# Report: Guns in the home provide greater health risk than benefit **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 28, 2011, 11:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014 "2011-04-28T11:02:41Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 8
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/141 "2011-04-29T01:47:52Z")
> [@HoboStew](#): > > The point that progun people miss is that **these things have actual, practical, real world uses that have nothing to do with killing people.** That’s why we aren’t awed by the amazing stats about car fatalities and whatnot. With guns, the only practical use is to shoot people. Bambi and Thumper too … I happen to adore venison, rabbit, not so hot on squirrel, gator is pretty good … unless I win a lottery or get a job paying serious cash I can not afford to mail order deer, I have to have hubby go out and hunt it for me [I can no longer hunt myself thanks to being a gimp] And he rather does need a gun for it as he has never trained bow and he has a dodgy knee so grabbing a knife and running the critters down is impracticle. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/142 "2011-04-29T01:51:16Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > I live in Florida, and I’ve never heard of the initiative. I’m assuming you don’t (unlike a mugger) have a vested interest in knowing the potential armament status of random women, though. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/143 "2011-04-29T01:53:20Z")
> [@opmike](#): > > I’d be interested to see the statistics for responsible gun owners. The problem with getting data on this is that many gun owners are to some degree concerned about becoming known gun owners, at least to “the government”. There aren’t even any good statistics on incidences of gun problems with concealed-carry permit holders. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 3:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/144 "2011-04-29T03:55:02Z")
> [@HoboStew](#): > > Its not a strawman at all Yes it is. It’s an fallacious misrepresentation of the position - there can be no possible equivalence between a “plutonium basketball game” and the issue of gun control. Good grief, I’m not even going to argue it further; it’s so ridiculous. > [@](#): > > You seem to be OK with the costs of gun ownership as it stands now. Would you still be OK if the death toll was 10x what it currently is? 100x? Its all a matter of degrees, which was the point of my post. It depends. Does the benefit increase as well? Are the absolute deaths more important than the cost/benefit? More importantly, when does my individual right to effective self-defense cease to exist, is probably a better question. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/145 "2011-04-29T04:01:48Z")
> [@opmike](#): > > I’d be interested to see the statistics for responsible gun owners. > > As with car statistics (going back this analogy, I apologize), those figures frequently include people who were driving drunk or otherwise compromised, fiddling around with radio, texting/talking on phone, going well in excess of the flow of traffic or what road conditions allow, and a myriad of other things we generally regard to be poor methods of driving or poor things to do with driving, and that many of us here wouldn’t do. > > With the gun issue, how do these figures change for responsible gun owners like myself? While I have a gun available for self-defense, my primary use of firearms is in competition shooting. Primarily, I shoot in USPSA, IDPA, and 3-gun style competitions. I also do instruction. You can get a proxy of “responsible gun owner statistics” by going to the websites and/or writing the State Attorney Generals offices of every State which has CCW like I did. At some point I reduced all the stats I got into a spreadsheet. I’ve updated the sheet a few times, but IIRC a CCW weapon holder was anywhere from 1/4 to 1/10 as likely to be involved in any crime than the general public at large (I believe the mean weighted value was close to 1 in 6). However these statistics were a little skewed IMO on two sides - on the “low” side because they mainly looked at felonies, and on the “high” side because I could not get figures from several low crime-rate states. ---
**Author:** ![Bryan\_Ekers](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bryan_ekers/32/183_2.png) [@Bryan\_Ekers](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bryan_Ekers)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 4:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/146 "2011-04-29T04:40:45Z")
> [@emacknight](#): > > Is it possible the politicians were in the pocket of the fence industry??? Keep looking. The links are there. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 4:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/147 "2011-04-29T04:55:38Z")
1. In a discussion such as this “guns” is too amorphous to be used as a descriptor. I would think a better description should be “handguns not used for sporting activities” 2. There is ample evidence of accidental deaths caused by handguns in the home that would otherwise not have happened. 3. A larger proportion of suicides use handguns, at least some of these would not happen if a handgun were not available 4. Using Gary Kleck (seems credible) as a point of reference, having handguns (or potential handguns) in the house DOES serve as a deterrent effect. 5. The amount of guns taken away from a defensive user and used against them is small, and is certainly outweighed by the number of people that successfully defend themselves using a self defense handgun 6. There are a huge number of crimes committed using handguns 7. Many many homicides are committed using handguns. Is there a net benefit from having handguns is the house? This is largely a moot point. Whether having handguns in the house makes the community safer or not is going to depend on your perspective. Some would say that if no handguns for defense then criminals won’t arm themselves. This is a little fallacious IMHO. People committing a crime (I believe) will use whatever means are easily at hand to give themselves a greater chance of success. So whether or not you take a handgun to commit a robbery is also a function of how easy that handgun is to get (and further, what are the penalities if you are caught with it, and what are your chances of getting caught) As of right now, it is not realistic to remove handguns from the criminal community in the US so it is largely an academic discussion anyway. Given the current situation, and what I have just read, I think it is a good idea to arm yourself with a self degense handgun if you are in the US AND if you are a reponsible owner that has a reasonable level of confidence you can keep you family (i.e children) safe from accidental usage. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/148 "2011-04-29T04:58:43Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > You can get a proxy of “responsible gun owner statistics” by going to the websites and/or writing the State Attorney Generals offices of every State which has CCW like I did. At some point I reduced all the stats I got into a spreadsheet. I’ve updated the sheet a few times, but IIRC a CCW weapon holder was anywhere from 1/4 to 1/10 as likely to be involved in any crime than the general public at large (I believe the mean weighted value was close to 1 in 6). However these statistics were a little skewed IMO on two sides - on the “low” side because they mainly looked at felonies, and on the “high” side because I could not get figures from several low crime-rate states. Hi Una - I would think another two factors would skew the results as well (possibly more) 1. Somebody that is able to get a CCW is IIMHO) likely to be more intelligent and better informed than the general populace, so will be better at avoiding crime in the first place 2. Somebody that takes the time to get a CCW is going to be more aware of, and think more about security so will take a much more active role in “staying aware from crime” than the general populace. ---
**Author:** ![bengangmo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/50afbb/32.png) [@bengangmo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bengangmo)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/149 "2011-04-29T05:06:57Z")
> [@bdgr](#): > > I"ve use a gun a couple of times to denfed myself. No shots were fired and there isn’t any record of it. For instance, someone tried to break in the front door, I pointed a gun at them, they ran. > > Of all the people I know to have used a gun in self defense, that’s how it went most of the time. Most studies that say guns aren’t used in self defense only count when they are actually fired, and there is no reliable data on how many times it is used as a deterrent. > > With licensed carry, the biggest detterent is probably the idea that nobody knows who might have a gun. The only problem with a cite such are this **bdgr** is that we don’t know if the burglar was scared off by you or by the gun. If somebody is trying to get into the house, and unarmed you appear, phone in hand 9as in, on phone to police), and tell them to fuck off they would then have three options right? 1. Pull a gun on, taking you captive and continuing with the robbery. 2. Not having a gun, crash through the door / window, take you captive and continue with robbery 3. Run Even if the person is armed, which do you think is going to be most common and “rational\*” approach - not that someone breaking into an occupied house can be realied upon to be rational mind you. ---
**Author:** ![Tristan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tristan/32/18058_2.png) [@Tristan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tristan)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 12:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/150 "2011-04-29T12:19:01Z")
> [@RedFury](#): > > Care to try again? You may have missed the GD and BBQ threads featuring our new friend here. He is a racist, of the “but… science says!” bent. I suggest ignoring his attempts to threadjack here. /hijack ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/151 "2011-04-29T12:33:09Z")
> [@Argent\_Towers](#): > > Hey left-wingers: if you want to encourage the NRA to become even more reactionary, encourage people who’d ordinarily be more moderate to turn into single-issue (gun) voters, and generally get gun owners and gun advocates even _more_ fanatically invested in defending the 2nd Amendment at the cost of other, ultimately more important political issues, then by all means, keep citing studies like the one in the OP and keep spouting totally uninformed knee-jerk anti gun rhetoric. > > The whole “gun lobby” that you so hate would _never exist_ if not for the people like _you_ who it rose up as a backlash against. The politicization of gun issues would never have occurred if _you_ hadn’t started chipping away at the 2nd Amendment. Nonsense. It’s a manufactured issue by the Right and the gun manufacturers, designed to distract people from rights that actually matter, while selling guns. American gun culture is as artificial as the “tradition” of diamond wedding rings. The NRA and the rest aren’t responding to anything that the other side does, they are responding to right wing propaganda and their own paranoid ego fantasies. ---
**Author:** ![DrFidelius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drfidelius/32/3447_2.png) [@DrFidelius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrFidelius)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/152 "2011-04-29T13:19:32Z")
> [@Bryan\_Ekers](#): > > Keep looking. The links are there. We should picket. ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/153 "2011-04-29T13:38:54Z")
> [@bengangmo](#): > > Hi Una - > > I would think another two factors would skew the results as well (possibly more) > > 1. Somebody that is able to get a CCW is IIMHO) likely to be more intelligent and better informed than the general populace, so will be better at avoiding crime in the first place > 2. Somebody that takes the time to get a CCW is going to be more aware of, and think more about security so will take a much more active role in “staying aware from crime” than the general populace. Yes, and there are many other factors as well. I guess one of the main things which **Cecil** and I both came up with upon viewing the results of upwards of 50 research papers and books (it may have been double that; I cannot recall) is that it is incredibly difficult to determine a net benefit or net cost to Society. My _opinion_ upon reviewing the research was that there was a small net benefit, and that even if it broke even we should err on the side of personal freedom. Cecil was a bit more pessimistic, saying he thought it was a wash, neither a net positive nor a net benefit. My personal opinion as well, which has changed even over the last 10 years, is that there are too many people who have firearms with no training and no ability to use them safely, and somehow there needs to be a way to reduce that number without taking away or excessively infringing on the rights of the rest of the gun owners of America. A problem is of course that the law-abiding gun owners of America have been lied to, misled, suffered confiscation bait-and-switches like in New York and California, and watched themselves be demonized by a clearly partisan press and one half of the political parties of the nation over the last 50 years, and they have little reason to trust anyone. The last time I made what I thought was a fairly reasonable proposal for gun safety requirements I was set upon by gun owners who claimed it would lead to local police having only one training center out in the middle of a desert, with classed held only on Leap Year days at 2:31am, etc., etc. I’ve seen too many clear idiots and even outright “unofficially” insane people with firearms, and something must be done. ---
**Author:** ![Nadir](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/nadir/32/7302_2.png) [@Nadir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nadir)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/154 "2011-04-29T13:39:10Z")
> [@bengangmo](#): > > - not that someone breaking into an occupied house can be realied upon to be rational mind you. That’s the thing about your typical criminal - they tend towards being unpredictable and irrational, generally speaking. The more serious the crime, the stronger the tendency. It’s hard to argue with somebody pointing a gun at you. Still, controlling a volatile crime scene never comes with any guarantees. At least the the good guy gun wielder gets a potentially more favorable outcome. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![emacknight](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/3ec8ea/32.png) [@emacknight](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/emacknight)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 1:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/155 "2011-04-29T13:44:33Z")
> [@Una\_Persson](#): > > A problem is of course that the law-abiding gun owners of America have been lied to, misled, suffered confiscation bait-and-switches like in New York and California, and watched themselves be demonized by a clearly partisan press and one half of the political parties of the nation over the last 50 years, and they have little reason to trust anyone. What’s really sad is that you can replace the part in red with just about any topic and it will still hold true. Abortion, taxes, immigration, health care… ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 2:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/156 "2011-04-29T14:06:09Z")
> [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > It is the high population of blacks and Hispanics that give the United States a higher murder rate than Western Europe. > [@New\_Deal\_Democrat](#): > > India has a tradition of urban civilization that is 4,000 years old. Agriculture goes back several thousand years further. According to The 10,000 Year Explosion, the longer a population has practiced agriculture and urban living the lower its crime rate is likely to be. This is because the criminal justice system of a civilized nation gradually removes those with criminal proclivities from the gene pool. > [The 10,000 Year Explosion - a book review - Great Debates - Straight Dope Message Board](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=605733) > > The Hispanics in Mexico and the United States are a hybrid race composed of Spaniards, American Indians, and Negroes. American Indians and Negroes usually have higher crime rates than whites because they are closer in numbers of generations to the paleolithic era. I warned you not that long ago about dragging your racial theories into unrelated discussions. This is a prime example. It has no bearing on the subject, and you already have a thread about the book if you want to discuss it. I’m giving you another warning here: don’t do this again. ---
**Author:** ![Kearsen](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/82dd89/32.png) [@Kearsen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kearsen)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/157 "2011-04-29T14:18:10Z")
“…and that gun accidents are most likely to occur in homes with guns…” This part did make me chuckle a bit. ---
**Author:** ![Zeriel](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/58956e/32.png) [@Zeriel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zeriel)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 2:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/158 "2011-04-29T14:23:54Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > “…and that gun accidents are most likely to occur in homes with guns…” > > This part did make me chuckle a bit. I suppose you could have an alternate theory with hordes of concealed-carry folks visiting their liberal neighbors and then accidentally shooting the cat or something. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![RedFury](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/ec9cab/32.png) [@RedFury](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RedFury)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/159 "2011-04-29T14:44:48Z")
> [@Tristan](#): > > You may have missed the GD and BBQ threads featuring our new friend here. He is a racist, of the “but… science says!” bent. I suggest ignoring his attempts to threadjack here. > > /hijack Thanks for this, **Tristan**. Indeed I haven’t been posting much lately & don’t keep up with the newcomers. Done. ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 29, 2011, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014/160 "2011-04-29T15:14:58Z")
> [@Kearsen](#): > > “…and that gun accidents are most likely to occur in homes with guns…” > > This part did make me chuckle a bit. I wonder if this is a comparison of all gun accidents in homes with or without guns, or gun accidents in homes with guns in them compared to ALL other gun accidents (for instance, while hunting). The wording is ambiguous. The former would be no surprise at all. The latter would be pretty fucking important. I suspect the former, though. If it was the latter, it would be a banner headline, I would think. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014.md?page=7) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/report-guns-in-the-home-provide-greater-health-risk-than-benefit/580014.md?page=9)