Was there something you wanted to discuss?

help cut down on suicide deaths? Lets here them.

The OP chose to offer no discussion at all.

as violence, as though gun laws would prevent those deaths. Everywhere in the world, rural areas have higher suicide rates. Rural states like Wyoming and Alaska have high gun ownership rates. That means most of those suicides will be with guns. Take out the guns, those same deaths will still happen and be with a rope.
In reality, Wyoming had 17 murders in 2013 only half of them with a gun.
If you remove the suicides, DC and USVI with their strict gun laws are still the worst.

he's back to his usual google dump without any comment.

If you post enough like this it tends to look like you are spamming a group.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=21&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=22&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=23&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=24&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=25&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=26&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=27&sort=author
http://www.democraticunderground.com/?com=forum&id=1172&page=28&sort=author

I myself seem to think we need to do much more on mental health issues as even the Google drive by post says they are the biggest cause of firearms deaths. I do not think banning barrel shrouds or scary black rifles will get that big of an impact on firearms deaths. That is what we all want I assume, fewer firearms deaths.

Another good source
Get a Safety Kit

If you would like a free Project ChildSafe Safety Kit, which includes a cable-style gun lock and safety instructions, click on the map below to find a distribution partner in your state. Be sure to contact the partner to verify that supplies are available.
- See more at: http://www.projectchildsafe.org/safety/get-a-safety-kit#sthash.He62O4jA.dpuf

Poster titles their thread "The 10 states with the most gun violence".

Then goes on to talk about "highest rate per 100k" as if "states with the most gun violence" and "states with the highest rate per 100k" are the same thing.


Such dishonesty.

"Most gun violence" in my view, is intended to indicate "most raw numbers of gun violence", which we KNOW states like MT and WY with their low population do not have.

The citing of rates by the usual suspects is intentionally done to point the finger at low population states like MT and WY, while keeping places like DC and Chicago where gun violence runs rampant, safely out of the discussion.

Suicides are described as "gun violence." Really? Generally violence is an act of force against another party intended to cause harm. The key is that it's perpetrated against another party. If we used the writer's standard suicide by hanging would be "rope violence" and deliberately overdosing on medications would be "pharmaceutical violence."

I can only imagine what else I would find if I troubled myself to read the rest of the article.

1) The "Urban Institute" whose representative was talked with about the article is not an objective observer and collector of gun violence data, but has a de facto anti-gun bias. All of their experts weighing in on gun issues at the site are anti-gun, so even if the site itself claims to take no sides, the only people they have representing gun issues are taking sides. Though to their credit, they do occasionally say sensible things that gun owners would agree with and support, which means that you are unlikely to find GCRA types quoting them for fear of being tainted.

Interesting tidbit from perusing their site: There was an atypical spike of about 1 million new gun purchases in the wake of Sandy Hook (based on background check requests). Which means that if gun owners or prospective gun owners had not been motivated by concerns about gun bans (shoutout to GCRA!), there would be 1 million fewer guns in circulation right now. The NRA also picked up 100,000 new members in the wake of that shooting, for a minimum of a $3.5 million boost to their coffers. Great job, guys!

2) The 24/7 Wallstreet site linked in the original story also has the same author bias, though amusingly its author has elsewhere said that Vermont is the safest state (I guess he forgot to consider its gun laws when saying that).

3) The rundown of the top 10 states goes out of its way to avoid using the firearm murder rate. Instead it uses the overall violent crime rate and overall firearm deaths (which include suicide). Otherwise, the numbers would show a higher firearm murder rate that does not comport with the implied "poor and poorly educated" narrative.

4) They also go out of their way to avoid giving the top 10 states with the lowest numbers because that would not support the narrative either.

Three of the ten on the list are in states with less-restrictive gun laws-
but all ten had low poverty rates...

http://247wallst.com/special-report/2014/11/12/the-safest-cities-in-america/print/

That's implying that getting people out of poverty might reduce tendencies towards crime, including gun crime. And since that does not put all the blame on guns, crazy talk like that is not permitted.

Oh wait, this is the RKBA group.

Carry on.