Gun deaths shaped by race in America

[ellisonz]

Posted by Dan Keating on March 22, 2013 at 11:19 pm

Gun deaths are shaped by race in America. Whites are far more likely to shoot themselves, and African Americans are far more likely to be shot by someone else.

The statistical difference is dramatic, according to a Washington Post analysis of data from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. A white person is five times as likely to commit suicide with a gun as to be shot with a gun; for each African American who uses a gun to commit suicide, five are killed by other people with guns.

Where a person lives matters, too. Gun deaths in urban areas are much more likely to be homicides, while suicide is far and away the dominant form of gun death in rural areas. States with the most guns per capita, such as Montana and Wyoming, have the highest suicide rates; states with low gun ownership rates, such as Massachusetts and New York, have far fewer suicides per capita.

Suicides and homicides are highly charged human dramas. Both acts shatter families, friends and sometimes communities. But the reactions are as different as black and white, and those differences shape the nation’s divided attitudes toward gun control.

More: http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/feature/wp/2013/03/22/gun-deaths-shaped-by-race-in-america/?wprss=rss_national

Still waiting for some new looks at domestic violence and guns in the US - let's not forget, what happened in Newtown was presaged by an act of domestic violence: the murder of Nancy Lanza by Adam Lanza.

What we know about domestic violence and guns in brief:

Statistics on Domestic Violence & Firearms
Posted on January 1, 2012

Guns increase the probability of death in incidents of domestic violence.1

Firearms were used to kill more than two-thirds of spouse and ex-spouse homicide victims between 1990 and 2005.2

Domestic violence assaults involving a firearm are 12 times more likely to result in death than those involving other weapons or bodily force.3

Abused women are five times more likely to be killed by their abuser if the abuser owns a firearm.4

A recent survey of female domestic violence shelter residents in California found that more than one third (36.7%) reported having been threatened or harmed with a firearm.5 In nearly two thirds (64.5%) of the households that contained a firearm, the intimate partner had used the firearm against the victim, usually threatening to shoot or kill the victim.6

Laws that prohibit the purchase of a firearm by a person subject to a domestic violence restraining order are associated with a reduction in the number of intimate partner homicides.7

Between 1990 and 2005, individuals killed by current dating partners made up almost half of all spouse and current dating partner homicides.8

A study of applicants for domestic violence restraining orders in Los Angeles found that the most common relationship between the victim and abuser was a dating relationship, and applications for protective orders were more likely to mention firearms when the parties had not lived together and were not married.9

Sources at link: http://smartgunlaws.org/domestic-violence-and-firearms-statistics/

Is there any reason to believe White suburban and rural America is just as effected by guns and domestic violence as Black America?

[dkf]

1. And as I was trying to say earlier, gun suicides aren't what drives the gun control debate.

[ellisonz]

2. Maybe they should be?

Every time I've seen a homicide in an urban part of America discussed in the Gungeon the attitude is that it's well not them. At the same time, the other post in this group right now is not how this topic should be discussed. Suicide doesn't just effect the person who does it, the effect is on the family and the community. Let's not forget, that at Newtown, the violence stopped with a suicide. Would Adam Lanza had done what he did if he hadn't imagined taking his own life at the end of his spree?

When the gunners tell me that suicide doesn't matter in the gun debate or that it shouldn't "drive" the gun debate, well then I tell them to put down the NRA Kool-Aid and look at the facts.

[dkf]

3. You don't think maybe that's a personal decision?

Suicide used to be illegal in many states but most got rid of the law.

If I have cancer I hope someone gives me a peaceful out.

[jimmy the one]

4. Suicide Illegal, ha.

dkf: You don't think maybe that's a personal decision?
Suicide used to be illegal in many states but most got rid of the law

Ha. That's because the state would penalize the suicide victim's family or estate (or both) by confiscating property or taking large tax levies, regarding the one committing suicide (I suppose they would justify it as him copping out of his further responsibility to the state to produce during his lifetime).
I suspect suicide was made illegal to keep a spiteful person from depriving his relatives what was fully due them upon his/her death.

There was really no 'penalty' to the victim by his 'illegal act of suicide', just that others in his family tended to suffer. Why, I believe, they got rid of the law making suicide illegal. (Tho attempted suicide also could be illegal, a different kettle of fish)

But the law making suicide illegal wasn't based upon whether it was a personal decision, just that it was deemed both state selfish & unfair to the suicide victims family or inheritors (if I remember correctly).

[CreekDog]

5. there are a lot of people who would not commit suicide if they didn't have access to a firearm

that's just a fact.

[ellisonz]

6. Oh I agree

I just don't see how or why using a gun is the best option for that. I wish other states would follow Oregon in allowing regulated euthanasia.