posted
thats one of the least convincing op-eds ive read on the issue. the atlantic at least had more rousing anti-gun opinion pieces, even if they were equally flawed.
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posted
A German boy recently repelled a pack of wolves by singing Creed songs at them. That could work.
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quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti: thats one of the least convincing op-eds ive read on the issue. the atlantic at least had more rousing anti-gun opinion pieces, even if they were equally flawed.
So, explain. Don't just handwave it.
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posted
first theres the title - 'myth of the hero gunslinger' - obviously he referring to citizen-heros. is that really a myth outside of hollywood? we hear of hero gunslingers every day. cops. citizens who carry concealed firearms dont typically do it because of the off chance some psycho decides to unload on a group outside a supermarket. they carry for personal protection where theres no question who the aggressor is and who the likely victim will be. in the tuscon shooting an armed citizen wasnt able to take down the shooter but that doesnt mean that in future shootings armed citizens wont be of some benefit.
the entire piece is driven by one big hypothetical - suppose, in the few seconds of confusion during the shootings, an armed bystander had fired at the wrong man - well, that didnt happen. suppose that after loughner got off two shots, some gunslinging, concealed carry hero-citizen nailed him in the head with his glock 40? game over. yeah, but that didnt happen either. lets not deal in hypotheticals and instead stick to the facts and reality.
the link to the penn state 'survey' - did they publish the results of the survey? i didnt see a link to them on the new release. id like to see the exact numbers the 'trained phone canvassers' produced and a little more on their methodology. the news release was sparse and confusing, to say the least. and surveys arent subject to peer-review so theyre in no way conclusive.
the other 'study' - also involving a survey - as reported on sciencedaily - typical studies trying to correlate gun ownership with numbers such as homicide rate usually lump every gun category - rifle, high-capacity semi-automatics rifles (the 'assult' variety), shotguns, handguns - into the catchall 'firearm'. id like to see how many people get murdered by someone with a bolt-action rifle.
when someone dicususses 'death rates by firearms' they often use data which represents every death by a firearm - suicides, cop shootings, domestic violence, gang crime, accidents. masking such facts bolster the authors arguments but such distortions perpetuate true 'myths' concerning gun crime.
the truth is, if youre not a black or hispanic male involved in some way with drugs, the chances of you getting shot are very small. walking down the street at night, the odds are much greater that you will be hit and killed by a drunk driver. you dont have to be a staunch gun-rights advocate to see the weaknesses in this guys op-ed. its not suprising though. considering recent events, this was an easy paycheck.
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quote:id like to see how many people get murdered by someone with a bolt-action rifle.
Which is why the gun control lobby focuses on handguns and assault rifles.
quote:the truth is, if youre not a black or hispanic male involved in some way with drugs, the chances of you getting shot are very small.
You got anything to back up this statement? You claim the article, AND a Penn State study, AND a Harvard School of Public Health study are flawed, and the best you can come up with is a bald faced racist assertion?
quote:first theres the title - 'myth of the hero gunslinger' - obviously he referring to citizen-heros.
He tells us explicitly what he's referring to: the often repeated assertion by the gun lobby that if more citizens were armed, there would be less crime, because armed citizens would prevent the crime from happening. And basic statistical data showing gun crime vs. gun ownership contradicts this. Where is your data?
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quote:You got anything to back up this statement? You claim the article, AND a Penn State study, AND a Harvard School of Public Health study are flawed, and the best you can come up with is a bald faced racist assertion?
Is it really racist? I'm pretty sure that black-on-black violence is statistically much more common than other kinds. I remember Samprimary (I think) mentioning in another thread a while back that if you're not black, you're not much less safe from violence living in the US than in European countries.
Or are you saying that it's racist because of an implication that since it's not a problem for non-black non-Hispanic people, it's not a big problem? I can sort of see that, but I doubt it was intended.
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posted
There's data about violence, gun deaths, and race that I've definitely commented on. It's not quite how capax is (poorly) wording it.
Now, the fundamental premise is sound. Groups like the NRA like to say that we're safer/there's less crime if more people are armed. It's not empirically convincing, and flat-out untrue if one is not talking about home invasion and want to pretend that armed populaces are an effective counter to shooting sprees like this or Vtech. They aren't.
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posted
(though I like the idea that I can be mostly safe involving myself in the drug trade cuz i'm white. it'll be like scarface, except I can't die unless someone unearths a black grandfather in my genaeological line)
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quote:Now, the fundamental premise is sound. Groups like the NRA like to say that we're safer/there's less crime if more people are armed. It's not empirically convincing, and flat-out untrue if one is not talking about home invasion and want to pretend that armed populaces are an effective counter to shooting sprees like this or Vtech. They aren't.
I totally agree.
quote:(though I like the idea that I can be mostly safe involving myself in the drug trade cuz i'm white. it'll be like scarface, except I can't die unless someone unearths a black grandfather in my genaeological line)
posted
I am often confused by the Pro-Gun rhetoric. They sound as if they confuse Gun and Shield. How does a Gun make you safer? It won't stop other people from shooting you, stop random bullets or stop someone who pulls a gun on you from shooting you if you pull your gun on them.
The only argument that makes sense is very similar to the vaccination argument. If someone thinks there is a good chance a random stranger will be armed they will be less likely to attack strangers. Hence gun owners--specifically concealed gun owners--create a herd immunity to crime.
While this is a very catch narrative, and a fun theory, statistics don't seem to back it up.
There are three other things that massive gun ownership provide.
1)$ for the gun manufacturers and gun stores. Of course they get more $ for bigger guns, so they want to make sure that any attempt to limit the bigger guns is fought. Similar to the way Detroit fought against anything that would get in the way of their SUV sales.
2) Revenge. Sure, some jerk is still likely to pull a gun and rob you. If they get their gun out before you realize what's going on, there is not much your concealed gun can do but get you shot--until they are done and turn to walk away. Then you can shoot them. Its not legal, but it feels good.
3)Offers you an armed resistance option to the government if the government becomes tyrannical. This is the reason the amendment was put into the constitution. Sure owning a couple of hand guns won't do much against the US Army, but it is still much more powerful in discouraging tyranny than a population owning no weapon.
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posted
4) A massive number of accidental shootings. Aren't the vast majority of gun deaths accidental shootings?
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quote:3) Sure owning a couple of hand guns won't do much against the US Army, but it is still much more powerful in discouraging tyranny than a population owning no weapon.
That's worked so well for the Branch Davidians and the Montana Freeman.
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quote:the truth is, if youre not a black or hispanic male involved in some way with drugs, the chances of you getting shot are very small.
Very small compared to what? I would call a 7/10000 chance, very small for most things. That's the latest murder rate in El Salvador, the highest murder rate of any country in the world.
Your chances of being murdered as a white person in the US, 3.2/100,000, but they are still much higher than in other developed countries. That's over twice the murder rate in Canada or France and nearly 4 times the murder rate in Germany.
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quote:the link to the penn state 'survey' - did they publish the results of the survey?
University of Penn, not Penn State.
And yes, they did publish the results. It was extremely easy to find.
---
Do you take this issue seriously capax? Because. honestly, I have a lot of difficulty believing that people really take these things seriously when the information is extremely easy to access, but they make no effort to do so.
It drives me a little nuts that we live in a society when really smart people are putting in a lot of work into making information easily available, but our public discourse is so blazingly ignorant. How is that responsible? How is that even justifiable? [/rant]
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quote:the link to the penn state 'survey' - did they publish the results of the survey?
University of Penn, not Penn State.
And yes, they did publish the results. It was extremely easy to find.
upenn not penn state. completely irrelevant but my mistake nonetheless.
and i address this more below but, honestly, do you really think i didnt try to find more information concerning the survey? there was no link in the news release nor are further information/results found anywhere on their website. your link, which google provides as well, results in this insightful information:
"This item requires a subscription to American Journal of Public Health Online"
on such a subject, useful information is rarely this hard to find. im not subscribing to anything to find out some 'survey' results. if its a printed publication ill check the newsstands but really theres more than enough information currently to argue the very simple points i was arguing.
quote:Do you take this issue seriously capax? Because. honestly, I have a lot of difficulty believing that people really take these things seriously when the information is extremely easy to access, but they make no effort to do so.
It drives me a little nuts that we live in a society when really smart people are putting in a lot of work into making information easily available, but our public discourse is so blazingly ignorant. How is that responsible? How is that even justifiable? [/rant]
i had this exact sentiment when i read the op-ed linked to in the OP. i dont think the guy writing the editorial did any real homework before he started regurgitating the same talking points that have been kicking around since the early 90s. i felt it was very disingenuous. he used deception and misrepresentation and didnt even make any relevant connections.
i knew this was a bait-thread. i wasnt going to continue participating because i saw the direction the discussion was going. i take the issue as serious as i feel the issue deserves to be. i agree the public discourse on this subject is pathetic and i think crappy op-eds and 'surveys' are largely to blame because they cushion their twisted statistics with emotionally appealing drivel and fail to distinguish irrational fears from rational ones.
i think i should apologize because i didnt approach this thread expecting honest discussion to ensue and perhaps my comments only fulfilled my expectations.
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posted
capaxinfiniti: The UPenn study was funded by the NIH and the NIH requires that all publication arising from NIH funded work be available free of cost online. You can access any NIH study through pubmed.
Here is the link to the UPenn study. linkPosts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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quote:i agree the public discourse on this subject is pathetic and i think crappy op-eds and 'surveys' are largely to blame because they cushion their twisted statistics with emotionally appealing drivel and fail to distinguish irrational fears from rational ones.
Which side of the argument are you talking about?
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posted
I feel like the topic of the article Glenn posted is an interesting and important question that hasn't gotten sufficient attention.
There are a number of scientific questions -- questions for psychology, probably -- that bear on the issue of how effective guns can be in defending against psycho killers.
How good are people at quickly recognizing the real threat without mis-identifying it, the way Zamudio almost did in Tucson?
How much training does it take to become a good enough shot to defend others in a situation like this? Do most handgun owners get that much training?
How easy is it to hit a bystander in a situation like this by mistake, even if you're shooting at the right guy? (Connected to the previous question, of course.)
Very hard questions to answer, and without answers it's pretty much impossible to tell whether armed citizens will help or hurt a situation like this.
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posted
Destineer--I don't have any factual answers to your very good question. I do know that police departments around the world spend a significant amount of time training their police officers to recognize threats with out mis-identifying them, defend others, and not shoot if you might hit an innocent bystander by mistake. And they routinely fail, for in the heat of the moment police do make mistakes occasionally.
So it makes sense that those carrying concealed weapons should all have training that you suggest. Most people agree with that idea. Most gun owners agree with that idea. However, since training and licensing means that the government will know who has guns and who doesn't, (hence make it easier to pry those guns our of those patriotic gun carrying hands--dead or alive) the paranoid and the NRA fight it tooth and nail.
Besides, it would slow up some gun sales, restricting them from people incapable of passing such a test, and that is bad for the gun business.
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