Posted by detroitpistons on January 28, 2010, at 18:16:40
In reply to Re: DON'T BUY A GUN!!!, posted by bleauberry on January 28, 2010, at 17:14:39
I want to respond to a couple points. I'll add my comments under each quoted section below.
>>>> I don't have them at hand, but it was a magazine and two newspaper articles that did editorials on how neighborhoods with the highest gun ownership had dramatically lower crime levels. I guess the reasoning was that criminals were not the only ones that had guns, and thus they were neutralized from attempting crime in those neighborhoods. The gunless neighborhoods were the ones hit hard by crime. It was a sidenote, but suicide rates were also lower in the gun ownership neighborhoods. <<<<
No offense, but a couple of editorials in magazines and newspapers do not science make. What you described about the content of these OPINION pieces completely flies in the face of the data and information gathered from numerous, real studies and statistics.
>>>> Granted, for a very depressed person, a nearby gun makes it quick and easy. <<<<
So you do think that it's a bad idea for a very depressed person to own or have access to a gun? Now we're getting somewhere.
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>>>> No matter. If someone is that depressed and intervention does not occur, they will die at their own hand one way or another. Whether they have access to a gun or not will not significantly change the outcome. <<<<This is simply not a true statement, to say the least. There is no evidence to support what you're saying as far as outcomes. Again, the evidence suggests the opposite.
Secondly, they will NOT necessarily die at their own hands one way or the other. Please stop saying that. You just can't make a bold statement like that as a matter of fact. It's a logical fallacy. Every single attempted failed suicide proves that they all will NOT "die at their own hand one way or another".
Statistics aside, isn't this just common sense? You're fighting an uphill battle trying to argue that it's perfectly OK for depressed people to own guns.
My friend tried slitting his wrists years ago. It didn't work. He didn't know what he was doing. The next morning, he went and bought rope and was going to hang himself. He was AWOL from the Army and he was in Canada. His family managed to track him down based on credit card transactions. His stepbrother found him sitting in the parking lot of his hotel in his car after he had returned from buying the rope. Clearly, in this case, the fact that he was unarmed saved his life. With a gun, he would've been dead.
Nobody's trying to say that guns are evil or that we should make laws to make it harder to buy guns or anything like that. I don't hate guns. I'm not against people owning guns.
It's a bad idea for people who are at risk of committing suicide to possess a gun!! How could anybody argue that? No matter what you want to believe, guns do make it easier to kill yourself! They are very effective for that purpose.
I don't know what else to say.
poster:detroitpistons
thread:933660
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20100122/msgs/935253.html