Also, WTF is up with this gun store?

tussock · Post by **tussock** » Sat Dec 22, 2012 3:37 am

FrankTrollman wrote:
tussock wrote:
FrankTrollman wrote: This is totally wrong and I have no idea why you believe that.
Because it's fucking true, stop assuming a bunch of bullshit about how "attempted suicide" is even the same thing as suicide, and look up suicide.
Seriously, just shut the fuck up.

Fuck no. You've got something that says people who attempt suicide are all really trying to kill themselves, despite 90%+ of them not doing so, including all those with guns in the house who do not blow a giant hole in their brain ... show it. You're begging the question, and I expect better.

I'm going to cut off all your attempts to bullshit up some numbers, because your conclusions are bullshit. Your fundamental assumption that successful suicides are successful because they were always supposed to be successful and unsuccessful suicides are unsuccessful because they were always supposed to be unsuccessful is baseless and insane.

It fits the numbers. You may not want to believe that people can actually kill themselves when they mean to, but they can, and they do.

International data correlation, guns/100 people vs gun suicides/100 suicides = 0.61
International data correlation, guns/100 people vs suicides per 10,000 people = -0.02

For the log/log versions, it's 0.77 and -0.06, which should be more accurate given the look of the scatter plots, evens out the spread.

The rate of gun ownership is not correlated with suicide rate (other than what I'm assuming is a proxy for wealth and freedom). The rate of gun ownership is strongly correlated with the rate proportion of suicides by gun though. Facts, eh. It's not the guns.

correlation for GINI index vs suicides per 10,000 people = -0.31

Being a more equitable society tends, somewhat, to lower the suicide rate. Shit works.

Tussock wrote:You believe a bunch of "trivially obvious" stuff about guns that simply is not true.

RadiantPhoenix · Post by **RadiantPhoenix** » Sat Dec 22, 2012 5:27 am

So, how does the rate of suicide attempts in the US compare to that in other countries?

Username17 · Post by **Username17** » Sat Dec 22, 2012 7:43 am

RadiantPhoenix wrote:So, how does the rate of suicide attempts in the US compare to that in other countries?

We have about the number of attempts per capita as England, but we have almost twice the number of successes. Tussock's conspiracy theory that people in the United States who attempt to kill themselves just "want to kill themselves more" and take actions that are significantly more likely to succeed than people in any other country in the world is not accepted by credible Psychiatric research. At all.

It's really very simple: countries with more guns have more suicide successes per attempt. There are countries with lots of suicide attempts (holy shit Lithuania), and there are countries with very few suicide attempts. The United States is an overall low suicide attempt country. Very much like the United Kingdom and not much at all like Romania or Norway (where suicide attempts are a lot more common). But we're still a medium-high suicide success country, because unlike any other country in the fucking world we have more than half of our suicides performed with firearms that have a success rate of over 90%.

-Username17

LargePrime · Post by **LargePrime** » Sat Dec 22, 2012 8:26 am

FrankTrollman wrote:
RadiantPhoenix wrote:So, how does the rate of suicide attempts in the US compare to that in other countries?
We have about the number of attempts per capita as England, but we have almost twice the number of successes. Tussock's conspiracy theory that people in the United States who attempt to kill themselves just "want to kill themselves more" and take actions that are significantly more likely to succeed than people in any other country in the world is not accepted by credible Psychiatric research. At all.

But you didn't answer the question. You found one country with data that supported your thesis. Or you already did all the math but are not showing your work? Something like Canada with a gun access rate approximately equal to the US might be more interesting and address the question?

Also, Do you agree people should be able to freely commit suicide? Do you agree they should be able to use a gun to do that? If they use a gun to commit suicide is that a gun control issue?