Suicide is “absent from the discussion of gun policy,” said Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research in Baltimore. “The availability of firearms does indeed increase the risk of suicide, but most people don’t see it that way.”Absent... while present. The suicide deaths get lumped in with the murders, inflating the numbers underhandedly. Suicide is bad, but it's a different kind of problem. And there's a huge racial disparity!
March 24, 2013
"A white person is five times as likely to commit suicide with a gun as to be shot [by someone else] with a gun..."
"... for each African American who uses a gun to commit suicide, five are killed by other people with guns."
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White people are better shots than black people.
Suicide raises the same issue as does other gun crime: Can you prevent person X from obtaining a gun if person X will use it for an improper purpose, viz., committing suicide?
Personally, I support a law that would impose a 48-hour waiting period before anyone can commit suicide with a gun. Also, the background check required before anyone can purchase a gun should include information about whether the prospective purchaser has ever committed suicide.
...for each African American who uses a gun to commit suicide, five are killed by other people with guns.
A nice way of eliding the ugly fact that of those five black people killed by others with guns, 4 of those 5, at least, are murdered by other black people with guns.
Suicide prevention is the flimsiest rationale for regulating or banning something. Suicide is, by definition, a deliberate act that is impossible to prevent.
For ever white American who dies from a gun-related crime, 10 blacks do.
And they keep voting Democrat.
So which should be taken away from black people, guns or Democrats?
Although suicides account for almost twice as many gun deaths as homicides nationwide,
I saw this yesterday and wondered about this --
ACTUALLY suicide and homicide rates (by firearm) are essentially equal in the age division of 0-24 years old. You know --- covering those years in which young black males are being knocked off right and left by their brothers.
I cannot find the page now (it was a pie chart) but the next age category was 25 to -- what -- 65? 45?? But those numbers did indicate almost twice as many suicides by firearms than homicides.
The point being depending on who is put into the pie seriously alters the numbers.
Back to the news -- now the emphasis is turning to how many people kill themselves with firearms and we should ....
Do they really want to decrease the death and destruction numbers in the USA?
Really??
Outlaw alcohol.
Untold numbers of Americans die of boredom every year.
This calls for a federal program to add a million new jugglers and clowns to the streets of America w/in the next 10 years.
It is interesting that blacks favor gun control. Is that because many live in war zones?
Anyone else noticed how effectively the Chicago community was orgagnized to provide safe neighborhoods for their citizens when Barack Obama was there?
/s
I blame racism. If otherwise law-abiding black people had better access to firearms, they would have equal opportunity to perform on this critical metric.
Suicide often occurs when there is felt to be a permanent and intolerable mismatch between how one's life actually is, and what minimum acceptable terms would be.
Suicides don't hate life, they love it so much they refuse to accept it under the terms it seems they must.
What's the Dem's end game on this? They are failing to get more than a few blue states to change laws and this will hurt them in the mid terms. They have no principles, e.g. drones, Gitmo, so let's not talk about that.
From the article:
Where a person lives matters, too. Gun deaths in urban areas are much more likely to be homicides, while suicide is far and away the dominant form of gun death in rural areas.
White people are much more likely to live in rural areas; and black people are much more likely to live in urban areas - at least outside the South.
It would be interesting to see if the racial disparities in murder vs suicide rates disappear if location is taken into account.
JAL said...
Do they really want to decrease the death and destruction numbers in the USA?
Really??
Outlaw alcohol.
Drug-related deaths are running 1 for every 2 from booze, so the War on Drugs is catching up.
I know what JAL means (I probably hate booze more than almost anyone here), but a lot of the booze-related stuff gets a slap on the wrist. Better to show 'em no mercy.
Blacks don't commit suicide much cause blacks got duh high 'steem.
More cons than libs own guns, so gun suicides are probably a net good in the libs' minds.
@Rocco,
and black people are much more likely to live in urban areas - at least outside the South.
Thank you for adding that exception regarding the South. Many Uhmericans don't realize that there is a large population of rural blacks in the South. Sadly, their Northern, more urban brethren seem to suck up all the cultural oxygen, so that their stories and folkways never seem to make the news.
Suicide is the ultimate personal choice. I am surprised that democrats who approve of the personal choice of murdering unborn babies are against it.
Suicide subtracts many "crazies" from the gene pool. This may be why such "liberals" disapprove of it.
It removes Democrat voters from the rolls.
Until the next election.
The homicide rate among whites in the US is roughly the same as the homicide rate in Belgium (1.5-1.7/100,000). Among Blacks, the rare is 21/100,000. That's more than double the hispanic rate of 8/100,000. Of those three groups, blacks are the least likely to own a gun. Homicide in the US is not a gun problem, it is a young black man problem.
“The availability of firearms does indeed increase the risk of suicide, but most people don’t see it that way.”
This experiment has already been run in Australia. After guns were confiscated the suicide rate when down for a short period of time, then has come back up. It has not come back to where it was before the gun ban, it's heading there.
No, I'm not planning to give up my right to self-defense so that somebody with suicidal impulses has to kill themselves by hanging or with rat poison.
Suicide is an essential part of any plan to reduce the rate of growth in health care spending. It's bad health care policy to discourage it.
someone ... can kill himself or herself ...
My high school English teacher would rip me a new one.
YoungHegelian: "A nice way of eliding the ugly fact that of those five black people killed by others with guns, 4 of those 5, at least, are murdered by other black people with guns."
It's closer to 19 out of 20. See FBI stats (95% of blacks murdered by other blacks)...
Similar for whites, too, though: 85% of whites were murdered by other whites.
Country Suicide Rate (per 100,000)
Finland 20.1
Denmark 13.7
Sweden 13.3
Norway 11.6
Iceland 11.2
This data, by itself, is not particularly informative, so I will list a few countries in comparison: Belgium, with Western Europe's highest rate of suicide, is at 21.1, a bit above Finland. France and Switzerland are at 17.6, below Finland, but above the rest. Germany is a bit below Sweden, at 13, and Canada and Norway have the same rate. The United States is at 11.1, a bit below the lowest Scandinavian country. Spain and Italy, countries with a lot of sunshine and a strong Catholic church, are at 7.8 and 7.1, respectively. This is not to mention the suicide rate in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, which runs from the mid-20s into the low 40s. The top seven countries by suicide rate are all part of the former Soviet Bloc. China is at 22.3.
So no matter what you liberals say on average - 'state controlled societies' seem to have the highest suicide rates and those are the exact societies which have the strictest gun control laws.
What say you know? I know your political narratives can't be breached - it's heretical to your minds!
Why don't we just tie all Americans to their bedposts with sheets? No chance of suicide then. Or of eating anything wrong. We'll be the safest country in all of history.
Of course, we'll have an army of government minders to come around and attend to everyone's needs. They'll know what's best for us, thank goodness. A coke? I don't think so. A drive down the highway? Uh uh. A gun within fifty miles? No so much. The TTYOB* program will take care of that.
We'll be so grateful, though, for being kept so very safe. It will be our own little Matrix. Soft and comfy.
* Tied to Your Own Bedposts
If you want to outlaw firearms as a reason to prevent suicide, you'll also want to outlaw bridges, subways, and tall buildings.
After Canada severly restricted handguns in 1975, a government funded study looked at the effect on suicide. It found that suicide by gun did go down but "Canadians appear to have fully substituted suicide by leaping." The overall suicide rate remained unchanged.
So, tell me -- is suicide by leaping so morally superior that thousands of non-suicidal Canadians have to lose their gun rights for NO GAIN AT ALL?
Suicide is caused by untreated clinical depression not the presence of a gun. The gun is merely one way of facilitating a decision already made.
The 87 year-old wodow lady who lived down the block made that crystal clear when she hung herself with clothesline off the basement stairs. All common, unregulated products plus 1 determined human being.
It just goes to show, white folks only think of themselves.
. “The availability of firearms does indeed increase the risk of suicide, but most people don’t see it that way.”
No it doesn't.
For the most part suicide isn't a spur of the moment decision. People who commit suicide usually come to grips with the idea long before they uh execute the deed.
Far more people around here commit suicide by Metro train than suicide by gun. Every few weeks someone jumps in front of one of them. Obviously, we need to ban the subway.
"White people are better shots than black people."
Thugaroons feel compelled to hold the gun in a stylish manner, even if their aim suffers.
Don't compare statistics from other countries on suicides, homicides, and infant mortality directly with U.S. statistics- especially the last category. To say they are untrustworthy is an understatement. The one thing the U.S. is adept at is gathering truthful numbers.
Big cities that alter crime rates to look good get caught. The media is still good at that.
YoungHegelian: "A nice way of eliding the ugly fact that of those five black people killed by others with guns, 4 of those 5, at least, are murdered by other black people with guns."
And of course, all legally obtained, registered, background checks, kept in required gun safes....and all that....doncha know.
If the angst is about the numbers of black on black shootings...or brown on brown, as in LA...then stricter gun control laws will only make more criminals out of law abiding "white" people who are not stupid enough to give up their guns. The same number of blacks will continue murdering each other. Gun control laws are a joke. Expect basically no one to comply.
@BDYNY and @SomeoneHasToSayIt - I had two children commit suicide by hanging and by heroin. There was nothing I could do. I despise the waste of money we are expending to "prevent" suicide. Are you kidding me? We did whatever we could, using the state "system" and our own sorry system of "counseling." When they wanna do it, they do it. I mourn every day.
I thought suicide was okie dokie in some states? You mean it's ok to do it with drugs but not a gun? Or is it ok to jump off a bridge and not use a gun?
See that is the way liberals think. Use suicide stats to make guns look bad but make available ways to kill yourself (or just let Obamacare do it.)
White people are like Finland.
Suicide is every adult's right. It's the ultimate "right to choose". Also, it cleans up the gene pool. So, more power to you, suicides, get cracking!
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"t's closer to 19 out of 20. See FBI stats (95% of blacks murdered by other blacks)...
Similar for whites, too, though: 85% of whites were murdered by other whites."
We only hurt the ones we love.
It is much more difficult to own a gun, especially a handgun, in Canada than in the US.
Yet Canada has a very slightly higher suicide rate than the US. 10.1/100,000 for the US vs 10.2/100,000 for Canada.
(Yes, probably statistically equivalent)
http://www.census.gov/prod/2011pubs/12statab/intlstat.pdf got yo Table 1345
Virtually all gun suicides in the US are committed with handguns, not long guns (rifles, shotguns)
Yet nobody is going after handguns. Not even almost ready for 6th grade Diane Feinstein or the loathesome Brit Piers Morgan.
Not only suicides. There were less than 400 (IIRC) deaths from long guns in the US in 2011 against 12,000 or so from handguns. Fewer deaths from long guns than from hammers and other blunt instruments.
John Henry
I could have sworn that the same people so hot for gun control believe that one has a right to suicide.
"Suicide often occurs when there is felt to be a permanent and intolerable mismatch between how one's life actually is, and what minimum acceptable terms would be."
The Germans have word for it: weltschmerz. Of course, as Sheldon Cooper says, they've always been a comforting people.
Suicide by gun is way more of a guy thing -girl prefer the death by pills.
Blacks don't get a chance to commit suicide. Someone else kills them first.
Off topic but:
Harold said:
"Don't compare statistics from other countries on suicides, homicides, and infant mortality directly with U.S. statistics- especially the last category. To say they are untrustworthy is an understatement. The one thing the U.S. is adept at is gathering truthful numbers."
There can be an issue of trustworthyness with some of that data from other countries. Some countries more than others. I am willing to trust Germany's infant mortality rate, for example.
The real problem is that the WHO definition for infant mortality defines the death as being before 1 year but does not define a live birth.
In Germany, many infants that die in the first days (up to 4-5) of life are not counted as "live births" and thus don't count against infant mortality rate.
In the US a baby that is born, takes 1 breath and dies, is counted in the infant mortality stats.
I can see pros and cons to both ways. What I don't see is any way to compare them.
Other countries have different practices for reporting "live births". Italy has several different practices depending on the part of the country.
John Henry
“The availability of firearms does indeed increase the risk of suicide, ..."
Without guns:
“The availability of knives does indeed increase the risk of suicide, ..."
Without knives:
“The availability of poisons does indeed increase the risk of suicide, ..."
Without poisons:
“The availability of high rises does indeed increase the risk of suicide, ..."
Without high rises:
“The availability of lakes does indeed increase the risk of suicide, ..."
“The availability of morons does indeed increase the risk of gun controls..."
The fewer people in a group who get shot, the less valuable such a statistic becomes. Lets say there were 2 shootings and 20 suicide shootings in the whole country - 10: 1. Just what do you want to do about that?
If I'm pregnant and I commit suicide is that a double murder, or just a self murder with a twist?
I wonder if the presence of a gun increases suicide attempts, or just successes?
bagoh20 said...
If I'm pregnant and I commit suicide is that a double murder, or just a self murder with a twist?
Extreme pro-choice.
Re: "Strelnikov said...
"We only hurt the ones we love."
That's what I told the Girl in the Basement.
Re: """A white person is five times as likely to commit suicide with a gun as to be shot [by someone else] with a gun"
Thank goodness today's students (white or black) do not understand Math.
Oh, here we go, again. Again and again and again, in the new, improved Althouse. Again and again and, yes, again and again.
***
I do appreciate the motivation, however.
Thank you, Ann.
Excuse me, did the Washington Post just notice the incredible disparity in gun violence between blacks and whites? Wow, it's a watershed moment.
@ bagoh If I'm pregnant ...
We call the Pope and have you and your offspring declared a miracle.
And when you *do* die, no one will ever forget you.
Elkh1 is right. As I've mentioned before, you cannot buy large containers of pain relievers here in England. It is illegal to sell them. The most you can get is 24 tablets/pack. But people still commit suicide using pain relievers, so they are considering a law to limit them either further.
When a government feels it must protect us all from ourselves, even Tylenol is too risky.
Blacks murderous range is directed outwardly for whites it is directed inwardly. There is your difference in murder/suicide rates.
Strelnikov said...
"Suicide often occurs when there is felt to be a permanent and intolerable mismatch between how one's life actually is, and what minimum acceptable terms would be."
The Germans have word for it: weltschmerz. Of course, as Sheldon Cooper says, they've always been a comforting people.
Ha. Good one.
But you CAN often go to Germans for a good dose of unvarnished reality.
What I wrote above on suicide, I learned from Schopenhauer, the philosopher who, imo, wrote the most insightful stuff about it.
Are we allowed to say "white person" in public?
Can someone who embraces autonomy (whcih might not be the same thing as liberty, classically understood) as a good call suicide a wrong or a tragedy? Isn't is simply a choice?
The famous mystery clause of Casey suggests that there is no reason to condemn suicide.
Strangely, I don't really consider my own suicide by firearm to be a "risk".
On the other hand, I do consider that I face some risk of being shot by someone else -- just not one that I have to think about much on a daily basis. (Now, if I lived in Kabul . . .)
i think whites have more stress,raising children,keeping a marriage together and the loss of a job is devastating.blacks don't marry most are on welfare and don't care about their kids
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