More Mass shootings

[swake]

Here is some summary data from Brookings.  Very stark data there.  Black men are killed 33 per 100k.  White men at about 17 per 100k.  Two to one ratio.   Blacks are 12% of the population.  That is an 8 to 1 ratio.   The effect is that 16 times as many blacks can expect to die from gun violence as whites.  There have been laws written for over 100 years to specifically target gun ownership by blacks.  If you keep guns out of the hands of blacks, there will be 2/3 of  the gun deaths eliminated.  It is the same kind of short sighted stick your head in the sand approach as the concept of blanket gun prohibition.  Does not find, let alone address the root cause of the problems.    

It's called the "drunkard's search".  Google it.   On second thought, I will just put it here.

"A policeman sees a drunk man searching for something under a streetlight and asks what the drunk has lost. He says he lost his keys and they both look under the streetlight together. After a few minutes the policeman asks if he is sure he lost them here, and the drunk replies, no, and that he lost them in the park. The policeman asks why he is searching here, and the drunk replies, "this is where the light is".


https://www.brookings.edu/blog/social-mobility-memos/2015/12/15/guns-and-race-the-different-worlds-of-black-and-white-americans/


As for your comment about NRA being terrorists.  bull sh$t.  

Another meme highlighting what a crock of carp that is.

Legal gun owners have over 200 million guns in this country and about 25 trillion rounds of ammunition.  Seriously people, if we were the problem, you would know it.

We do know it.

33,000 deaths a year. ten times the number of Americans killed by terrorists ever. Each year. More Americans have died from gun violence this decade than all the wars in the last 100 years. It's fracking problem.

Talk about sticking your damn head in the sand.

[TeeDub]

33,000 deaths a year.

In 2010, there were 19,392 firearm-related suicides, and 11,078 firearm-related homicides in the U.S.     You won't stop suicides, you will just change the method...   You may as well discount those.  

Of the 2,596,993 total deaths in the US in 2013, 1.3% were related to firearms.    Take out the suicides and you are at a paltry 0.42%.    Even including the suicides, guns kill fewer than are killed each year from diabetes, Alzheimer's, pneumonia or nephritis.  I didn't even know Alzheimer's was terminal.  (https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr65/nvsr65_05.pdf    page 17)

*  I used wiki's numbers, supposedly they are cited, but I hate to trust it as a source.

More Americans have died from gun violence this decade than all the wars in the last 100 years.

Your numbers are also off here....   Extrapolating on your numbers, you have 330,000 dead in the last decade. (33,000 * 10)   There were 405,399 American military casualties in WW2 alone.

[swake]

In 2010, there were 19,392 firearm-related suicides, and 11,078 firearm-related homicides in the U.S.     You won't stop suicides, you will just change the method...   You may as well discount those.  

Of the 2,596,993 total deaths in the US in 2013, 1.3% were related to firearms.    Take out the suicides and you are at a paltry 0.42%.    Even including the suicides, guns kill fewer than are killed each year from diabetes, Alzheimer's, pneumonia or nephritis.  I didn't even know Alzheimer's was terminal.  (https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr65/nvsr65_05.pdf    page 17)

*  I used wiki's numbers, supposedly they are cited, but I hate to trust it as a source.

Your numbers are also off here....   Extrapolating on your numbers, you have 330,000 dead in the last decade. (33,000 * 10)   There were 405,399 American military casualties in WW2 alone.

My fault, I went by memory, I thought we were at ~250k in WWII and ~60k in Vietnam. And I don't fully agree that all gun suicides would be equally successful using other methods. That doesn't bear out in other western nations.

[cannon_fodder]

I was confused too, because nearly every statistic available says there were 58,220 US Military deaths in the Vietnam war. The Vietnam memorial wall has 58,193 names on it. The US archives say there was 58,220 US military deaths in Vietnam.  The Department of Defense agrees. The VA also agrees.

https://www.archives.gov/research/military/vietnam-war/casualty-statistics.html
https://www.dmdc.osd.mil/dcas/pages/report_vietnam_sum.xhtml
https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_americas_wars.pdf

The 90,220 number includes all deaths of United States Military personnel between 1955-1975 from whatever cause inside and outside Vietnam.  If a soldier crashed a jeep in Germany in 1955 and died, he is a "other deaths in service (non-theater)" in that statistic. To reach it they add the battle deaths and "other deaths" caused by in theater action, then add exactly 32,000 "Other Deaths in Service (Non-Theater)." See the VA statistic above.

Other than what I posted above,  I couldn't find any more  information on that specific statistic. However, more recent data suggest most of those deaths are likely training exercises, motor vehicle accidents, and suicides.   Between 1990-2011 traffic accidents not in a combat zone were 37% of all deaths.  Suicides were 20%.  Then other accidents at 10%.  I feel comfortable assuming a similar pattern held up from 1955-1975, probably even heavier on the traffic deaths statistics while suicides were probably unreported or poorly tracked by DOD.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22694586

Not a judgment in any way on the sacrifices of any of those people, I was just curious about the statistic.

[Ed W]

I think the 58, 193 figure was for in-country deaths while the higher one included those who were evacuated and died of their wounds in other hospitals outside Vietnam. I could be wrong.

[TeeDub]

I don't know....   I assumed that PBS was a reliable source.  It could be my bad for trusting the liberal media.

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/updates/many-americans-died-u-s-wars/

[Conan71]

I though it was the automatic weapons  that empowered someone to kill 58 and injure 500+.
Saying the media causes mass shootings is like saying video games encourage violence.

I don't know if you are being obtuse on purpose, but disenfranchised people wanting to make a statement to as many people as possible is a known reason for many and even stated reason in some mass killings.  The killer or killers know they will gain national or international notoriety for their act.  Why else would you select a large crowd in a public place, other than to send a message?

As far as video games, off the top of my head, that was a known tie between Dylan Klebold and Eric Harris, the Columbine killers and largely suspected as something which escalated into real violence.

That's the sole purpose when it comes to terrorist attacks.  They know the 24 hour news cycle will strike terror in people and disrupt lives and routines.

[Conan71]

You won't remove all threats by banning all guns. But the fact does remain that the single best thing you can do to lower your odds of being killed by a gun is to not have a gun in your home. The idea that you are going to protect your family by having a gun is extremely remote, but having the gun present increases your own risk greatly. By suicide, accidents and family violence.

We need to have real studies on how to mitigate gun violence. The American public at this time has no appetite to ban guns, excepting assault rifles, so that's a non-starter to really address overall gun violence. But there may be other workable solutions to lessen risk We need to study those ideas.

Reading your comments on this thread, I do want to compliment you on a much more reasoned approach on guns than I've sensed from you in the past.  The only thing I'd tend to disagree with is about keeping a gun in the home.  Having a gun in the home is not the problem, irresponsible gun owners are the problem.  If guns are properly locked up and all members of the household are properly trained in the use and respect of firearms or in the alternative restricted from access to them, it's not an issue.

One of the sons of a family I've been very close friends with for decades was killed a few weeks ago by his own gun in Tulsa.  He was in a conflict with his GF, left the house and left his gun in the house.  When he returned, he was shot with his own gun.  That's an example of irresponsible gun ownership.  Chris had been taught better but none of us know the exact circumstances (i.e. where the gun was kept how she knew about it, etc.) other than he was shot with his own gun by his girlfriend.  It's pretty safe to say though that had he left the house with his gun in his possession or it had been locked away out of reach of the crazy girlfriend he wouldn't have been shot by his own gun.  Had he not owned a gun in the first place, we can't say for certain she wouldn't have found one elsewhere but by reasonable deduction, we can say he wouldn't have been killed by his own gun.  Not having a gun in the house when there's an unstable relationship is probably a very good idea.  He lived in a somewhat sketchy neighborhood so it's likely he had a gun to try and even the odds in a home invasion.

In contrast to that, had the Broken Arrow teacher who was murdered in front of his family last weekend by a 16 year old punk been armed, his chances of not being killed would have gone up dramatically if he had been armed and properly trained in such a confrontation at the time of the attempted robbery.  Random deaths like that one are pretty rare but your chances of survival in a home invasion or burglary go way up by being armed.  

People have to use good discretion when deciding if keeping a firearm or firearms in the home are a good idea.  If they decide they want to have them, they need to take the proper precautions to assure they are not used in ways they are not intended to be.  If someone has a child with emotional issues or they are in an unstable relationship, they might want to re-think the idea of having firearms in the home or at least make damn sure they cannot fall into the wrong hands at ANY time.

[swake]

https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_americas_wars.pdf

According to the VA it was 58k in Vietnam and 291k in WWII.

[Red Arrow]

Your numbers are also off here....   Extrapolating on your numbers, you have 330,000 dead in the last decade. (33,000 * 10)   There were 405,399 American military casualties in WW2 alone.

Accurate data is not important when you are trying to make a point.

[Hoss]

Accurate data is not important when you are trying to make a point.

Correct....look at the current occupant of the White House.

[Red Arrow]

Correct....look at the current occupant of the White House.

An obvious example but he is not the only one.

[swake]

Accurate data is not important when you are trying to make a point.

My data was not that far off, I was going by memory when I wrote the post. This isn't a term paper.

Real statistics:
All wars in the last 150 years, Spanish American War, WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Gulf, Iraq and Afghanistan - total killed in action - 442,776
Gun deaths in the US by all causes 2003 to 2016 - total deaths 446,997.

Total number of deaths due to terrorism in the United States the last 20 years, including 9/11 and Oklahoma City - 3,264
Total number of gun deaths in the United States in 2016 - 30,470

https://www.start.umd.edu/pubs/START_AmericanTerrorismDeaths_FactSheet_Oct2015.pdf
https://gun-control.procon.org/view.resource.php?resourceID=006094
https://www.va.gov/opa/publications/factsheets/fs_americas_wars.pdf

Mass shootings the last 10 years have killed far more people than terrorism. In fact, the vast majority of terrorist related deaths in the United States the last 10 years are due to mass shootings. They largely overlap, it's just there are also a lot of mass shootings that are not terrorism.

We have one death ever due to terrorism from a group of Muslim countries and we ban travel from those places. We have almost half a million deaths from guns since 2003 and there's nothing we can or should do, it's just too bad.

Is this not a problem?

[TeeDub]

I don't know how to best argue this... 

I could point out that inanimate objects are only as evil as the person using them, I could try to show that writing more laws and banning more things is pointless (war on drugs, statistics of people killed by drunk drivers, etc.)

I guess the real problem I have is that I grew up around guns and responsible gun ownership.   I understand that guns are a tool and I don't understand why life would be better off if they were hard to get.    I just can't wrap my head around your argument.

Just out of curiosity...   Have you ever held or fired a gun?

[swake]

I don't know how to best argue this... 

I could point out that inanimate objects are only as evil as the person using them, I could try to show that writing more laws and banning more things is pointless (war on drugs, statistics of people killed by drunk drivers, etc.)

I guess the real problem I have is that I grew up around guns and responsible gun ownership.   I understand that guns are a tool and I don't understand why life would be better off if they were hard to get.    I just can't wrap my head around your argument.

Just out of curiosity...   Have you ever held or fired a gun?

Oh yeah. My dad, while he was an conspiracy theory loving uber-liberal semi-reformed hippy with a PHD among other degrees, he was from Oklahoma and always had guns. Heir on here always reminds me of my dad. One of his guns was a sawed off shotgun in the closet for self defense. the only living thing he ever shot with it was a goat he bought when we lived in rural central Florida (he was teaching at U of Florida at the time) so he wouldn't have to the mow the yard. The damn goat wouldn't eat grass but always ate all the bark off my dad's beloved Kumquat and Orange trees. And the goat was mean. So one afternoon after too many beers watching football he decided to shoot the goat. Ran around the house chasing the goat with my mother screaming at him to put the gun down. Bad day for the goat. We got a riding lawnmower after that.

My mom's side of the family all the men were career military officers. Air Force, but they still had guns.

I was a Boy Scout, got all the gun related merit badges, won a lot of marksmanship awards too. I've shot most everything. All kinds of hand guns, AK-47, AR-15, but I won't have a gun in the house while we have kids in the house.

I'm not saying we should ban all guns. But there need to be actions we can take. Let's study the issue.