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LongingSoul
Guest
So is there not even a national data base of registered gun owners? No system of accountability or cross referencing for police investigating gun crime?
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Gary_Sheldrake
Guest
Meta analysis is used in many serious statistical, medical and other research efforts. One of the advantages is that meta analysis offers an aggregate view of numerous studies, which statistically reduces the effect of the errors that might be present in a particular single study whose results might be outliers. However, I suppose you probably don’t put much stock in research. Where do you practice medicine by the way? Just curious.
Thank You
Gary
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Zoltan_Cobalt
Guest
There is no federal firearms registration scheme in the United States. Some states require the registration of handguns, some states register all guns and some states have no firearms registration at all.
Remember Canada recently repealed its registration requirements because it proved very costly and did absolutely no good at all.
Registration does nothing to help a criminal investigation. Criminals cannot register firearms…because they are prevented by law from possessing them. The only people who register their firearms are law abiding citizens with no intention of violating any law.
In states where registration is required, abuses by law enforcement are common. A police officer on his way to issue a warning for a barking dog, checks the firearms registration list and finds that the owner of the residence has a registered shotgun. The officer then calls in a SWAT Team, doors are kicked in, citizens are roughed up, private property is confiscated and the barking dog warning is never issued. End result…the city and/or the law enforcement agency face massive law suits. Not very good for the common good.
Registration serves only one purpose…confiscation.
We don’t like that idea here in America.
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YADA
Guest
As someone who has stated that they have suicidal tendencies and mental issues - you should understand this … my great grandfather lost his wife and then his eye sight … suffering loneliness and depression he wanted to kill himself … he owned a pistol and my great uncle was convinced he would use that pistol on himself [and he would have - he tried] … my uncle had rendered the pistol unusable by filing down the firing pin and increased his visits and time with his father … my great grandfather hung himself by the chandelier in the dining room …
Personally - it is my opinion that those who gather statistics in this county have little absolute information on the number of households that have firearms and those who don’t … registrations and background checks have not always been required …States like Hawaii have stricter laws which provides good info on ownership in Hawaii - at least since those laws were passed …
States - like Oregon - that have less built in tracking of gun purchases and those purchases made years ago are much harder to capture in statistics … felons and criminals are less likely to self report possessions … and many people don’t acknowledge ownership of firearms to prevent being a target of gun thieves …
Statistics don’t lie - but liars use statistics …
There are some cities where gun ownership is required … based upon your statistics there should be murders and suicides … yet I personally know one small eastern Oregon town with such an ordinance … and they have not experienced a murder within the City limits since the 1960s … the ordinance was passed in the 1980s …
And no - they do not actively enforce the ownership of guns … and yes - a higher percentage of people would own firearms anyway …
I am also pretty sure no one has bought a gun in order to comply …
Do the bad guys commit less home invasions because of the ordinance - who knows
… I’d bet some may have
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Robert_Sock
Guest
If you believe that liars use statistics, which some certainly do, then you need to reject much of earthly science (which may not be a bad idea).As someone who has stated that they have suicidal tendencies and mental issues - you should understand this … my great grandfather lost his wife and then his eye sight … suffering loneliness and depression he wanted to kill himself … he owned a pistol and my great uncle was convinced he would use that pistol on himself [and he would have - he tried] … my uncle had rendered the pistol unusable by filing down the firing pin and increased his visits and time with his father … my great grandfather hung himself by the chandelier in the dining room …
Personally - it is my opinion that those who gather statistics in this county have little absolute information on the number of households that have firearms and those who don’t … registrations and background checks have not always been required …States like Hawaii have stricter laws which provides good info on ownership in Hawaii - at least since those laws were passed …
States - like Oregon - that have less built in tracking of gun purchases and those purchases made years ago are much harder to capture in statistics … felons and criminals are less likely to self report possessions … and many people don’t acknowledge ownership of firearms to prevent being a target of gun thieves …
Statistics don’t lie - but liars use statistics ….
There are some cities where gun ownership is required … based upon your statistics there should be murders and suicides … yet I personally know one small eastern Oregon town with such an ordinance … and they have not experienced a murder within the City limits since the 1960s … the ordinance was passed in the 1980s …
And no - they do not actively enforce the ownership of guns … and yes - a higher percentage of people would own firearms anyway …
I am also pretty sure no one has bought a gun in order to comply …
Do the bad guys commit less home invasions because of the ordinance - who knows
If you do not like the study in which this article is based, there are many others. Just Google “households guns homicide” and take your pick. Please let me know which one you choose, and we can then discuss it. You may be especially interested in the ones that use a meta-analysis, which incorporate the results of many studies.
Here’s one such meta-analysis that was recently published: ucsf.edu/news/2014/01/111286/access-guns-increases-risk-suicide-homicide
Please, let us discuss this, unless you think there is some kind of a conspiracy where all the researchers are fraudulent.
LOVE!
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jmcrae
Guest
There is not a class of people called “criminals.” A “criminal” is a person who is in the process of committing a crime. Anyone can do this - there’s no school one attends, and no pattern of DNA, that makes one person a “criminal” and someone else not.
We are all potentially criminals - all it takes is to break the law. And if anyone who hasn’t yet been caught breaking the law can own a gun, then you already have a great many criminals owning guns - they just haven’t yet committed their crimes.
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Cat
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Although I agree that anyone can commit a crime of passion, I disagree that there is not a class of people called “criminals.” As difficult as it is for decent people to comprehend, there are people in the United States who deliberately choose to spend their lives committing crimes/violent crimes.
If a person consistently makes his or her living by committing crimes, he/she is a criminal and part of a “class” of people called “criminals.”
There are plenty of people who do not have gainful employment, but rather, are involved in gangs and mobs, and are regularly involved in violent crimes with the goals of acquiring money and destroying those that get in their way.
Many of these people are from families who have been involved with crime for several generations; this is especially true of those who are members of street gangs, who often have no interest in other lifestyles. They are loyal to their specific gang, as were their parents and grandparents.
Also, many of those involved in buying and selling illegal street drugs are part of the “criminal class,” and all too often, these people are willing to commit violent crimes against others in order to continue profiting in their “business.”
And of course, there are those who are involved in terrorism and are willing and ready to commit violent acts against humanity for their particular cause. I personally believe that there are more of these people in the United States than we can even imagine, and that many of the so-called “random acts” of violence are actually part of a terrorist attack on a small scale. JMO. These people are part of a “criminal” class; they may earn an honest living in a respectable job or profession, but their willingness to associate themselves with a terrorist group that is ready to commit crimes for their cause makes them “criminals” by association.
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Gary_Sheldrake
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I know conservatives dislike meta analysis because it eliminates the ability to use one or two studies that are inconsistent with the greater body of evidence across many studies. But the facts are the facts, and most of the available data is rather consistent with what common sense should already tell us:
-Most murders in America are committed with guns:
Source: FBI
It is projected that for the first time in decades, more people in the US will die in 2015 from gunshot than from car accidents.
Source: Center for Disease Control
A comparison Statistics on gun ownership in American households from 1960 through 2010 with FBI statistics in deaths by murder and violent crime in the same time period show a positive skew that suggests a strong relationship between gun ownership and murder/violent crime.
Source: Gallup and FBI
The South and Midwest have the most guns per capita, while the Northeast has the fewest. The South and Midwest have significantly higher death rates per capita by assault than the northeast. The three states with the highest number of guns per capita have the three highest death rates per capita by assault . The three states with the lowest gun ownership have the lowest death rates per capita by assault . The trend tracks almost evenly in the same manner for all the states in between - the more guns, the more deaths per capita by assault.
-Source: Gallup and Center for Disease Control.
-Most murders in America are committed with guns:
Code:
-Blunt objects: 4%
-Personal weapons: 6%
-Other: 9%
-Knives: 13%
-Guns: 68%It is projected that for the first time in decades, more people in the US will die in 2015 from gunshot than from car accidents.
Code:
-Firearms: 32,929
-Auto accidents: 32, 036A comparison Statistics on gun ownership in American households from 1960 through 2010 with FBI statistics in deaths by murder and violent crime in the same time period show a positive skew that suggests a strong relationship between gun ownership and murder/violent crime.
Source: Gallup and FBI
The South and Midwest have the most guns per capita, while the Northeast has the fewest. The South and Midwest have significantly higher death rates per capita by assault than the northeast. The three states with the highest number of guns per capita have the three highest death rates per capita by assault . The three states with the lowest gun ownership have the lowest death rates per capita by assault . The trend tracks almost evenly in the same manner for all the states in between - the more guns, the more deaths per capita by assault.
-Source: Gallup and Center for Disease Control.
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Brendan
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No, a ‘criminal’ is someone who is committing a crime, or who has, in the past, committed a crime. And because that now defines a subset of the group ‘people’, that by, definition, is a class of people.
And, in the US, they are prohibited from possessing firearms. You are correct that everyone had the theoretical potential to become a criminal, in much the same what that everyone has the theoretical potential to be a child rapist.
But we do not prohibit based on potentiality. People who are not criminals are able to posses guns, in much the same way that people who are not yet child rapists are permitted to interact with children.
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jmcrae
Guest
If this is so, then it is even more important to regulate the sale of guns, and register them, so that members of the criminal class who have not yet come to the attention of law enforcement can have their weapons purchases tracked - this would also aid police in being able to anticipate when a terrorist or criminal event is about to take place.
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Brendan
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How so?
If a person purchases a 9mm handgun, how does that inform the police that a criminal event is about to take place?
IIRC, for the Canadian gun registry, the RCMP could not point to a single case where firearms registry solved a crime, let alone prevented one.
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jmcrae
Guest
If 25 people in the same neighborhood purchase weapons on the same day, it might be a clue that something’s up.
Probably because we also have mental health requirements, criminal record checks, required references, and residency requirements, which haven’t been taken away. For example, if I apply to buy a gun, my spouse is asked whether he would feel threatened if I owned a gun.
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Boatswain2PA
Guest
Meta-analyses are only as good as the original studies that they analyze. However the quality of most “studies” done in the “soft sciences” (behavioral health, psych, politics, etc) are far inferior to the studies done in the hard (earth) sciences (chemistry, biology, medicine) because it is very difficult (and likely immoral) to perform prospective, randomized, double-blinded controlled studies that are repeatable by future investigators…the gold standard for studies in the hard sciences. The double-blinded nature, and the repeatability, effectively removes the human emotional affect upon the results of the study.If you believe that liars use statistics, which some certainly do, then you need to reject much of earthly science (which may not be a bad idea).
If you do not like the study in which this article is based, there are many others. Just Google “households guns homicide” and take your pick. Please let me know which one you choose, and we can then discuss it. You may be especially interested in the ones that use a meta-analysis, which incorporate the results of many studies.
Here’s one such meta-analysis that was recently published: ucsf.edu/news/2014/01/111286/access-guns-increases-risk-suicide-homicide
Please, let us discuss this, unless you think there is some kind of a conspiracy where all the researchers are fraudulent.
LOVE!
However there is almost always inherent personal bias in “soft” science studies. These “soft” studies are done by those in the “soft” science fields such as psychology, social work, or (worse yet), political sciences…and these folks almost always have a liberal ideology. (Don’t think I am denigrating social workers with that statement because I most certainly am not). Furthermore the organizations that fund such studies are also typically extremely liberal organizations (example - UCSF), which adds to the selection bias and, of course, the publication bias.
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freeRadical
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My state has all those things too and it’s very pro gun.
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Cat
Guest
I don’t think these people get their guns from friendly legal gun shops. The weapons are bought and sold in secret on the streets through various international criminal networks that the government has little or no information about.
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Brendan
Guest
That is purchase, not registration. And the BATF can already gather that information.
We have the same, at point of purchase.
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Robert_Sock
Guest
As I mentioned to others here in this thread, go to Google and search the keywords “guns households homicide” and pick a study or article that you like. It’s an unrealistic “paranoia” to believe that they are all fraudulent.
Public health and public policy institutions rely heavily on these types of studies. No experimental methods are possible.
LOVE!
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Brendan
Guest
That is true.
The US Dept of Justice did a study of over 200,000 criminals. What would constitute legal sales only accounted for 14% of the firearms used.
The other 76% came either from black-market street sales, theft or ‘straw purchases’ (where the criminal contracts with a person who is capable of passing a background check make the actual purchase and then transfer the firearm (illegally) to the criminal.
bjs.ojp.usdoj.gov/content/pub/pdf/fuo.pdf
Table 8 has the relevant data
Even in Canada, in testimony re their gun registry, the RCMP stated that only 1% of criminals had their guns registered in their name.
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Brendan
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Robert, I did read throught the questions, and the study does not account for legal vs illegal purchases. All that was asked of the respondant was if there was a gun in the house, if there was more than one gun, if there were handguns, long arms, or a mixture and if one or more were stored outside of lockers.Public health and social policy institutions rely heavily on these types of studies. No experimental methods are possible.
LOVE!
At no point was the firearm purchase history asked, nor were the serial numbers traced.
And even if it was asked, how would you account for false negatives, where the gun is actually illegal, but the respondant claimed it was legal out of fear of arrest.
Or guns stored outside of lockers, but with trigger safeties. Or in my case, I have several 22 bolt action firearms that I use for my Scout troop. The barrels and stocks are stored outside of the gun safe, but the bolts are stored inside the gun safe.
How is that reported?
Technically, once it’s disassembled, it’s not even a firearm anymore, so if that was all that I had, I could have honestly reported that I had no firearms in the house.
Likewise with my muzzloading flintlocks. That type of device is excluded from the Federal definition of a firearm. I could have a dozen in my basement, but claim ‘no firearms’ in this survey.
How would that be accounted for in the study?
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Brendan
Guest
On the plus side, this thread reminded me that I needed to take my daughter to range again.
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