Well I still think the data itself has no agenda, and is easier to read, but CPD is more “official”. Though IIRC it doesn’t track police shootings and some other data points.
ETA - also I was more recently made aware of the CPD reports. Some of these are well hidden in poorly built it city sites.
We can’t have any honest conversations about guns in the US. Full stop. Between the cherry picking, arbitrary exclusions and goal post moving, it just can’t happen.
Ask yourself: why is domestic abuse (which includes everything up to when the person is actually killed) not considered a felony?
That’s true, but I think people for more gun control can learn to stop doing that and see truth of the issue 
I don’t know, why? Isn’t it? Isn’t there felony assault? If you’re asking me if assault and abuse, domestic or not, should be a felony then yes, it should.
I’m out.
Or if your agenda is downplaying gun violence?
I am still waiting for someone to demonstrate the my owning lots of guns makes me any more dangerous than if I just owned one. I guess it just goes to wanting to portray people with differing views as crazy extremists. I have mentioned before that I have a friend with a giant and very expensive gun collection, all military weapons from Germany from WW1 through 1945. If he collected guns because of paranoia, he would probably own ammo. But he does not.
I don’t really want to get into the “guns are bad”/“guns are good” argument today.
But you don’t have anything to be “worried about” from me.
I went to the CDC’s report on suicides, and from there to their PDF of the specifics: Deaths: Final Data for 2014. On page 87, it shows the total number of suicides as indicated above, at 42,773, and the total number due to firearms as being half of the total number: 21,334. Here are all the causes, in decreasing number:
Firearms: 21,334
Suffocation: 11,407
Poisoning: 6,808
Fall: 994
Other: 517+164+79= 760
Cut/Pierce: 740
Drowning: 372
Fire/Flame: 180
All transport (but only for sub-category “other land transport”??): 177
Struck by or against: 1
That’s a noticeable drop-off.
I’m asking you to think about why assault on the street or against a stranger is a felony, but not if it happens to a “loved one” at home.
Our laws are slowly catching up to reality. It just happens in this one instance that gun ownership restrictions are actually ahead of the laws in recognizing a dangerous situation waiting to happen.
My agenda is rational discussion showing real world figures, dispelling biases, myths, misconceptions, and lies. Attempting to familiarize people with something they know little to nothing about, and related it to things they are more familiar with.
I would focus more on suicides, vs gun crime, but I honestly don’t have answers as to how to reduce suicides other than 1) having healthcare more accessible, 2) removing stigmas of mental health issues so people are more likely to get help.
I realize that it is an emotional issue, and I truly don’t want anyone to commit suicide. But I am against the whole concept of reduction of rights for someone who wishes to do harm to themselves. This includes the war and drugs and drug laws. I am not keen on drugs, but I think they should be legal as well.
At any rate, I haven’t heard anyone suggest precisely what gun laws would curb suicide. I would be interested in hearing ideas. Maybe there is one I have never considered.
I don’t know. I do know that people have taken it seriously, as in some states restraining orders and even just charges - not convictions - can lead to rejections on back ground checks.
IMHO violence is violence, whether it is “just business”, revenge, hate crime, or against a spouse, they should all have similar punishments/restrictions.
Do you have an answer to the question, or just posing it. If I had to venture a guess, it is because whites are more likely to commit domestic violence rather than just an assault out on the street or a bar. And like how cocaine possession punishments were less severe than crack possession, there is a racist slant to the reason.
In response to several posters: I was tired and frustrated and spoke in hyperbole. No, I don’t actually think there is a direct correlation between number of guns owned and likelihood for a specific individual to use them to harm a human being. Of course there are counter examples. But on a meta level, homes/areas/countries with higher gun ownership without a matching level of formal training and regulation have higher gun violence against human beings.
Like most people in the U.S. who would like to see greater control measures in place, I’m not against gun ownership. I’m against having less regulation against them now than in the Wild West frontier days. Even dog ownership has more rigorous regulation.
With rights come responsibility…or at least, they used to. I’m old enough to remember when “conservative” meant something very different. Back when people thought being adults and taking responsibility was a good thing. I would like to have that back (without all the bigotry and prejudice against “others”).
Because you are at the forefront of arguing against gun control on this site, and you stated that domestic abuse was the only non-felony that could block someone’s gun registration, I wanted to see if you could recognize that there are overlapping issues here.
I think that’s a good point, although I’m not as convinced as you that white people aren’t having bar fights at least in proportion to their numbers in the population. More central to the issue, I think the fact that domestic abuse is overwhelmingly male against female and adult against child means that the people empowered to legislate, prosecute, or arrest have more in common with the perpetrators than the victims, and we know how that usually turns out.
Good for owning it; but that wasn’t a compliment.
In case it wasn’t clear; you’re doing it again.
Thank you, that makes the ad a lot more entertaining for me, too. Dude holding down a trigger on something doesn’t lead me to think he knows jack shit about firearms–he just looks like a poseur to me.
Here’s a thought, American candidates for political office, how about you talk about your skills as they relate to the job at hand? Which skill will be more useful to your constituents–knowing how to operate a machine gun, or knowing how to build consensus and develop policy?
Yes, he really does look like he showed up for the shoot (pun intended) and was told to sit there and pull this thing and maybe scream like Rambo. Shooting a big gun can look bad ass but this guy just out of place.
Debating on actual topics and qualifications. What a radical thought. HaHaHa… A few more elections cycles and the presidential race will just be a bigger longer version of Joker’s Wild.
Please don’t refer to gay people gunned down in a nightclub as a tiny rounding error.
Thank you very fucking much.
I disagree with your conclusions, both about what the maps say and about what “the best available evidence” says about gun violence.
Urban:
Chicago = 6.5
Detroit = 8.37
Miami = 5.21
Seattle = 2.22
LA = 5.67
Boston = 1.94
Rural:
Western NY = 3.59
Western South Carolina = 7.16
Northeast Texas = 7.99
Central Michigan = 6.22
Eastern Oregon = 3.54
Central Arizona = 5.65
