On mass shootings and gun rights.

[Dwesson]

Your first link is behind a pay wall. Your second link doesn't have any data on gun ownership - not sales or background checks - gun ownership.

So far you have presented zero evidence that "gun ownership is at an all time high as a % of the population". I have presented three sources that say it isn't and you tried to dismiss them nothing more than hand waving.

You can't beat something with nothing,



Again, increasing gun sales does not = increasing gun ownership. I bought tons of guns during the Obama regime, and all of my gun purchases increased the number of gun owners by ZERO. I'm sure many here can say the same thing. Yes, of course some sales are to new owners, but many sales were people who already owned guns buying more guns Meet America's gun super-owners – with an average of 17 firearms each

Again, still waiting for clear evidence that "Gun ownership is at all time highs as a % of the population" as was claimed earlier. Telling me to "Google it" like Cenk Ugyur does

is not evidence.

You can lead a horse to water. Sorry you can't read the behind the paywall and yes "Just googling" the title is the solution to that actually. (Literally, google search the title and click that link, you can get behind the paywall..)

You want to believe that gun ownership is in a precipitous decline, 50% to 37% because why? Some left leaning surveys tell you so? Your own surveys linked have a spread of 7% and a survey methodology that's pretty damn questionable. You call up the average gun owner and ask them over the phone if they have guns? What % OF GUN OWNERS will deny owning a gun?

Let me guess, you tell the doc you own guns too...

But if you want to get hung up on a single statistic that seems to indicate that a smaller % of the total US population owns guns now than in the past and that somehow invalidates my statements have at it.

You're fighting the good fight!

 

[Dwesson]

It's not a matter of what I want to believe. I wish the percentage of the population that owned guns was increasing. But facts are facts. I don't engage in wishful thinking.

I am aware of the problems of getting accurate estimates of gun ownership, but I am still waiting for even ONE source - left wing, right wing, any wing - that supports the claim that "gun ownership is at an all time high as a % of the population". Gun ownership - not sales, or NICS checks (many of which are performed for concealed carry permits and other non-sales purposes), or guesses, or wishful thinking.

Still waiting...

Which FACTS are you citing? Which of the polling data that YOU posted do you believe? The 43% or the 37% Which one is the fact? They both indicate a decline, I just want you to indicate which one is gospel.

You understand that both are flawed, but believe the trend no matter what?

What is true, without any contention, is that there are more guns in the US now than there have ever been before, take that for what you will.

You picked a great hill to die on though, you got me, gun ownership is NOT at an all time high because flawed surveys indicate it isn't despite record gun sales.

Good luck with your gas tax.

 

[Ura-Ki]

Lets quit beating this dead horse and continue on with this thread!

 

[Dwesson]

Wait a minute. You're the one who stated



Which FACTS are you citing? Still waiting for even one source to back up your claim.



For the reasons you helped point out, getting precise numbers is difficult therefore the differences between the surveys, but all three sources agree that the percentage is declining, not at an all time high.



I agree. I never claimed otherwise. But you have to agree the number of guns is not the same as the percentage of the population that owns guns, or even the number of gun owners. And guns don't vote, so not that helpful politically.



I didn't die on the hill, I'm king of the hill!!



Still a better idea than "it's the price of freedom" or gun bans. Can protect schools from many threats, not just those involving guns, and doesn't ban any firearm or magazine. It's something reasonable to offer as an alternative and it has a much better chance of actually preventing a mass murder than a gun ban.

Here's one:
NRA-ILA | Gun Ownership at All-Time High, Nation's Murder Rate at Nearly All-Time Low

FYI if you believe gun ownership is on a decline, well you're going to get a gun ban before a gas tax lol.

 

[dancinghippos]

It has become a propaganda war, not a logical discussion. Yet to win the propaganda war in the eyes of the sleeping electorate, when you get their attention, YOU MUST BE RIGHT. Here is some support. Use these arguments in the letters to the editor, your letters, emails and phone calls to legislators, and to all the people you know who will listen.

MYTH: Police want stricter gun laws
TRUTH: Police chiefs, mostly political appointees may echo their politicians. Police on the street overwhelmingly support gun rights for citizens without police records. These are just three of many links:

https://www.quora.com/What-do-polic...ement-professionals-think-of-gun-control-laws

What do police officers think about gun control: National survey by PoliceOne tells all (Joe's Outdoor Office)

Police Gun Control Survey: Are legally-armed citizens the best solution to gun violence?


MYTH: "Incidents like the Parkland shooting demand gun control"

FACT PART 1:
The Parkland shooting was a textbook case of failure of "the authorities" we are supposed to depend on for protection. The authorities tell us: "See Something, Say Something". Local residents called the Broward Sheriffs to the shooter's home 45 times. No arrests, because the Broward County Sheriff chose to divert Niklaus Cruz to counseling instead of arresting him. Residents called the FBI on him twice. No arrest, even after Cruz posted a video saying he wants to be a school shooter. Because the Sheriff and the FBI ignored an obvious violent lunatic that all his classmates feared, Cruz passed the background check to buy the murder weapon. So why should we wait for you to let us down again?

The authorities say the police will protect us. Yet the four Broward County deputies who were on the scene when Cruz started shooting kids stayed outside while Cruz was murdering children. The Sheriff ran to a CNN "Town Hall" event to blame the NRA for the murders his deputies let happen. This sequence of real events would fail the smell test for a TV drama.

FACT PART 2:
Deaths from mass shootings get all the headlines, but they are extremely rare compared to other violent crime, even now. There have been 1135 mass shooting deaths since 1966 (Washington Post). That represents less than 2 years in Chicago.

In any recent year in the US, gangsters who already ignore murder laws shoot each other and innocent victims with guns they won't give up. Those are 6-7000 homicides each year. That doesn't support the gun control narrative, so it is ignored.

The ice.gov website enumerates 2038 homicides committed by illegal immigrants they deported in 2018 and a similar number in 2017. Add to that 2085 kidnappings, 50,000 assualts, 80,000 drunk driving, 76,000 drug offenses, 12,600 burglaries, 23,000 obstruction of justice, 5562 robberies, 12,600 burglaries, 5300 sexual assaults.
Here is a link to the 2018 ICE report: The numbers are in table 1

https://www.ice.gov/doclib/about/offices/ero/pdf/eroFY2018Report.pdf

So border control would stop more deaths every year than the total number of mass shooting victims. But that doesn't support the gun control agenda, so it is ignored.

 

[dancinghippos]

In 1997, Britain banned and confiscated all firearms after a school shooting. Again, the local constables completely ignored the obvious problems the shooter displayed prior to the murders. Another failure of the authorities. How did that in fact change British homicides in the subsequent 22 years? The homicide rate rose 60% between 1997 and 2003. Now they are banning knives too. And addressing crime with an aggressive "surveillance state" strategy and 20,000 more police. Here is proof:

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1QwAfQTAz...-12-20+at++Thursday,+December+20,+5.45+PM.png

Here is another article containing that chart and others.
Updated: Murder and homicide rates before and after gun bans - Crime Prevention Research Center

 

[dancinghippos]

this information only matters if you drown the opposition in it. We can tell each other all day long and nothing will change. Fill the reader responses on newpaper websites, Yahoo, Oregonian, and the legislators.

 

[Dwesson]

Close but no cigar. That article - from 2013- uses 2011 data to state that the number of gun owners has increased. The number of gun owners can increase, but if the overall population increases faster than the number of gun owners increases, the "% of the population" that owns guns will decrease.

Maybe back in 2011 "Gun ownership is at all time highs as a % of the population". But it isn't 2011 anymore.

And what was the source of the 2011 data the article you cited used? Why it is the Gallup Poll, which you yourself dismissed! So, is their old data totally believable but their new data is to be dismissed? Is Gallup worthless or great?

Again, it's not a matter what I "believe". Still waiting for evidence newer than 2011 that "Gun ownership is at all time highs as a % of the population".

What if the population growth exceeded the new gun owners but the population growth is prohibited to own firearms? Are you counting them in the denominator? Is Gallup?

Seems to me there's a lot of illegal immigrants in this country between the 90s when the rate was 50% and now...

Did you ever think there's a lot more single family households now where it's just a mother and a child? That women are less likely to own firearms? That the survey is households and not individuals in some cases? Maybe that skews the numbers?

You also keep ignoring the point that the delta between your surveys (which you acknowledge have error bars around the %) is literally the difference between all time high and not. This may suggest 50% is within the confidence interval of one of those polls.

Do I have a survey of 700-1000 people over the phone to point to for my assertion that gun ownership as a % of population is at an all time high? No I don't.

What I do have is quantitative data from the ATF about the number of firearms manufactured in the US each year and no qualitative reason why gun ownership would DECLINE despite the massive uptick in sales , the sunset of an AWB AND several shootings which drove MASSIVE adoption of items potentially going to be banned over the same time horizon.

This is known as deduction. Again neither you nor Gallup nor anyone else has offered a scenario to explain a decline in gun ownership.

Again, if you believe those polls you linked you're going to get a gun ban before a gas tax to support guns in schools. As my old coworker from Texas used to say, that'll go over like a fart in a phone booth.

 

[Dwesson]

Are you saying illegal immigrants don't own guns because they are prohibited? Do you also believe felons don't own guns because they are prohibited? You're reaching. Why not just concede that your earlier statement "Gun ownership is at all time highs as a % of the population" has zero evidence to back it up and move on?

Do you think the survey asks if they are a felon? Do you think they ask their citizenship? I have no problem qualifying the statement:

"Gun ownership of non-prohibited individuals is at an all time high of total non-prohibited persons".

I have as much evidence that's the case as you that it's not the case. Mine is based on empirical quantitative evidence, and reasonable deduction.

Your evidence is some dodgy left leaning surveys with poor past performance. Do you also believe the Mass Shooting Tracker's number of total Mass Shootings?

Call it confirmation bias, call it talking your book, call it what you want. I believe gun ownership is at an all time high for a lot of the reasons I outlined.

You can't seem to articulate why it's at a 40 year low except for some really poor surveys. You also want to believe those surveys for some reason despite a lot of reasons why the methodology is incorrect. Which you conveniently ignore.

Please stop trying to explain how percentages work, I fully understand what you are trying to say. I'm not denying a lot of guns were bought by existing gun owners at all.

I am telling you I don't believe those surveys several times now and I have given you reasons why.

Do you also believe that 3% of the gun owners own 50% of the guns? I mean here it is
3% of Americans own half the country's 265 million guns

If you believe those surveys how do you expect to get legislation passed that puts more guns in school with a gas tax vs the people that are going to vote to ban specific weapons?

 

[Dwesson]

You can believe anything you want, including in the Easter Bunny.

Try this one on for size then, I BELIEVE if those surveys YOU BELIEVE are correct, we're up bubblegums creek, but then again you already know that. Which is why you refuse to address my other point.

BUT HEY lord knows non-gun owners are gonna vote a gas tax in over a gun ban to get MORE guns in school.

You haven't presented ANY quantitative evidence (newer than 2011) that "Gun ownership is at all time highs as a % of the population". You have made faulty extrapolations from gun sales to gun ownership.

So you acknowledge that the evidence was correct in 2011 and that SandyHook and a slate of other issues failed to increase new gun owners at the same pace or greater than population growth?

 

[Dwesson]

"More guns in school" is a phrase used by gun controllers to argue against increased school security. Why are you sounding like a gun controller and using their talking points?

Well, will your plan increase guns in school or not? If it won't, how is it going to help? If it will how are you going to convince the majority of the public that do not own firearms that that will work paid for via a gas tax vs a gun ban?

LOL I'm the one talking like a gun controller? You're the one parroting their statistics. You also dodged the mass shooter tracker. Are those numbers real or not?

Your Gallup Poll:

1994 - 51% of homes own a gun, total population 263MM people
Total household gun owners 134.28MM normalizing across households.
If a Household is 2 people, divide this number in half.

1999 - 34% of homes owns a gun, total population 279.73MM
Total household owners 95.1MM

So the population increases 16MM and net gun owners declined 39MM...5 years AFTER an AWB. How many people do you know GOT RID of their guns as a result of the ban? Do you see how ridiculous this is? The survey is BS

 

[Pete F]

How are these for statistics on gun ownership?

Gun ownership is up in America. So why isn't the media telling you about it?
Gun ownership in the U.S. 1972-2018 | Statistic

I found several others including Gallup that shows an increase.

 

[Dwesson]

I'm talking about armed, trained security personnel. Like they have in Israel Why school shootings are so rare in Israel, where guns are such a common sight

It works in Israel. There is no need to re-invent the wheel.

Where did I say I disagree with this approach? At the end of the day there's more guns in school, regardless of who's hands they are in. According to the statistics you believe you need to convince 60+% of the non-gun owning public why they should increase their gas taxes vs banning a semi-auto "assault" rifles.

None of my statistics were from gun control organizations. You're reaching in your desperation.
And since the "mass shooter tracker" is irrelevant to this discussion I'm not going to fall for your Red Herring.

You think the faculty of the University of Chicago aren't left leaning? No bias? Really? CBS? Really, they don't have an agenda? Sounds pretty naive to me..

The mass shooter tracker is relevant to this discussion because it points out quite clearly how statistics can be used to deceive people. You also seem really averse to pointing out it's propaganda (which it patently is on it's face) but that your surveys as produced by the aforementioned folks couldn't possibly be...LOL

I have already wasted enough time explaining basic math to you. I have a ton of work you are keeping me from. Go back and redo your calculations, and show your work for full credit. I'll grade it in the morning.

"
Total household gun owners 134.28MM normalizing across households.
If a Household is 2 people, divide this number in half."

Normalizing, you have to set a baseline, it can be whatever you want. You do realize this right? If a household size changes from 1994 to 1999 you have to account for that. OR you can NORMALIZE a household to 1, 2, 3 or 4 people etc.

So household size matters to you now but when I mentioned the fact that there are more single mother households less likely to own guns NOW which could skew the results, I was just grasping at straws? Which is it.

That's not even the point, the simple fact of the matter is that the total households with firearms in the US DID NOT decline 17% in the course of 5 years when the total population only increased ~16MM or 6%.

You do have a lot of work to do, you have to sell your bill to a bunch of non-gun owners with a gas tax HAH. Good luck with that.

 

[Dwesson]

How are these for statistics on gun ownership?

Gun ownership is up in America. So why isn't the media telling you about it?
Gun ownership in the U.S. 1972-2018 | Statistic

I found several others including Gallup that shows an increase.

Nice work, doubt you'll convince him though...

 

[notazombie]

I love you guys.

 

[Dwesson]

I love you guys.

I find it pretty frustrating that we are on this board with folks parroting gun control advocates talking points as if they are gospel, when pointed out that we should view them with a more critical, skeptical eye, that notion is attacked.

I also find it somewhat telling that given my original post, this person's first instinct was to post CBS News's poll with it's gun control talking point headline. Seems odd to me that someone who's pro 2A would

1) Go there first
2) Post something with such a ridiculous headline without more of a critical eye..

Gun owners are their own worst enemy sometimes.

 

[arakboss]

I propose a 3 cent per gallon gasoline tax that would completely fund armed police and physical security at every K-12 school in the entire country. Have you seen anyone propose that? For an average 10 gallon fill-up that would be 30 cents. People who oppose that could be accused of "not caring for the children". You could hold up a quarter and a nickel and say "See this? They would rather leave our precious children vulnerable to madmen than spend 30 cents every time they fill up their car!" That's more likely to appeal to non-gun owners than shrugging your shoulders and saying "Oh well. It's a necessary sacrifice, the 'price of the idea of America'" the next time there is a mass shooting.

I think we (all stakeholders) need to decide on what will be acceptable to secure our schools then decide how to pay for it. But then the mass shooters will move to softer targets movie theaters, shopping malls, restaurants, etc. Then we will be back to the same old arguments.

People today seem willing to accept risk only when the reward is something they desire or benefit greatly from. They are not eager to accept risk for something they have no interest in or see no benefit from.

 

[bbbass]

Not 3%, THREE CENTS PER GALLON.

Oh... okay... still won't fly.

 

[bbbass]

I think we (all stakeholders) need to decide on what will be acceptable to secure our schools then decide how to pay for it. But then the mass shooters will move to softer targets movie theaters, shopping malls, restaurants, etc. Then we will be back to the same old arguments.

People today seem willing to accept risk only when the reward is something they desire or benefit greatly from. They are not eager to accept risk for something they have no interest in or see no benefit from.

I hear ya... but I'm obliged to mention that securing schools, airports, theaters, churches, etc etc is a short term measure. In the long run we have to cure our sick society and stop letting other societies bring their brand of sickness to our shores.

So what's the carrot; what's the reward that will get some traction? Do we buy teens a latte if they go shoot a box of .22lr? Do we buy a millennial a new elec game in exchange for a good word in college? Do we need to buy Senators and Reps? Maybe we need our own sugar daddy... how rich is Steve Hilton?

 

[notazombie]

But then the mass shooters will move to softer targets movie theaters, shopping malls, restaurants, etc. Then we will be back to the same old arguments.

Exactly. And when the antis finally find the magical piece of legislation that makes all firearms dissolve with a poof we'll be arguing about knives...then pressure cookers...then airplanes...then box trucks...then fuel and fertilizer...then castor beans...then matches...then...

Bad people do bad stuff. Just about anything can be weaponized for evil.