Ever heard this Anti-Gun Argument?

[Sgt.Murtaugh]

It goes something like this:

Statistically a gun that you own is more likely to be used against your family or loved ones than it is against an intruder/criminal/attacker, etc...

I have heard it spouted in various places and on various internet communities.

Is there validity to this (there probably is but it's foolish when you actually think about why) and How do you/would you respond to this inteligently?

thanks

 

[primalmu]

I might be wrong, but isn't that something that came out of the often criticized Kellerman studies?

 

[Skribs]

Considering studies show that guns are used 2,000,000 times per year in self defense, I find it unlikely that guns are used 2,000,001 times per year in domestic abuse.

The statement probably also includes suicides, and ignores the fact that a domestic abuser has other ways to kill if the gun is taken away (bat, golf club, tool, kitchen knife, bare hands, or any sort of strangulation/smothering).

 

[M-Cameron]

im willing to bet that doesnt factor in accounts where a gun was used but not shots were fired (IE. Brandishing), and thus no police report was likely filed.

 

[beatledog7]

Claims like that include guns used in suicides, which really skews the numbers. But they don't tell you that part.

 

[smalls]

Well of course your gun is more likely to be used against you if you own one as opposed to not owning one.

If you don't own one, you can't have it used against you, it's physically impossible. Because there isn't a gun to be used. Common sense, really.

Now, just because you own a gun does not mean its more likely to be used against you then in a criminal, that's BS.

 

[Skribs]

Used in a criminal?

 

[yokel]

The absurd notion that people can’t control things, but that things control people and situations forms the bedrock premise of the gun control agenda.

How about the phony-baloney assertion that certain weapons should be regulated and restricted to a place of insignificance or of oblivion because “they have no purpose except to kill people in quick succession"?

 

[Sgt.Murtaugh]

Well of course your gun is more likely to be used against you if you own one as opposed to not owning one.

If you don't own one, you can't have it used against you, it's physically impossible. Because there isn't a gun to be used. Common sense, really.

Now, just because you own a gun does not mean its more likely to be used against you then in a criminal, that's BS.

well of course that's the answer but that's exactly what they want you to say. If you tell them that a gun that doesn't exist can't be used against you, they will say "A ha! see, we should just get rid of the guns!" You are basically walking into a trap with that logic.

 

[Skribs]

Except the argument to that is "if I don't have a gun, they could use a lot of other things against me - including a gun they brought."

The idea that we can get rid of all guns is ridiculous.

The idea that getting rid of guns will prevent criminals from using other weapons or simply disparity of force is ridiculous.

The idea that a person who owns a gun is in greater danger than one who does not is ridiculous.

 

[smalls]

Used in a criminal?

My spelling has been atrocious the past few days. But I suppose in would work, too. Just very much more painful.

 

[2nd 41]

I once read(don't remember where) that a gun in the house is 6% more likely to kill a friend or family member. I can't document that.
I do know of individual suicides by a gunshot. And used by wives or husbands against each other.

 

[mljdeckard]

Some papers in the medical literature have written a homeowner's gun is more likely to kill its owner or family member than kill a criminal, and therefore "the advisability of keeping firearms in the home for protection must be questioned." The most notable (or notorious), and quoted in the previous sentence, is written by doctors Arthur Kellermann and Don Reay, and is titled, "Protection or peril? An analysis of firearms related deaths in the home." (New Engl J Med 1986. 314: 1557-60.)

The oft cited Kellermann paper found a homeowner's gun was 43 times more likely to kill a family member, friend, or acquaintence, than it was used to kill someone in self-defense. Kellermann stated, "for every case of self-protection homicide involving a firearm kept in the home, there were 1.3 accidental deaths, 4.6 criminal homicides, and 37 suicides involving firearms." Florida State University professor Gary Kleck appropriately terms these ratios "nonsensical." (Targeting Guns: Firearms and Their Control, pp. 177-179, 1997)

Although this study was published in 1986 its findings continue to be uncritically cited in medical journals, government publications, and non-technical periodicals such as health newsletters, general interest magazines, op-ed pieces, letters-to-the editor, etc.

Not only is Kellermann's methodology flawed, but using the same approach for violent deaths in the home not involving a firearm, the risk factor more than doubles from 43 to 1, to 99 to 1. Let's see why this 43 to 1 ratio is a meaningless indicator of gun ownership risk.

(Cut and pasted from guncite.com)

 

[barnbwt]

6% more likely than what? The gun that isn't there? You're missing half the statistic. A gun that is present is 100% more likely to save your life than one that you don't have.

Excluding suicide(since lack guns have never stopped people from offing themselves), and the criminal homicides where the defending gunowner/homeowner is killed despite fighting back(since a gun is not a guaranteed defense), and all the cases where the homeowner's gun is illegally possessed(exclude felon or minor gangbangers), I wonder what the numbers turn into. How can a homeowner's gun be a bigger threat to himself than the bad guy's is to himself, anyway?

TCB

 

[ETXhiker]

As Skribs said, guns are used over 2,000,000 times (I understood 2.5 million) a year for defense against criminal acts. In over 90% of these uses, there is isn't even a shot fired - just the presence of the gun ends the confrontation. This would seem to completely discredit any assertion that it is more dangerous to own a gun than not.

 

[mljdeckard]

However, that figure is based on survey data. I tend to stick more with the tangible figure of 1-200,000 police reports filed by people who used guns defensively.

 

[mnrivrat]

Kellerman

Some papers in the medical literature

The AMA liked the BS that Kellerman spewed and have continued to use the debunked data . Not because it is true, but because they like it that way.

Statisics done by Kellerman would likely prove the earth is flat .

I guess that old saying that if you tell a lie long enough, it starts to sound like the truth is what the AMA and anti-gun folks are going for with that one.

 

[toivo]

I think that if you pre-screen to eliminate households where drugs are manufactured and/or packaged for sale, the probability goes way down.

 

[steelerdude99]

Lies, damned lies, and statistics

Statistics can be used to prove or disprove anything you WANT to prove or disprove. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lies,_damned_lies,_and_statistics

chuck

 

[Deanimator]

I've heard just about EVERY anti-gun argument.

Typically that "argument" is framed as "You're (n) times more likely to be killed with your own gun than to KILL a criminal."

This is of course a profoundly dishonest argument given that:

• Most self=defense incidents involve no shooting.
• Most self-defense shootings don't cause a death.
• Most people killed with their own gun did it ON PURPOSE.

My response is usually:
"Do you believe that people should be able to use chemical sprays for self-defense?"
"Yes."
"So then you believe that people should be allowed to carry sarin nerve gas?"
"No!"
"But you seem to believe you've ONLY 'defended' yourself if somebody DIES. Obviously pepper spray or mace won't get that done... and by the way, do you believe that you've only 'defended' yourself with the martial arts if you've beaten or choked somebody to DEATH?"

"Oh, and PS, a man trying to beat, choke or stab his wife to death is a 'family member'. Does she have a legal DUTY to NOT use deadly force to defend herself?"

 

[vito]

There are a lot of bogus statistics tossed around by the anti-gunners. Even long after a statistic is debunked it lives on, and on, by folks who either don't know its been debunked or just can't get themselves to give up on a number that supports their beliefs. The one that never seems to go away is that you are 43 times more likely to be killed by your own gun than for your gun to kill a criminal. The data is false, it is a meaningless statistic anyway when you think about it, but it has a life of its own. As I discussed with someone earlier this week, I don't know for sure that if the principal at the Newtown school had had a gun that she would have stopped the shooter, but I know that without a gun, by throwing herself at him she had zero chance to stop him. Carrying a gun, legally, does not ensure that you will be able to protect yourself from a criminal, but it sure gives you a better chance than if you do not have a gun (unless you are foolish enough to put yourself in a dangerous situation merely based upon your having a gun). Many statistics about guns are intellectually fraudulent, such as when discussing gun deaths they include those where police have shot and killed a criminal, or when discussing youths killed or shot they include gangbangers up to their early twenties who have shot each other. Don't expect the misinformation or deliberate distortion of the truth to stop anytime soon.

 

[helotaxi]

I might be wrong, but isn't that something that came out of the often criticized Kellerman studies?

Yep. "Often criticized" doesn't begin to describe the scholarly reviews of that study. "Without academic merit or credibility", "fundamentally flawed" and "grossly unscientific" are the standard responses from economic and criminology researchers. The original report was so thoroughly refuted as flawed data from an completely illogical, biased design that all the "co-authors" retracted their association from it and Kellerman himself backed away from the ridiculous numbers that he originally claimed. His reports have never faced a proper peer review prior to publication and he has been entirely unwilling to submit them for review outside the medical community. The AMA has proven in no uncertain terms that they are gun-grabbers. The Kellerman reports were trumped up as their justification and were political pieces not actual scientific research.