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> For example, one of the new tactics gun control advocates have adopted is lumping homicides and suicides together into “gun deaths” even though the policy imp

> For example, one of the new tactics gun control advocates have adopted is lumping homicides and suicides together into “gun deaths” even though the policy implications of the two things are quite different. That's assuming that the reason for lumping them together is an attempt to justify policy. One counter argument to gun control seems to be that gun ownership is a way to preserve liberty and defend the home. It has been repeatedly and consistently found that gun ownership leads to an increase in gun related injuries and deaths for the owners - which undermines those arguments about liberty and home defence, regardless of the type of injury or death. It's hard to defend anything or have liberty when you're dead.

ryeights 7y ago
So we should curb people's rights to self defense because some people might hurt themselves with the tools involved? You can apply a similar line of reasoning to the banning of fast food and cars. Why should the people be held to the standard of their least common denominator?
- yongjik 7y ago
  Personally I see it the opposite way: America's infatuation with guns reflects a world where your fellow citizens are wild animals to be fended off with lethal threat, and your government is run by dangerous criminals ready to take you and your freedom by brute force. This is a world built upon the lowest common denominator of civilization.
  - tomlockwood 7y ago
    > your government is run by dangerous criminals ready to take you and your freedom by brute force. Even more interesting to me is the idea that the American government has such a hold over the patriots in the military that they could be commanded to enforce tyranny. Or, that owning an assault rifle is some antidote against the best funded military in the world, which has been fighting armed insurgencies for years.
    - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
      > Even more interesting to me is the idea that the American government has such a hold over the patriots in the military that they could be commanded to enforce tyranny. Tyranny generally doesn't come overnight. There are plenty of things you can ask soldiers to do that they'll feel uncomfortable about but still do it, and then in eighteen months when it's time to reenlist they decline. A decade later you've got only zealots. > Or, that owning an assault rifle is some antidote against the best funded military in the world, which has been fighting armed insurgencies for years. Because we sure handed it to those Iraqis, and the Vietnamese before that. Counter-insurgency is hard. Having planes and nukes doesn't help you when the bridges and cities are friendly assets. Morale is low when you're fighting your own people. You can't guard every military resource with hundreds of soldiers, but that means the one guarded by twenty can be overrun by a hundred civilians if they're armed. And it only takes one bullet to kill Hitler.
      - tomlockwood 7y ago
        So what I'm hearing you say is that you feel an american insurgency will be effective and persistent. Where is the confederacy?
        AnthonyMouse 7y ago
        You may recall they did manage to put up quite a fight once upon a time. But an insurgency requires a sufficient number of people who feel strongly enough to take up arms. I think if you did a poll today you'd find that the pro-slavery contingent is well below the threshold.
        tomlockwood 7y ago
        > You may recall they did manage to put up quite a fight once upon a time. If I recall correctly they both lost and lost their rights - whether we consider those rights the right to own slaves or leave the union. > But an insurgency requires a sufficient number of people who feel strongly enough to take up arms. Not true. "The accidental guerilla" by David Kilcullen is a great book on this idea. I'm wondering though for what reason you feel the confederates felt less strongly than gun owners do today.
  - ryeights 7y ago
    That's a fair take. However, history shows us that, for every nation, the probability of those two statements becoming true approaches 1 as time progresses. The fact remains that there exist criminals in society who would harm my family and I for personal gain or pleasure if they had the chance, and I would like to have the means to defend myself from them.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- tomlockwood 7y ago
  > So we should curb people's rights to self defense because some people might hurt themselves with the tools involved? Guns don't help with that goal. Having a gun makes you more likely to die of gunshot wounds, either self-inflicted or by others.
  - ryeights 7y ago
    That depends entirely on you and your family's level of responsibility around firearms. Unless you act like an idiot with regards to guns, you are unlikely to be accidentally injured by them. That is what I mean by 'least common denominator': people shouldn't be denied firearms because certain people can't be responsible with them.
    - tomlockwood 7y ago
      Awesome. Sounds like you're in favour of reasonable gun control via strict license requirements and tests. You know - to make sure irresponsible idiots don't get them. We agree.
      - ryeights 7y ago
        Sort of. I don't believe its the government's job (nor position) to protect idiots from themselves, so I would not support such regulations.
        tomlockwood 7y ago
        I dunno, maybe this is a super controversial opinion but I think it may be harmful to categorize a bunch of people who commit suicide as idiots. Particularly given that those people in America are more and more often veterans and men. I also think that by some tragic circumstance or another a lot of those mentally ill people have no friends or family to support them. I'm happy to pay the government to care for those "idiots", to be frank. What do you think?
        7y ago
mlyle 7y ago
I think people have the right to kill themselves if they want. It's not in the same category as involuntarily losing your life through someone else's deliberate action.
- tomlockwood 7y ago
  Ok! Is there perhaps a less messy way to do it than a gun? Also I think people, particularly men, seem to think they're pretty immune to mental illness or fits of emotion. That's another belief that lacks a basis. Whether you die because you had a bad month or because a toddler found your gun, or your partner was angry at you, you'll still be dead.
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    > Ok! Is there perhaps a less messy way to do it than a gun? Of course. And maybe we should encourage people to pursue those alternatives if they're sure in their decision, and maybe take some time to contemplate whether it's what they really want before doing something they can't undo. But we need to do that anyway, because even without a gun, someone may have a rope on hand, or a bottle of pills. We need to address the underlying issue, not nerf the world because we couldn't be bothered to solve it right.
    - tomlockwood 7y ago
      Neither rope nor pills are as easy to use, fast, or as lethal as death by gun. Pills particularly are a really bad example. People mess it up all the time. Pills and rope have the added bonus of not being as lethal in other situations either. Pills and rope: 1, guns: 0
      - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
        Unless pills and rope are never fatal, that doesn't really matter, because we still need to solve it for the times that they are. And if we do then it doesn't matter how fatal the method is because there is no longer an attempt.
jMyles 7y ago
> It has been repeatedly and consistently found that gun ownership leads to an increase in gun related injuries and deaths for the owners This supposed factoid is frequently repeated in these sorts of discussions about gun-related data, but I have never been presented with convincing findings that support the thrust of this argument. Is this more true for guns than any other object? Is there such a strong casual relationship between proximity and firearms and subsequent injuries and deaths to overcome the other aspects of the discussion? Every time it comes to actual hard-hitting facts, this argument seems to fall apart. Perhaps you can help me understand its basis better?
- tomlockwood 7y ago
  > Is this more true for guns than any other object? Is there such a strong casual relationship between proximity and firearms and subsequent injuries and deaths to overcome the other aspects of the discussion? What other aspect of the discussion do you feel undermines the point that owning a gun actually measurably reduces personal liberty via death? What hard hitting facts do you think are missing here?
  - jMyles 7y ago
    1) As best I can tell, owning a gun doesn't increase the risk of becoming a victim of violence. 2) Many decisions in life come with risks: the decision to own a car or swimming pool puts you much closer to the most frequent causes of death for people under the age of 35. But people make rational decisions to do these things anyway and then mitigate the risks in ways that they see fit.
    - tomlockwood 7y ago
      Neither of these undermine the point that liberty and self-defence are actually lowered by gun ownership.
      - Jamwinner 7y ago
        Care to prove that point?

ryeights 7y ago

So we should curb people's rights to self defense because some people might hurt themselves with the tools involved? You can apply a similar line of reasoning to the banning of fast food and cars. Why should the people be held to the standard of their least common denominator?

yongjik 7y ago
Personally I see it the opposite way: America's infatuation with guns reflects a world where your fellow citizens are wild animals to be fended off with lethal threat, and your government is run by dangerous criminals ready to take you and your freedom by brute force. This is a world built upon the lowest common denominator of civilization.
- tomlockwood 7y ago
  > your government is run by dangerous criminals ready to take you and your freedom by brute force. Even more interesting to me is the idea that the American government has such a hold over the patriots in the military that they could be commanded to enforce tyranny. Or, that owning an assault rifle is some antidote against the best funded military in the world, which has been fighting armed insurgencies for years.
  - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
    > Even more interesting to me is the idea that the American government has such a hold over the patriots in the military that they could be commanded to enforce tyranny. Tyranny generally doesn't come overnight. There are plenty of things you can ask soldiers to do that they'll feel uncomfortable about but still do it, and then in eighteen months when it's time to reenlist they decline. A decade later you've got only zealots. > Or, that owning an assault rifle is some antidote against the best funded military in the world, which has been fighting armed insurgencies for years. Because we sure handed it to those Iraqis, and the Vietnamese before that. Counter-insurgency is hard. Having planes and nukes doesn't help you when the bridges and cities are friendly assets. Morale is low when you're fighting your own people. You can't guard every military resource with hundreds of soldiers, but that means the one guarded by twenty can be overrun by a hundred civilians if they're armed. And it only takes one bullet to kill Hitler.
    - tomlockwood 7y ago
      So what I'm hearing you say is that you feel an american insurgency will be effective and persistent. Where is the confederacy?
      - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
        You may recall they did manage to put up quite a fight once upon a time. But an insurgency requires a sufficient number of people who feel strongly enough to take up arms. I think if you did a poll today you'd find that the pro-slavery contingent is well below the threshold.
        tomlockwood 7y ago
        > You may recall they did manage to put up quite a fight once upon a time. If I recall correctly they both lost and lost their rights - whether we consider those rights the right to own slaves or leave the union. > But an insurgency requires a sufficient number of people who feel strongly enough to take up arms. Not true. "The accidental guerilla" by David Kilcullen is a great book on this idea. I'm wondering though for what reason you feel the confederates felt less strongly than gun owners do today.
- ryeights 7y ago
  That's a fair take. However, history shows us that, for every nation, the probability of those two statements becoming true approaches 1 as time progresses. The fact remains that there exist criminals in society who would harm my family and I for personal gain or pleasure if they had the chance, and I would like to have the means to defend myself from them.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
tomlockwood 7y ago
> So we should curb people's rights to self defense because some people might hurt themselves with the tools involved? Guns don't help with that goal. Having a gun makes you more likely to die of gunshot wounds, either self-inflicted or by others.
- ryeights 7y ago
  That depends entirely on you and your family's level of responsibility around firearms. Unless you act like an idiot with regards to guns, you are unlikely to be accidentally injured by them. That is what I mean by 'least common denominator': people shouldn't be denied firearms because certain people can't be responsible with them.
  - tomlockwood 7y ago
    Awesome. Sounds like you're in favour of reasonable gun control via strict license requirements and tests. You know - to make sure irresponsible idiots don't get them. We agree.
    - ryeights 7y ago
      Sort of. I don't believe its the government's job (nor position) to protect idiots from themselves, so I would not support such regulations.
      - tomlockwood 7y ago
        I dunno, maybe this is a super controversial opinion but I think it may be harmful to categorize a bunch of people who commit suicide as idiots. Particularly given that those people in America are more and more often veterans and men. I also think that by some tragic circumstance or another a lot of those mentally ill people have no friends or family to support them. I'm happy to pay the government to care for those "idiots", to be frank. What do you think?
        7y ago

mlyle 7y ago

I think people have the right to kill themselves if they want. It's not in the same category as involuntarily losing your life through someone else's deliberate action.

tomlockwood 7y ago
Ok! Is there perhaps a less messy way to do it than a gun? Also I think people, particularly men, seem to think they're pretty immune to mental illness or fits of emotion. That's another belief that lacks a basis. Whether you die because you had a bad month or because a toddler found your gun, or your partner was angry at you, you'll still be dead.
- AnthonyMouse 7y ago
  > Ok! Is there perhaps a less messy way to do it than a gun? Of course. And maybe we should encourage people to pursue those alternatives if they're sure in their decision, and maybe take some time to contemplate whether it's what they really want before doing something they can't undo. But we need to do that anyway, because even without a gun, someone may have a rope on hand, or a bottle of pills. We need to address the underlying issue, not nerf the world because we couldn't be bothered to solve it right.
  - tomlockwood 7y ago
    Neither rope nor pills are as easy to use, fast, or as lethal as death by gun. Pills particularly are a really bad example. People mess it up all the time. Pills and rope have the added bonus of not being as lethal in other situations either. Pills and rope: 1, guns: 0
    - AnthonyMouse 7y ago
      Unless pills and rope are never fatal, that doesn't really matter, because we still need to solve it for the times that they are. And if we do then it doesn't matter how fatal the method is because there is no longer an attempt.

jMyles 7y ago

> It has been repeatedly and consistently found that gun ownership leads to an increase in gun related injuries and deaths for the owners This supposed factoid is frequently repeated in these sorts of discussions about gun-related data, but I have never been presented with convincing findings that support the thrust of this argument. Is this more true for guns than any other object? Is there such a strong casual relationship between proximity and firearms and subsequent injuries and deaths to overcome the other aspects of the discussion? Every time it comes to actual hard-hitting facts, this argument seems to fall apart. Perhaps you can help me understand its basis better?

tomlockwood 7y ago
> Is this more true for guns than any other object? Is there such a strong casual relationship between proximity and firearms and subsequent injuries and deaths to overcome the other aspects of the discussion? What other aspect of the discussion do you feel undermines the point that owning a gun actually measurably reduces personal liberty via death? What hard hitting facts do you think are missing here?
- jMyles 7y ago
  1) As best I can tell, owning a gun doesn't increase the risk of becoming a victim of violence. 2) Many decisions in life come with risks: the decision to own a car or swimming pool puts you much closer to the most frequent causes of death for people under the age of 35. But people make rational decisions to do these things anyway and then mitigate the risks in ways that they see fit.
  - tomlockwood 7y ago
    Neither of these undermine the point that liberty and self-defence are actually lowered by gun ownership.
    - Jamwinner 7y ago
      Care to prove that point?