# Solution to US gun violence **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [July 29, 2016, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181 "2016-07-29T12:34:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![bump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@bump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bump)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/21 "2016-07-29T18:17:45Z")
> [@yellowjacketcoder](#): > > That said, apparently [only 4% of shootings in the US are related to mental illness](http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/16/opinion/dont-blame-mental-illness-for-gun-violence.html?_r=0), so covering mental health for all our citizens, while probably worthwhile anyway for the other benefits, is not the silver bullet that will solve all shootings. You could argue that suicide could be prevented by better mental health care, and suicides compose some 60% of gun deaths each year (roughly 19,000). But the other gun violence that people are all in a lather about is a media-driven chimera. It’s roughly 12,000 deaths a year… out of some 2,600,000 deaths per year. That’s less than half a percentage point. Doesn’t even crack the top 10 causes. For that matter, that 12,000 is roughly 1/3 the total number of suicides in the nation, and suicide is the tenth most common cause of death. Mass shootings are a vanishingly tiny number- 500 a year. Overall, there are something like [11 times as many weather-related deaths each year- hot, cold and storm/flood/lightning.](http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhsr/nhsr076.pdf) There are LOTS of other things out there that any money and effort spend to reduce gun violence could be far better spent on- like say air conditioners or heating for the poor and/or elderly than going off tilting at politically correct windmills by ranting about gun violence. ---
**Author:** ![cochrane](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cochrane/32/10441_2.png) [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/22 "2016-07-29T18:27:26Z")
> [@yellowjacketcoder](#): > > I’m not **boffking** , but the mental health improvement seems straightforward - treat it the same way we treat kidney care. That is, cover it by Medicare, so people can get their therapy sessions and psych meds covered regardless of income. How will covering it under Medicare help? Medicare is only for people receiving Social Security benefits, i.e. people who have reached 65 years of age (or 62, if you take early retirement) or the disabled. Did you mean Medicaid, which is designed to help low-income people? ---
**Author:** ![yellowjacketcoder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/4bbf92/32.png) [@yellowjacketcoder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/yellowjacketcoder)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 6:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/23 "2016-07-29T18:44:52Z")
> [@bump](#): > > You could argue that suicide could be prevented by better mental health care, and suicides compose some 60% of gun deaths each year (roughly 19,000). > > But the other gun violence that people are all in a lather about is a media-driven chimera. It’s roughly 12,000 deaths a year… out of some 2,600,000 deaths per year. That’s less than half a percentage point. Doesn’t even crack the top 10 causes. For that matter, that 12,000 is roughly 1/3 the total number of suicides in the nation, and suicide is the tenth most common cause of death. > > Mass shootings are a vanishingly tiny number- 500 a year. Overall, there are something like [11 times as many weather-related deaths each year- hot, cold and storm/flood/lightning.](http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/data/nhsr/nhsr076.pdf) > > There are LOTS of other things out there that any money and effort spend to reduce gun violence could be far better spent on- like say air conditioners or heating for the poor and/or elderly than going off tilting at politically correct windmills by ranting about gun violence. This is not wrong, but my counter to it is that I think we as a nation can afford to work on reducing those top 10 causes of death **and** reducing gun violence at the same time. We’ve got 320 million people, we can work on several things at once. > [@cochrane](#): > > How will covering it under Medicare help? Medicare is only for people receiving Social Security benefits, i.e. people who have reached 65 years of age (or 62, if you take early retirement) or the disabled. Did you mean Medicaid, which is designed to help low-income people? No, I meant Medicare. [QUOTE=[https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/health-topics/kidney-disease/financial-help-for-treatment-of-kidney-failure/Pages/facts.aspx](https://www.niddk.nih.gov/health-information/health-topics/kidney-disease/financial-help-for-treatment-of-kidney-failure/Pages/facts.aspx)] Medicare is a federal insurance program that pays health care costs for eligible people who are [ul] [li]age 65 or older[/li][li]under age 65 with certain disabilities[/li][li]_of any age_ with ESRD[/li][/ul] [/QUOTE] italics original to the article. I misunderstood that it’s only a specific kidney disease however. ---
**Author:** ![Miller](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/miller/32/481_2.png) [@Miller](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Miller)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 7:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/24 "2016-07-29T19:06:37Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > I don’t understand what is so goddamned hard about it. Well, have you tried drugs? They’re _really_ good. But the real question is, what does locking up people for using drugs get us? We’re spending an enormous amount of money on it, but I’m just not seeing a payoff. Take some guy holding down a regular 9-to-5, raising a family, and sometimes smoking some weed. What’s the point of busting that guy, spending a ton of tax money to arrest, try, and incarcerate him, get him fired, separate him from his kids… why? Why is that a better outcome than just letting the dude get high on weekends? ---
**Author:** ![Dallas\_Jones](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dallas_jones/32/3277_2.png) [@Dallas\_Jones](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dallas_Jones)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 8:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/25 "2016-07-29T20:34:28Z")
> [@Miller](#): > > Well, have you tried drugs? They’re _really_ good. > > But the real question is, what does locking up people for using drugs get us? We’re spending an enormous amount of money on it, but I’m just not seeing a payoff. Take some guy holding down a regular 9-to-5, raising a family, and sometimes smoking some weed. What’s the point of busting that guy, spending a ton of tax money to arrest, try, and incarcerate him, get him fired, separate him from his kids… why? Why is that a better outcome than just letting the dude get high on weekends? Exactly. The legalization of pot in Alaska, Oregon, Washington, Colorado and soon to be overwhelmingly approved in California has taken millions and soon billions of dollars (once CA comes online) out of the pockets of the drug cartels and left them with no reason at all to continue to illegally produce and import the stuff. You can walk in and buy it with no more trouble than buying a bottle of wine. And instead of the profit benefits going to the cartels the state gets a very substantial tax benefit. In Oregon several of the more conservative counties passed ordinances disallowing any sales in their domain. They can’t prevent use but they decided to stop sales in their area. But they don’t get and tax money from the sales either. One by one they are quietly rescinding these bans so they get a piece of the pie too. The sky has not fallen. School children are not being forced to inhale or else. Any casual visitor to these states will notice no social impact at all. After California falls I expect that Mexico will soon follow. Inviting pot tourism to the homeland, so to speak. It will alleviate a huge problem in money and lives for Mexico. "Acapulco Gold! Come back home and remember!’ And these developments are not only preventing lives from being destroyed, they will be saving many lives once the illegal profit opportunities are removed. There is a substantial social experiment going on in the western US, and it is working. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/26 "2016-07-29T21:42:04Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > I have been watching the DNC and this was a big theme. But I realised something from the speeches. No matter how much politicians like to talk about solving the problem, very little seems to actually be done about it. How do we solve gun violence? I think improving mental health care and decriminalzing drugs would do far more than limiting the size of magazine’s. What else can be done? How about we start by saying "How do we solve violence? " and nor care if it’s by gun, knife or bomb? Let’s reduce crime by reducing poverty. Decriminalizing drug would reduce crime, true. It might even reduce violent crime, but the cartels still are pretty fucking violent even where Pot is legal. ---
**Author:** ![Little\_Nemo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/little_nemo/32/3120_2.png) [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/27 "2016-07-29T21:49:38Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > If people didn’t do drugs in the first place, there would be no drug violence. > > Maybe we could start with that. And if people would just stop getting sick or injured, that would solve our health care problem. Really, people, the solutions are there. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [July 29, 2016, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/28 "2016-07-29T22:25:13Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > How about we start by saying "How do we solve violence? " and nor care if it’s by gun, knife or bomb? > > Let’s reduce crime by reducing poverty. > > Decriminalizing drug would reduce crime, true. It might even reduce violent crime, but the cartels still are pretty fucking violent even where Pot is legal. I agree with this 100%. Many of the measures legislators have taken seem more like useless feel good things than real solutions. Magazine limits for example, just mean a shooter will carry more mags. We need to solve all violence. AR-15s are a red herring. The ultimate question of gun violence isn’t what gun should be legal, but how to stop criminals from pulling the trigger. ---
**Author:** ![JXJohns](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jxjohns/32/469_2.png) [@JXJohns](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JXJohns)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 12:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/29 "2016-07-30T00:55:29Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > I agree with this 100%. Many of the measures legislators have taken seem more like useless feel good things than real solutions. Magazine limits for example, just mean a shooter will carry more mags. We need to solve all violence. AR-15s are a red herring. The ultimate question of gun violence isn’t what gun should be legal, but how to stop criminals from pulling the trigger. Exxcellent points. Convince HRC of that last one and she would win by a landslide. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 12:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/30 "2016-07-30T00:58:56Z")
> [@JXJohns](#): > > Exxcellent points. Convince HRC of that last one and she would win by a landslide. I think she is pandering to the majority of the Democratic party there.☹ ---
**Author:** ![QuickSilver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/quicksilver/32/7832_2.png) [@QuickSilver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/QuickSilver)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/31 "2016-07-30T01:03:55Z")
> [@boffking](#): > > I agree with this 100%. Many of the measures legislators have taken seem more like useless feel good things than real solutions. Magazine limits for example, just mean a shooter will carry more mags. We need to solve all violence. AR-15s are a red herring. The ultimate question of gun violence isn’t what gun should be legal, but how to stop criminals from pulling the trigger. Go on then, how do you propose we “stop criminals from pulling the trigger”? ---
**Author:** ![thirdname](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@thirdname](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thirdname)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/32 "2016-07-30T01:05:52Z")
As far as mass shootings go, I think most of those shooters are looking for attention for one reason another. Every maladjusted young man knows that if he kills a dozen people, he’ll get his face on the cover of Time magazine and everybody will read his manifesto or his bad poetry. I think the best way to reduce these incidents would be to stop giving them so much attention. Don’t publish their picture, and don’t report at length about why they did it. I’ve read that newspapers generally avoid reporting suicides (especially public ones) unless it’s a celebrity, so as not to encourage copycats. Of course, I doubt my plan will happen, because I don’t think most of the media have enough ethics to forgo a little bit of profits in order to save people’s lives. ---
**Author:** ![Ambivalid](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/a5b964/32.png) [@Ambivalid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ambivalid)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/33 "2016-07-30T01:09:42Z")
> [@Chihuahua](#): > > I don’t understand what is so goddamned hard about it. > [@Chihuahua](#): > > I don’t drink, smoke, or use illegal drugs. Then how the fuck did you arrive at your opinion that it should be as easy as just stopping? I’ve never been a woman but I sure don’t understand what all the fuss about pregnancy is. I mean, maternity leave? Seriously?! Someone mentioned bootstraps upthread, that’s all pregnant women need. Not all this coddling. 😛 ---
**Author:** ![levdrakon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/49beb7/32.png) [@levdrakon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/levdrakon)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/34 "2016-07-30T01:15:29Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > How about we start by saying "How do we solve violence? " and nor care if it’s by gun, knife or bomb? How about we take all the guns away until we figure out what’s going on? Once we solve this violence thing, we can let people have guns again. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 1:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/35 "2016-07-30T01:32:52Z")
> [@yellowjacketcoder](#): > > I’m not **boffking** , but the mental health improvement seems straightforward - treat it the same way we treat kidney care. That is, cover it by Medicare, so people can get their therapy sessions and psych meds covered regardless of income Medicare already covers mental health treatments, doesn’t it? Part A covers institutional care, Part B covers outpatient and therapy, and Part D covers prescription drugs. There are certain problems with Medicare not covering non medical doctors, like psychologists and clinical social workers, who don’t agree to the fee schedule that Medicare sets up, and I guess they could change Medicare rules to treat them the same way as they treat MDs in regards to fees. That would probably be a good thing, but I don’t know that it would do a lot for gun violence. I don’t get the impression that the over 65 set commit a bunch of mass shootings. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/36 "2016-07-30T02:13:11Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > Go on then, how do you propose we “stop criminals from pulling the trigger”? 1. Legalize marijuana and decriminalize other street drugs. 2. Improve addiction treatment. These will create a massive decline in drug gang violence. 3. Better opportunities for ex-convicts. Recidivism is high because a criminal record ruins a persons life. 4. Improve education, especially in high crime areas. 5. Access to mental health care through Medicare and Medicaid. ---
**Author:** ![boffking](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/858c86/32.png) [@boffking](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/boffking)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 2:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/37 "2016-07-30T02:14:57Z")
I also very much agree with Thirdname, we should stop giving so much attention to mass shooters. ---
**Author:** ![Common\_Tater](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/common_tater/32/13846_2.png) [@Common\_Tater](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Common_Tater)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 4:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/38 "2016-07-30T04:06:07Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > How about we take all the guns away until we figure out what’s going on? Once we solve this violence thing, we can let people have guns again. This may have been possible at one time, maybe in the 1930s, or possibly just after World War II. Today? No way. That ship sailed a long time ago. Not saying I like it. Anyone who isn’t able to effectively defend themselves at this point will probably be in deep shit, possibly sooner rather than later. ---
**Author:** ![pkbites](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pkbites/32/204_2.png) [@pkbites](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pkbites)\ **Post date:** [July 30, 2016, 5:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/39 "2016-07-30T05:24:12Z")
> [@levdrakon](#): > > How about we take all the guns away until we figure out what’s going on? Once we solve this violence thing, we can let people have guns again. :rolleyes: murder has always existed. Mythology tells us the third human on this planet killed the fourth with a rock. Forever and ever politicians have used any excuse to disarm the electorate. My biggest piece of evidence of this is their drive to ban .50 caliber weapons. Practically no crimes are committed with them, and they cost a zillion dollars so few own them anyways. But because they “could” cause problems they want to ban them. Interesting that the people in power who want to ban or severely limit ownership of guns are usually protected by people with guns. How are their lives any more important than ours? Wake up, stupids. ---
**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:** [July 30, 2016, 5:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181/40 "2016-07-30T05:30:49Z")
> [@QuickSilver](#): > > Go on then, how do you propose we “stop criminals from pulling the trigger”? Outlaw fingers. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/solution-to-us-gun-violence/761181.md?page=3)