I dont think we should do that either.
Murder is murder, dead is dead.
If some imaginary gun control law reduced the number of Gun homicides but the overall murder rate stayed the same, nothing has been gained.
You already basically have called anyone wishing reasonable gun control legislation a gun grabber.
I don’t suppose you are familiar with grants, but anyone thinking about doing a study that might reveal that guns are bad isn’t going to want to since that conclusion, no matter how well supported, is going to be accused of promoting gun control by the NRA and their lackeys.
If guns are considered a health issue - and they kill enough people that they should be - researching ways of preventing or reducing gun violence should be no more controversial than researching ways of preventing measles or heart attacks or polio. No one makes money on those, so the anti-vaxxers don’t have a lot of support in Congress. People do make money on obesity, so there is a lot more pushback in that area.
I’ve shot rifle in the Boy Scouts and I took pistol in college. Guns for target practice are fine. I’m also fine with hunting for food. But if I felt the need to have a gun, I’d store it at the range. Much less dangerous that way.
No, I did not, since I am in favor of reasonable gun control. For example- outlawing straw man “dealers”. Define 'reasonable"- show me “reasonable”.
Scientific studies dont make ethical judgements like “gun are bad”. That was the issue with the DCD study, not to mention it started out with the stated goal of showing that guns are bad.
Guns arent a health issue any more than cars are.
There are people who attempt suicide, fail, and do not attempt suicide again. They LIVE instead.
Some people regard would-be suicides who survive and seem to enjoy life enough that they don’t attempt to kill themselves again as SUCCESS stories.
It sounds like you regard them as FAILURES. Do I have that correctly?
(Suicide is often considered criminal and/or sinful. That would be a separate debate, but to automatically assume that society should treat suicide as a right, is an assumption too far.)
Please start a new thread if you need to defend your opinion about whether you are a “gun nut” or not. 
Cars are useful. People use them to drive to work. Sometimes they help rush someone to hospital and save a life.
Missile launchers are useful. If the Russkies attack in Wyoming and there’s no time to call up the Prez, you can blow their planes away with a missile launcher.
Anthrax is useful. If your neighbor rushes over with “I’m working on an antidote for anthrax. Quick quick! Got any anthrax for me to test it on?” you could be Johnny-on-the-spot helping out if those danged G-men didn’t make anthrax so hard to obtain.
Our leaders feel that anthrax in private hands may do more harm than good. Google “Risk reward tradeoffs.”
Nobody is claiming that no gun has ever been used for a good purpose. There’s a risk-reward tradeoff involved. We can hardly click News without reading about another innocent person shot by a gun. In a fairy-tale version of America things might be different, but in the real world American gun nuts have demonstrated over and over that widespread gun possession does more harm than good. (Having said that, I regard gun control as a lost cause and instruct my delegates to drop all references to guns from the platform. Hence it’s stupid to call me a ‘gun grabber.’)
HTH.
There will be no more references to “gun nuts” or “gun grabbers” in this thread lest posters begin getting their feelings hurt.
[ /Moderating ]
Sure, and so? If they fail and dont try again, that is their right.
It can be a success story, *or *a tragedy. If you have a bad day and make a half hearted attempt and fail- it likely a Good Thing. If you are dying from a extremely painful cancer and fail but your loved ones cant let you go and take away any chance you have of ending the pain- That’s a Bad Thing.
Sure, Suicide is often considered criminal and/or sinful. So is Gay sex. Perhaps we have moved beyond that, and will let people make their own choices, eh?
Actually, no, studies have shown that gun ownership prevents more crimes than it causes.
Nor was I calling you that.
Cars are undeniably a health issue, so that sounds like implicit acknowledgement that guns are too. There’s a reason the CDC studies automobile injuries and deaths. Note the very first sentence at my link:
Reducing motor vehicle crash deaths was one of the great public health achievements of the 20th century for the US.
I dont notice a call to ban cars in that article.
No one mentioned < term excised> in this thread before you did. The OP was about a study showing that suicide rates increase with gun ownership. The only policy suggestion I found while search for this issue was to enforce a waiting period so that people buying guns to commit suicide - which you agree they do - might cool off before doing this. Is this idea too <term excised> for you?
Anything up there in the causes of death (and injury) in the US is definitely a health issue. Cars are also, but we put a lot of law and a lot of money into reducing deaths and injuries from cars. Guns, not so much. Smart guns wouldn’t do much for the suicide rate, but would help with other deaths and injuries, and you remember that the NRA had a meltdown over the very idea.
If we had an NRA today for cars we’d neither have seatbelt laws or airbags, except as custom items, and we’d still be forecasting the Memorial Day death count just like they did when I was a kid.
Sorry, didn’t see this when I posted.
How many suicides are the result of terminal illnesses? You should have this information readily available.
If we had decent right to die laws, the family of a terminally ill patient who had them locked up so tight they couldn’t see their doctor to request this would also take away their guns. So I don’t buy it. You should go off and fight for these laws. I’d join you. Alas, it is the right and the religious who are blocking them.
Dying when you want to in a way that is not a shock to family and friends is a lot better than blowing one’s brains out, isn’t it?
However the position that people with physical issues such as chemical imbalances or drug reactions causing suicidal thoughts should just do it is pure evil.
Anywhere from 1-5 to 1-10, depending on source. About the same number for chronic pain. You can have extreme untreatable chronic pain without having a terminal disease.
Yes, those would be tragedies. But who are we to take that right away from them? Who are we to say *this *person can end their life but *that *person cant? Do we have a board of “right to death” and you take your request before them?
Many people marry who shouldnt. Many people have kids that shouldnt. Many people drink booze that shouldnt. Those are tragedies too- tragedies that can echo far down the line. But we dont have boards make these choices for people.
YES! We do need places and people and centers where people who want help- on suicide, on drinking, on having kids- etc- can reach out to. And we do have those things- but not enough,** we need better outreach.** If you want help- it should be there. But should we force help on those that dont want it?
Sad as it may be, and indeed very often a tragedy- people should be able to choose the hand basket they to go to hell in.
Nice goalpost moving. Can I take that as tacit agreement that guns do constitute a health issue?
The CDC does support seat-belt laws. For obvious reasons, they do not point out something more fundamental: that seat belts, air bags, and so on are already legally mandated equipment on cars (there’s no need to fight a battle that’s already won). They support drunk driving laws, sobriety checkpoints, ignition interlocks, and so on.
Overall, they treat automobile use as a public health issue and support laws that reduce harm.
Your statement about “gun bans” is a red herring since almost no one supports a complete ban on guns, and almost no countries have a complete prohibition. The only question is which forms of gun control are most effective and give the best balance between safety and utility.
Your argument that guns are not a health issue is a transparent attempt to shut down that line of discussion at all. The absurdity of it is highlighted by the fact that even the NRA implicitly acknowledges that there is an argument to be had: their position on guns and suicide is predictable, but the fact that they admit there is an argument at all is a step beyond where you’re at.
The CDC wants to make cars safer. You can also make guns safer (in fact some older guns arent very safe). The CDC wants to ban guns. Did the CDC cover deliberately using cars to kill people?
Guns are not a health issue except so far as them haveing safety features and training in how tito use them safely.
Unlawful use of them, like unlawful use of a car= are not health issues. They are Criminal law issues, to be studied by criminologists, not MDs.