So it appears that the even wierder than dungeons and dragons crowd aka the gun blogosphere has “sounded the alarm and circled the wagons” to attack Delaware liberal. Quite a bit of discussion has ensued and as usual. Those clinging to their beliefs are having a hard time comprimising at all.
So in my travels to testosteronesphere I have noticed quite a few “defenders of the 2a” have talked a little bit about this article the article recently in the Washington Post regarding the study that PROVED owning a gun increases the risk of suicide. The article clearly states the study conducted over the course of 19 fucking years that
“that when people own a gun, they unwittingly raise their risk of getting hurt and killed — because the odds that they will one day use their gun to commit suicide are much larger than the odds they will use their gun to defend themselves against intruders, muggers and killers.”
So the question I’m dying to know is why are these “2A” freaks going so apeshit over this study? Why does this study matter SOOOO much for them to go on the “attack” and “muster” up all the “soldiers” they can to “launch” an “assault” on some blog that disagrees with them? So….why does it matter?
Why are these grown men so worried that a study showed:
“The evidence is overwhelming,” said David Hemenway, a professor of health policy at Harvard. “There are a dozen case-controlled studies, all of which show the gun in the home is a risk factor for suicide for the gun owner, for the spouse, for the gun owner’s children.”
I just don’t get it? The study (did I mention it took 19 years) was obviously very lengthy and conducted over a period of time where deep statistical analysis could be conducted and not argue against. So do people read stuff? did they see this little nugget?
The reason we can be sure that suicide — and not assaults, break-ins, muggings, school shootings and other fatal attacks by sinister strangers — would account for most of the stories is that suicide dwarfs homicide as a killer in the United States. There were 32,637 suicides in the country in 2005, the latest year for which statistics are available. That year, the collective homicidal mayhem caused by domestic abusers, violent criminals, gang fights, drug wars, break-ins, shootouts with cops, accidental gun discharges and cold, premeditated murder produced 18,538 deaths
hmmm…break ins….domestic abusers….shootouts with cops….do they sound like those type of “self defense” type arguements people like to make to advocate gun ownership. You know Assault weapon type stuff. 50 round/second shit….?
I kept reading this article done on a 19year study and i have a hard time arguing that guns are safe and we shouldn’t restrict them in some way:
But because guns are so lethal, 17,002 of all suicides in 2005 — 52 percent — involved people shooting themselves.
I saw some other tough guy say, well if they are weak then so be it. A “fuck the weak” type attitude. But I wondered would this same 2a guy really feel that way? After all our own VETERANS are attempting suicide at record numbers. I can’t imagine a soldier defending 2a could be so callous as to not understand suicide.
So I keep reading the article and I have to ask myself why does it matter that:
people who have lethal means at their disposal are much more likely to kill themselves than those who lack such means.
what is the big deal. It’s just a study done over 19 years and used a few hundred thousand situations to come up with this stunning analysis.
“If you bought a gun today, I could tell you the risk of suicide to you and your family members is going to be two- to tenfold higher over the next 20 years,” Harvard’s Miller said. “There are not many things you can do to increase your risk of dying tenfold.”
So what’s the big with the research?