4 ms·

Ok, here's a Harvard analysis of peer-reviewed studies: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/gun-threats-and-self-defense-gun-use-2/ https://www

Ok, here's a Harvard analysis of peer-reviewed studies: https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/gun-threats-and-self-defense-gun-use-2/ https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc/firearms-research/gun-thr.... Some highlights: > We find that the claim of many millions of annual self-defense gun uses by American citizens is invalid. > Criminal court judges who read the self-reported accounts of the purported self-defense gun use rated a majority as being illegal > Most purported self-defense gun uses are gun uses in escalating arguments, and are both socially undesirable and illegal > We found that firearms are used far more often to frighten and intimidate than they are used in self-defense. > We found that guns in the home are used more often to frighten intimates than to thwart crime > most of the reported self-defense gun uses were hostile interactions between armed adolescents > We found that one in four of these detainees had been wounded, in events that appear unrelated to their incarceration. Most were shot when they were victims of robberies, assaults and crossfires. Virtually none report being wounded by a “law-abiding citizen.” > little evidence that self-defense gun use is uniquely beneficial in reducing the likelihood of injury or property loss Overall, it seems that: * Many publicized statistics about self-defense usage are inaccurate (millions of self-defensive usages appears to be completely impossible, for example). * Even legal guns are used more often illegally than for self-defense, generally for intimidation or during escalating arguments. * When used for legal self-defense, guns do not appear to be any more effective than other defensive alternatives for protecting either you or your property. These are high-profile peer-reviewed studies from a variety of research organizations, backed by varied selection of sources, and they come to consistent conclusions. I'd be interested to see any similar analysis that points towards any other conclusion.

giantg2 5y ago
Those studies are pretty old (97-04). Here's a more recent one done in 2013 by the CDC (link to report in article, but costs money). It seems to refute some of the claims in those articles. Also, it would seem that Harvard has some bias (as everyone does) given they choose to hold on to these older studies and they are all one sided. Some of them seem pretty poorly formed from a basic conceptual standpoint (ie that a defensive gun use requires that one shoots the assailant which is inconsistent with the definition that they are trying to verify, or that using a sample size of 300 claim that women never use a gun to defend against sexual assualt even though there are news reports showing it does occur). https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cdc-study-use-firearms-self-defense-important-crime-deterrent https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cdc-study-use-firearms-... The study of the two phone surveys that were reviewed by judges piqued my interest. I was intrigued to see what these judges were reviewing (I thought maybe cases or police reports). Then it got interesting from a design point of view.
- giantg2 5y ago
  Why downvote? I would like to know what's wrong...
SV_BubbleTime 5y ago
Not only is that old information as another user posted, but it’s all literally funded by Joyce Foundation and later Michael Bloomberg directly. The Harvard School Of Public Health is without any exaggeration a paid-for propaganda wing. No one actually takes them seriously. You clearly don’t know gun control history, but see how many references are by Hemenway, David? He is probably the #1 junk science producer in the field. You know how the CDC was banned from studying gun control? (They weren’t actually, they or banned from recommending policy, which meant that suddenly no one wanted them to study gun control anymore) Well, it was Bill Clinton in 90 to the direct to the CDC to fund a bunch of junk science in order to drum up support for his assault weapons ban and 93/94. Millions of dollars went to Hemenway, Who produced garbage studies, small sample size, never released the data, everything he published has been fully discredited. This guy’s “work” was the reason the Dickey amendment passed. Absolute garbage from the 90s. Still alive and kicking today. they posted up on their site, it says Harvard, here you are happy to post it. Same plan they had in 1992. EDIT: To add on to the other user’s correct comments about the junk science. Hemenway is “famous” for his bad methodology, like the phone surveys, and looking at incidents where a gun was used in the home but not who the gun owner was, meaning every drug shooting was counted, hardly representative of most people’s lives. EDIT2: I asked for evidence of these fantastic claims, and you posted classic trade-A nonsense that everyone who knows anything on the topic has seen for 20 some years. Probably the first search result you found. Do you really consider yourself to know anything on this topic? Why is it you think you do?
- pimterry 5y ago
  As in my previous post: I'd be interested to see any similar research that points towards any other conclusion. Seriously, I don't have a dog in this fight, I'm interested in the reality. In your previous comment, you asked for evidence - I've provided a selection of studies supporting the previous poster's position. If you disagree, please produce peer-reviewed studies refuting these points. Currently you're listing unsupported ad-hominems against both the various researchers involved and Harvard (and honestly, I think saying that nobody takes Harvard seriously is a bit of a stretch). Regardless of the individuals: the linked studies were all reviewed in depth and accepted by a wide assortment of respected academic journals from across the field of public health. If you think there are specific flaws in the methodology then please, be specific, but rejecting evidence you disagree with as 'junk science' out of hand is not helpful. The 'small sample size' and 'unreleased data' you reference is specifically tenuous, since much of the referenced research is based entirely on public data & official statistics, such as the National Crime Victimization Survey (https://bjs.ojp.gov/data-collection/ncvs https://bjs.ojp.gov/data-collection/ncvs) produced and released annually by the US Justice Department. On age: the sibling reply here was wrong and the most recent study listed in that Harvard analysis is actually 2015, but still, age has little bearing here unless you think there's been a very significant change in gun usage in recent years that would invalidate the past conclusions. If so, do please explain why that is. In the meantime, take a look at https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2763812 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/articl... as one more example: a 2020 research paper published by a peer-reviewed medical journal, which doesn't involve David Hemenway or Harvard, but supports similar claims backed by public fatality statistics from 2011-2018, and specifically showing that gun self-defense statistics today continue to match patterns from past research in the 80s. I understand that you don't agree with this research. If you want to convince anybody else, find some concrete reviewed research or hard statistics that directly support your claims (specifically, research that shows "Firearms are used almost exclusively for legal defense", as you claimed above).
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

giantg2 5y ago

Those studies are pretty old (97-04). Here's a more recent one done in 2013 by the CDC (link to report in article, but costs money). It seems to refute some of the claims in those articles. Also, it would seem that Harvard has some bias (as everyone does) given they choose to hold on to these older studies and they are all one sided. Some of them seem pretty poorly formed from a basic conceptual standpoint (ie that a defensive gun use requires that one shoots the assailant which is inconsistent with the definition that they are trying to verify, or that using a sample size of 300 claim that women never use a gun to defend against sexual assualt even though there are news reports showing it does occur). https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cdc-study-use-firearms-self-defense-important-crime-deterrent https://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/cdc-study-use-firearms-... The study of the two phone surveys that were reviewed by judges piqued my interest. I was intrigued to see what these judges were reviewing (I thought maybe cases or police reports). Then it got interesting from a design point of view.

giantg2 5y ago
Why downvote? I would like to know what's wrong...

SV_BubbleTime 5y ago

Not only is that old information as another user posted, but it’s all literally funded by Joyce Foundation and later Michael Bloomberg directly. The Harvard School Of Public Health is without any exaggeration a paid-for propaganda wing. No one actually takes them seriously. You clearly don’t know gun control history, but see how many references are by Hemenway, David? He is probably the #1 junk science producer in the field. You know how the CDC was banned from studying gun control? (They weren’t actually, they or banned from recommending policy, which meant that suddenly no one wanted them to study gun control anymore) Well, it was Bill Clinton in 90 to the direct to the CDC to fund a bunch of junk science in order to drum up support for his assault weapons ban and 93/94. Millions of dollars went to Hemenway, Who produced garbage studies, small sample size, never released the data, everything he published has been fully discredited. This guy’s “work” was the reason the Dickey amendment passed. Absolute garbage from the 90s. Still alive and kicking today. they posted up on their site, it says Harvard, here you are happy to post it. Same plan they had in 1992. EDIT: To add on to the other user’s correct comments about the junk science. Hemenway is “famous” for his bad methodology, like the phone surveys, and looking at incidents where a gun was used in the home but not who the gun owner was, meaning every drug shooting was counted, hardly representative of most people’s lives. EDIT2: I asked for evidence of these fantastic claims, and you posted classic trade-A nonsense that everyone who knows anything on the topic has seen for 20 some years. Probably the first search result you found. Do you really consider yourself to know anything on this topic? Why is it you think you do?

pimterry 5y ago
As in my previous post: I'd be interested to see any similar research that points towards any other conclusion. Seriously, I don't have a dog in this fight, I'm interested in the reality. In your previous comment, you asked for evidence - I've provided a selection of studies supporting the previous poster's position. If you disagree, please produce peer-reviewed studies refuting these points. Currently you're listing unsupported ad-hominems against both the various researchers involved and Harvard (and honestly, I think saying that nobody takes Harvard seriously is a bit of a stretch). Regardless of the individuals: the linked studies were all reviewed in depth and accepted by a wide assortment of respected academic journals from across the field of public health. If you think there are specific flaws in the methodology then please, be specific, but rejecting evidence you disagree with as 'junk science' out of hand is not helpful. The 'small sample size' and 'unreleased data' you reference is specifically tenuous, since much of the referenced research is based entirely on public data & official statistics, such as the National Crime Victimization Survey (https://bjs.ojp.gov/data-collection/ncvs https://bjs.ojp.gov/data-collection/ncvs) produced and released annually by the US Justice Department. On age: the sibling reply here was wrong and the most recent study listed in that Harvard analysis is actually 2015, but still, age has little bearing here unless you think there's been a very significant change in gun usage in recent years that would invalidate the past conclusions. If so, do please explain why that is. In the meantime, take a look at https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/article-abstract/2763812 https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamainternalmedicine/articl... as one more example: a 2020 research paper published by a peer-reviewed medical journal, which doesn't involve David Hemenway or Harvard, but supports similar claims backed by public fatality statistics from 2011-2018, and specifically showing that gun self-defense statistics today continue to match patterns from past research in the 80s. I understand that you don't agree with this research. If you want to convince anybody else, find some concrete reviewed research or hard statistics that directly support your claims (specifically, research that shows "Firearms are used almost exclusively for legal defense", as you claimed above).

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]