THE WISDOM OF ARMING IN SELF DEFENSE

Robert Gentel wrote:

If he is not suicidal and lives alone I don't think it's unreasonable for him to conclude that the studies indicating a greater risk from successful suicide and accidental shootings of family members don't apply to him as well as to the general populace.

Except most of the population is not qualified to judge their mental health.
The lifetime risk of experiencing a major depressive episode is something like 50%.

Certainly the risk assessment will vary from household to household, though.

DrewDad wrote:

I don't pretend that driving my car makes me safer than staying at home, though.

But who are you accusing of doing this pretending?

Quote:

Further, that's a red herring. The discussion isn't about whether guns are safer than cars; the discussion is about whether being armed actually increases one's safety.

It's a useful comparison. The additional danger you cite is much smaller than things you are probably willing to do every day (like not drive perfectly). If you portray gun ownership as irrational because of those statistics then engaging in much more dangerous behavior must mean one is positively mad, right?

Quote:

I do agree that a single person with a gun in the house is a very different prospect from a gun in a family residence.

Why then do you use the "very different prospect", overwhelmingly skewed towards familial tragedy, to argue that specific single guys endanger themselves through gun ownership and "pretend" that it doesn't? It seems, to me at least, like you are acknowledging that it's an application of apples to oranges without letting go of the resulting conclusion.

I wonder whether DrewDad favors razor control.

OmSigDAVID wrote:

I wonder whether DrewDad favors razor control.

I favor good mental health. Unfortunately, not everyone achieves it.

In fact, suicide is more likely when one is coming out of a depression, which makes it even more tragic, IMO.

I don't dispute the right to end one's life; I just don't think it ought to be made easy.

The number of people willing to slit their own throat is smaller than the number of people willing to eat a bullet.

The rate of successful suicides is lower when there are no firearms available.

If someone is determined to take their own life, there are certainly ways to accomplish that, some even painless.

I'm not trying to discuss the relative merits of ways to end one's life, though. I'm only trying to discuss the risk associated with having a firearm in the home.

Again, the discussion is not whether someone has the personal right to do that.


The question is, "does owning a gun make you safer, or less safe?"

In a dispassionate assessment of risk,
having a gun laying around makes it more likely
that someone will successfully end their own life.

Suicide of single adults isn't really my biggest concern, though.

That is NOT a risk;
indeed, all Earthly risks will end for him, at that time.
It is a CHOICE, not a risk; like the choice of whether to vote
or whether to watch television.

Gun owners (David, at least, and many others who have frequented the site) claim that having guns in the home make them safer. The statistics show that they are wrong.

Again, David, the risk is not solely from predators.
You keep going back to that;
there seems to be some fundamental disconnect where you evaluate risk.

Is the thought of a predator is so overwhelming to you,
that you discount the other perfectly valid risks?

For a firearm to be useful, it must be loaded and available.

How would you suggest that I safely have a loaded, available handgun
around a four-year-old and an almost six-year-old?

I mitigate the risk by other methods.

Weren't you making the same statistical arguments about cars?

I would argue, though, that the statistics show that people are bad assessing the risks.

For the same reasons that one carries a spare tire in his trunk,
he shoud also carry a defensive gun.

Carrying a spare tire does not make it more likely that u will get a flat.

the gun control side.