Thank you for the well-thought out response, willravel!
We are in agreement on several points, but the conclusions we draw from them are different.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Willravel
There are many, many tools at one's disposal for the job of protection. You can purchase thicker doors to your home featuring very elaborate and strong locks. You can install double and triple pane windows featuring an adhesive plastic so strong you couldn't even hope to break them with the heaviest sledge hammer. You can even install electronic home protection systems which alert the local authorities the very instant something in your home is opened without permission. But it doesn't stop at passive protection. Currently, it's legal to carry with you all manner of nonlethal methods of self defense including electric stun-guns, pepper spray, and mace. It would seem the options for the pragmatic or even the paranoid are nearly endless. The primary function of these tools, however, is defense first and foremost.
|
I concede readily that owning a firearm is not the be-all and end-all answer to self defense. A multi-layered defense, both passive and active, is strictly superior to a single-layer defense, consisting of only lethal force. However, an argument advocating a multi-layered defense is an argument FOR a firearm, not against it. If you are going to expend the thousands of dollars of resources to fortify your house, presumably in an effort to go out of your way to defend yourself and family, it would be irresponsible not to account for as many scenarios as possible.
Also, we live in a world of finite and limited resources, both in terms of what you can buy and what it is reasonable to carry at any given time. Since you have to start somewhere, I would advocate that you should first give yourself the option of an armed response, and then fill in less lethal and expensive passive fortification options as your resources allow. If you encounter a situation with a violent criminal where a Taser or pepper spray might possibly have been enough force to stop the attack, but only have a pistol, the worst case is your attacker is seriously injured or dies. If you encounter a violent criminal where your pepper spray is NOT sufficient, but you do not have a handgun to escalate to, the worst case is YOU are seriously injured or die. I do not have so much sympathy for people who wish to do me harm that I would weight these two scenarios even close to equally.
Quote:
|
What is the primary function of a gun? Some might argue that the gun was invented as a tool of defense, but I would beg to differ. The gun, a projectile weapon that uses an explosion to propel a piece of metal or pieces of metal at an animal or human, has one purpose: to kill. While there are certainly moral justifications for how guns are used, certainly it can't be argued that the gun isn't a tool which has a primary function of killing. You stand at some distance from the desired target and fire the gun with the expressed intent to take the life of the target. While some people use guns to hunt game or practice shooting, the intended use of a gun is to blow a hole in another human being. It's why they were invented and has maintained its primary function since then.
|
The purpose of a handgun in a defense situation is not to kill attackers. It is to stop attackers. Sometimes that results in their death. Other times it results in sufficient injuries to end the encounter, and frequently no shots even need be fired--do not underestimate the persuasive power of "Stop or I'll shoot!"
Quote:
But what about your family? Certainly we do live in an uncertain world. There are unsafe situations and unsafe people out there, and there's a chance that you might find yourself in a situation where you and your family are in significant danger and are in need of some sort of defense. So why not arm everyone? I'll show you why:
[graph]
I'd like you to take a look at that graph carefully. On the x axis, we have the percent of households with a firearm and on the y axis we have intentional firearm deaths per year. Before you go and say this is coincidental, be sure to examine how consistent that line is. Between Scotland and the United States is a very clear line demonstrating a relationship between simply having more households with guns and intentional gun deaths. I'm sure a few nations along this line could be excused as coincidence, but you're looking at 19 industrialized, Western (or Westernized in the cases of Japan, Australia and New Zealand) nations. I don't think this can be dismissed as coincidence. The graph would seem to demonstrate a correlative relationship between arming a public and gun violence.
|
I would say two things to this graph and your analysis: First, you know as well as I do that correlation does not equal causation, so it may be just as plausibly argued that more homes are arming themselves in response to increased firearms violence.
Second, national statistics of this type may be useful for policymakers, but not for personal defense decisions, except possibly to draw the exact opposite conclusion that you are advocating--I would suggest that residents of a countries with higher than average intentional firearm deaths may be even more inclined likely to arm themselves--there is significantly more chance it will be needed!
Quote:
|
Unfortunately, as you delve into the statistics even further, more troubling facts come to light. Did you know a gun kept in the home is 43 times more likely to kill a member of the household or friend than an intruder?* Worse still, using a gun to resist a violent assault increases the victim's risk of injury and death.** Worst of all, residents of homes where a gun is present are over 5 times more likely to commit suicide than those without.***
|
I find your '43 times' statistic to be overly-broad and slightly disingenuous for two reasons. First, your sourced article was very narrow in scope...
according to the abstract,
Quote:
|
[W]e reviewed all the gunshot deaths that occurred in King County, Washington (population 1,270,000), from 1978 through 1983.[...] A total of 743 firearm-related deaths occurred during this six-year period, 398 of which (54 percent) occurred in the residence where the firearm was kept.
|
A five year sample from the late seventies of a specific county in Washington is hardly enough to make broad sweeping generalizations about the effects of owning a firearm.
Second, and more seriously, the abstract continues:
Quote:
|
"For every case of self-protection homicide involving a firearm kept in the home, there were 1.3 accidental deaths, 4.6 criminal homicides, and 37 suicides involving firearms."
|
If I am reading that correctly, your statistic did not mention that 37 out of those 43 were suicides. This ties into your third point. People do not commit suicide without a history of depression, and gun ownership has little or nothing to do with that. A person who wants to commit suicide will do so, gun or no gun.
Quote:
|
I wish it were as simple as having a gun to ensure you and your family's safety. I wish it was just a one time purchase of a handgun and some bullets that could magically make the bad people and bad situations go away. The sad truth, however, is that we live in a complex world with complex problems that require complex answers.
|
You are right: a one-time purchase of gun and ammo is not the solution to keeping your family safe. Gun owners need to be responsible, and by 'responsible' I mean have and use proper safety equipment (like locks and safes), have familiarity with their weapons, and train enough to be able to effectively use them.
Quote:
|
Having a gun may make you feel safer, but it would seem that illusion comes with a steep price. I propose the best way to keep you and your family safe would be to employ many different preventative, passive, and active strategies from bolted security doors to avoiding dangerous parts of town to carrying a taser or mace. If you want to be safe, arming yourself with a gun may end up being a lethal mistake.
|
I agree with your multi-layer defense proposal, but do not understand why that should not include firearms for when a lethal response is required.
Since owning and carrying a firearm is really worst-case-scenario prepardness, I would propose that the existance of any scenario where firearms were the only suitable resolution is sufficient to make their ownership reasonable. One such perfect example was earlier this month, in Florida, reported in
an article which begins, relevantly, "John Lee says he's convinced they would have killed him if he hadn't had his gun." The details of the encounter are that the aforementioned John Lee was ambushed getting out of his car at his apartment by three armed attackers, who demanded he 'give it up' but opened fire without giving him on opportunity to do so. It wasn't until he had already been shot that he had a chance to draw his own weapon and returned fire. He fired multiple shots, and the assailants fled.
This is the perfect case study for a defense situation which required a handgun and only a handgun. The firearm couldn't have escalated the situation, since he didn't draw until he had already been shot. Less-than-lethal methods, such as Taser and Mace, are generally unsuitable for multiple assailants, particularly those who have already opened fire, and he was at home, not blundering aimlessly through 'the bad part of town', although after this incident I think his home de facto becomes 'the bad part'.
I argue that any statistical increase in danger can be mitigated in your specific instance with proper safety techniques and training, but I bet no amount of percentage annual increase in shootings would convince John Lee that he shouldn't have been carrying. I am going to let him finish my response for me:
Quote:
"If I hadn't had my gun on me, I wouldn't be talking to you right now," Lee said. "They would have finished me off."[...]
He said he was determined not to allow himself to be killed, for the sake of his children. He didn't want to leave them without a father.
"I can't even contemplate that, not being around my kids, not seeing them grow up," he said, his voice choking.
|
Sources:
NEJM -- Protection or peril? An analysis of firearm-related deaths in the home
Ambushed Palmetto Bay Man Tells Survival Story - cbs4.com