You should be. Removal of a method for suicide, all things being equal, does not mean that suicidal people will simply substitute another method. One factor in suicide rates (though not the only factor) is the availability of highly lethal methods. When said methods are less present, or less used for whatever reason, then suicides decrease, if all other factors stay the same.
Correction noted!
A cheap gun costs $250. A canister of helium costs $25 and leaves a nice corpse.
Admittedly not too many people keep a canister of helium around.
And they get to go out on a high note.
These outdated numbers are quite soft compared to those on gunshot deaths. The infant statistic is, I believe, from back when the overall SIDS rate (higher with mothers who smoke) was maybe three times what it is today, and smoking rates were far higher as well.
But I’m all for linking tobacco with gun ownership as major menaces to public health. We need similar public health measures against guns as against smoking, such as warnings on gun packaging about the much higher violent death rate of gun owners.
I agree with Benjamin Franklin that gun ownership doesn’t confer safety.* And I agree that banning guns isn’t right for America. If brought back to life today, don’t be so sure that gentleman would be on your side here.
- Context is here:
http://franklinpapers.org/franklin/framedVolumes.jsp?vol=6&page=238a
Franklin may have meant that gun ownership was a safety plus on the frontier, but not generally.
yes but I think you missed my point. it’s far easier and cheaper to get helium. Or any gas actually works. Anything that displaces oxygen.
yes the existence of a gun makes it a one-shot deal if someone is suicidal but so does a car or heroin.
Since when has a helium tank cost $25? The price of helium is going up up up, thanks to the government finally getting to the end of selling off its reserve.
Access to implements for suicide is a factor in suicide rate. I’m sure that many people on this board will be familiar with the decline in suicide ratesin the UK when the gas started to have much less CO. It may well be that someone who has neither is more likely to buy gas than a gun (although I won’t accept it without proof), but someone who does have access to a firearm is probably more likely to kill themself than someone who doesn’t.
But anyways, this is far afield. In this country, we have generally held that if a product is legal to sell, then you can’t successfully sue someone for selling that product (provided it is not defective in some way). For firearms, this principle is codified.
So I begin to sense what the strategy is here.
Walter Olsen points out:
So knowing that the suit is absolutely barred by the PLCAA, I suspect that this is simply the opening move. When the suit is dismissed, there will be editorials and social media blitzes about what an unexpected result this is and how the law was never intended to reach this far. It’s a strategy to weaken support for the law.
It may be, but if so it is a really mistimed strategy, considering that they are launching it at the time the Congress is the most pro-2nd-amendment in decades.
No choice: the two-year limit to file suit in Connecticut expired over the weekend.
I am not very concerned as I believe suicide is a choice each of us may make.
http://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/secondhand_smoke/general_facts/
More than 42,000 people a year, including 900 infants, according to a new, thorough analysis of secondhand smoke deaths by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco.
Hardly outdated.
How can you be sure that zombie Benjamin Franklin would be on your side? Franklin was known as an independent thinker who supported the right to self-defense. Plus, you have to consider that he may be distracted by internet porn.
+1
Following your links, your stats are mostly based on 2006. That’s closer to the present than I would have thought, so I’ll concede this point.
Tobacco and firearms are big public health problems best addressed by public health measures and regulation rather than bans.
You’ve noticed a relationship between internet porn consumption and firearms-friendliness, have you?
Of course I can’t be sure where Franklin would stand. But looking at the context of the famous quote, he was on the side of these who blamed the frontiersmen for poisoning their relationship with the Indians. The advocacy of arming the frontier settlers, or at least of funds for armed men to protect them, was in the context of making a concession to a governor who wanted a stronger military posture.
I think its pretty clear from my earlier link that the 1755 Franklin wasn’t siding with the wingers. And as he got older, he only became closer in his views to a modern liberal:
http://www.wampumchronicles.com/benfranklin.html
Is it possible that he would today be against the FoxNews side on anything and everything except guns? Sure, a lot is possible.
(post shortened)
What is well known is that Ol’ Ben really liked the ladies.
While well known, it may not be true to the extent widely believed. From Cecil:
Wouldn’t that make it even more likely that Ol’ Ben would be interested in internet porn?
“U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The Health Consequences of Smoking—50 Years of Progress: A Report of the Surgeon General. Atlanta: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2014 [accessed 2014 Apr 11].”
Ok, we’re both on the same page, tho.