WaPo: Congressional deal could fund gun violence research for first time since 1990s

"The study that gun-rights activists keep citing but completely misunderstand....

"The authors [of the CDC study] suggested focusing on five areas: the characteristics of firearm violence, risk and protective factors, interventions and strategies, gun safety technology and the influence of video games and other media. The document is peppered with examples of how little we know about the causes and consequences of gun violence -- no doubt the result of an 18-year-old CDC research ban.

"But gun-rights supporters zeroed on in a few statements [in the CDC study] to make their case. One related to the defensive use of guns.The New American Magazine article noted that 'Almost all national survey estimates indicate that defensive gun uses by victims are at least as common as offensive uses by criminals, with estimates of annual uses ranging from about 500,000 to more than 3 million per year, in the context of about 300,000 violent crimes involving firearms in 2008.'....

"The authors also say gun ownership might be good for defensive uses, but that benefit could be canceled out by the risk of suicide or homicide that comes with gun ownership."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...sts-keep-citing-but-completely-misunderstand/

Surveys seem a very questionable way to measure defensive gun use. How do you know that a claimed defensive gun use is really a bona fide defensive gun use without a police investigation? Furthermore, there doesn't seem to be any evidence that people who keep guns in their homes are less likely to be victims (in fact Kellermann found the opposite) so whatever people claim in surveys about defensive gun use doesn't seem to be supported by other measures of crime. Ultimately, more research is necessary.

 

It would depend on the product since some products provide much more benefit to society than others.

 

I think it's harder to justify restrictions on free speech since it is a much more fundamental part of being human than gun ownership. Most humans on the planet don't own guns. Speech, however, is something that we are born with an innate capacity for.

 

The tool used does make a significant difference:

"Residents of homes where a gun is present are 5 times more likely to experience a suicide than residents of homes without guns....

"The overall fatality rate in gun robberies is an estimated 4 per 1,000--about 3 times the rate for knife robberies, 10 times the rate for robberies with other weapons, and 20 times the rate for robberies by unarmed offenders."
http://www.asahi-net.or.jp/~zj5j-gttl/guns.htm#The problem with

Guns increase the likelihood that a violent crime or a suicide attempt will result in a fatality.

 

The obvious question of "so what?" must be asked with regard to the above. What ultimate, meaningful difference, does such actually make?

The united state supreme court has already ruled that total prohibitions on entire classes of firearms is unconstitutional. Therefore whatever the center for disease control may find, it will make no difference. So long as any firearms remain available to the public, there will always be firearm-related homicides to go along with such, and the level of firearm-related violence in the united states will always exceed to recorded levels of firearm-related violence in any other nation held up for comparison purposes.

 

So let's address the true problem. As I said before the gun is not the problem it is the tool. What needs to be addressed is violence, mental health, drug use.

If the focus remains on the gun as the root of the problems the true problems will never be solved.

Anti gun folks keep saying it is about saving lives yet while they work on eroding my Constitutional rights, death from diabetes and obesity continue to rise. In 2017 there were 91,304 deaths from diabetes and obesity. As you can see that number is more than twice the number of all gun deaths combine.

Maybe we should start saving lives by taking away people's burgers, fries and donuts!

100% of automobile accidents involve automobiles; the vehicle is not the cause of the accident... it's the drivers!

 

What? I don't understand your point at all. You know what the term societal disease refers to right?

 

Clarify. Precisely what does the phrase mean?

 

It's a disease that stems from societal issues. Think deaths by despair. Readily avaliable sources of alcohol, plus social loneliness, leads to alcoholism which leads to deaths. The idea is that not all diseases stem from pathogens, etc. They can stem from other issues as well. This isn't a new idea. This goes back to when people were treating Cholera and making the connection between drinking water and the disease.

 

I wonder what the Democrats would think about the CDC researching the societal effects and detriments of single-mother households and made recommendations on how to improve same.

 

They already do?
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/fastats/unmarried-childbearing.htm

"Results—From 2002 to 2011–2013, there was an increase in the percentages of men and women who agreed with premarital cohabitation, nonmarital childbearing, the right for gay and lesbian adults to adopt children, same-sex sexual relations, and premarital sex for those aged 18. There was a decrease in the percentages of men and women who agreed with divorce. There was no change in the percentages of men and women who agreed with premarital sex for those aged 16. There was no change from 2006–2010 to 2011–2013 in attitudes regarding marriage, cohabitation and the risk of divorce, the necessity of having children for one’s happiness, and raising children in a cohabiting union. Several of the attitudinal items varied significantly by age group for both men and women"
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhsr/nhsr092.pdf

 

The fact that this does not deal with single-mother households aside....
"...and made recommendations on how to improve same."
I don't see those. You?

 

1.Because they also decided to expand it to more than just single mothers? I don't understand your point. But I can give you this if it helps:
https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nvsr/nvsr68/nvsr68_13-508.pdf
2. Fair enough. It was a study done, not much room for normative claims in those. But still your point. Would you take this?
https://www.cdc.gov/preconception/women.html
https://www.cdc.gov/reproductivehealth/features/baby-safe-sleep/index.html

Though you will probably make the same point again. As far as I can tell, the CDC doesn't want to make those suggestions, and the reason why is tied to divorce. Don't guilt trip parents into staying in bad relationships. It's better to know how to take care of the children, then be in a bad relationship.

 

The information you posted from the research done by the CDC is exactly the sort of research the CDC has been able to do on gun violence all along.
There's no need for recommendations on gun policy any more than there is a need for recommendations on family policy.

 

They haven't been able to do research because there was a gag rule. You can't fund research if it would lead to gun control. That's a financial incentive not to do research. And you miss the point. They do have recommendations on family policy. One of sources I brought up was preconception. Another was how to keep a baby safe. Heck, I'm right now looking over how to help kids deal with abuse. That's all family policy. The reason they don't do it as you want them to, is because they see other ways of having a health family. Force people to be together and that won't go over well. By your argument, we should have recommendations for gun policy, because we can recognize the need to be healthy with them.

 

Right... but not the family policy/issue I mentioned. Do they have any recommendations for that?

 

The language clearly states that no funding may be used to advocate or promote firearm-related restrictions. Meaning the center for disease control is prohibited from utilizing its funding for the purpose of political lobbying. That is ultimately the long and the short of the matter, nothing else.

 

In this particular case, the societal disease in question would be the complete disregard for the value of human lives. Excluding suicides, which do not count, the majority of firearm-related deaths are homicides committed by those who are engaged in illegal activity, and who are already legally prohibited from firearms ownership under any circumstances. It is not something that can be blamed on the presence and availability of firearms, as there are a great many murders and homicides committed without firearms.

If it is truly a matter of disease, the appropriate course of treatment is to identify the individuals that amount to pathogens, that being anyone with an extensive criminal record, and removing them from the equation entirely for the duration of their natural life, be it indefinite confinement or execution.

 

Sadly many people do not want to be reminded of the horrific cost of their "freedom".

 

1) No.
2) No -- the doctor prescribing my Effexor forbids it. If I had been drinking, I would have deteriorated in a few years.

 

Then you will probably have little chance to be involved with gun violence.

 

Definitely -- never touched a gun.

But 30,000 to 40,000 lives are lost in USA each year.

 

Here, I will give you something to really fret over.
800,000 children go missing in the US every year.
Call Bloomberg

https://abcnews.go.com/US/missing-children-america-unsolved-cases/story?id=19126967