# Is Obama really the best gun salesman in America? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [December 6, 2013, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641 "2013-12-06T04:33:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 6\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Kable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kable)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2014, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/261 "2014-01-04T01:48:15Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > As you know from my past posts, what’s significantly changed, in the US, is the ratio of gun homicides to suicides, not the number of gun deaths. Yes, as I know from your past posts you are obsessed with suicides. I believe in the right to die myself. > [@](#): > > It could be that the increasing guns sales, and gun suicides, have the same underlying cause – worry and fearfulness. Worried people are probably more likely to kill themselves than others. Of course, people aren’t killing themselves for fear that Obama is going to come for their guns. But if they get upset over such nonsense, imagine how upset they may get when real life challenges appear. Just an idea. I don’t know about that. Gun buyers are largely conservative and conservatives are happier than liberals, so I would think they would have less reason to kill themselves. ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 4, 2014, 11:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/262 "2014-01-04T23:38:53Z")
> [@Kable](#): > > Gun buyers are largely conservative and conservatives are happier than liberals, so I would think they would have less reason to kill themselves. Most of the time, sure. So you might expect that gun ownership would be associated with lower suicide rates, excluding cases where the gun was bought for the suicide. But, because guns can make a temporary problem permanent, we find this: [Gun prevalence and suicide rank by state](http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/spr08gunprevalence/) ---
**Author:** ![Kable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ed655f/32.png) [@Kable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kable)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2014, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/263 "2014-01-05T00:11:18Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > Most of the time, sure. So you might expect that gun ownership would be associated with lower suicide rates, excluding cases where the gun was bought for the suicide. > > But, because guns can make a temporary problem permanent, we find this: > > [Gun prevalence and suicide rank by state](http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/spr08gunprevalence/) I might think you have something there except every time countries ban guns, suicides by other means rise to match. But there you and your suicide talk again. You don’t believe in the right to die I take it. ---
**Author:** ![Farin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e79b87/32.png) [@Farin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Farin)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2014, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/264 "2014-01-05T00:44:52Z")
> [@PhillyGuy](#): > > Most of the time, sure. So you might expect that gun ownership would be associated with lower suicide rates, excluding cases where the gun was bought for the suicide. > > But, because guns can make a temporary problem permanent, we find this: > > [Gun prevalence and suicide rank by state](http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/magazine/spr08gunprevalence/) I have a problem with your maps: That seems to be total suicide rate. Why did they use a total suicide rate instead of the firearm suicide rate? Wouldn’t that be better tied to gun ownership than total suicides? Or is there another reason to look at total suicides that I’m missing? ---
**Author:** ![PhillyGuy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ed655f/32.png) [@PhillyGuy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PhillyGuy)\ **Post date:** [January 5, 2014, 4:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/265 "2014-01-05T04:22:16Z")
> [@Kable](#): > > I might think you have something there except every time countries ban guns, suicides by other means rise to match. How do you define banning guns? Is this banning all guns, or is outlawing just some types for some some people enough to be considered a ban? Either way, to know what you say you know, you must have studied the dozens (probably hundreds) of countries that have banned guns, often more than once, and checked the suicide rates before and after the law changed. How many months did you spend in libraries (since most of those bannings happened long before the web) gathering these statistics? Maybe you have a link to someone who says they did spent those months in libraries, and make your claim about each one, but I question whether there are reliable (or any) before and after suicide statistics in most cases. So I’ll try to be objective if you give me a link. But I’m also going to be asking, while reading, whether it either doesn’t say what you think it says, or is making up data. There would be no reason for me to do the same study because I don’t propose to ban guns, any more than I propose to ban that other public health menace, cigarettes. > [@](#): > > You don’t believe in the right to die I take it. Do I believe in a right to die which cannot be infringed? No. Just like so-called second amendment supporters don’t (with rare exceptions) really believe in an unlimited right to bear arms. You can’t prevent someone from killing themselves who consistently wants to do so. Do I believe in giving people time to reconsider an impulsive act AKA suicide prevention? Yes. The great majority of people who survive serious suicide attempts voluntarily choose not to retry, but some decide otherwise. I won’t elevate that to the word “right,” but obviously, they can make that choice. ---
**Author:** ![DragonAsh](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/db5fbb/32.png) [@DragonAsh](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DragonAsh)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2014, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641/266 "2014-01-07T09:02:15Z")
> [@Kable](#): > > I might think you have something there except every time countries ban guns, suicides by other means rise to match. But there you and your suicide talk again. You don’t believe in the right to die I take it. I was going to say that this was complete and utter baloney and ask for a cite, but since he’s no longer with us… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/is-obama-really-the-best-gun-salesman-in-america/675641.md?page=13)