Firearm Related Deaths by State

[JellyJar]

Two things!

1. This statistic includes suicide by firearm. The empirical evidence clearly shows that there is no causal relationship between the presence or absence of firearms and the suicide rate in a country. Japan has very few privately owned firearms yet has a per capita rate of suicide much higher than the US. Therefore, there is no justification in including firearm related suicides when discussing the issue of gun control.

2. The Brady bunch in all their various forms really only have one goal in mind. To make it impossible for people to use deadly weapons in lawful defense of innocent human life no matter the circumstance! In their opinion the moral thing to do would be to let a murderer kill an innocent person than shoot the murderer to prevent the crime! That is why they are always talking about gun violence as if all gun violence is the same because they think that gun violence used to protect and defend innocent people is just as bad as gun violence used to hurt innocent people.

 

[Owen Sparks]

Something does not jibe. I saw a news show about the high rate of suicide and alcoholism in Alaska a few years back and they blamed it depression caused by the long periods of darkness. They also claimed that Iceland and Siberia had some of the highest rates of suicide in the World for the same reason.

 

[kentucky bucky]

This article could also read: Auto accident death rate tied to automobile travel. Shocking!!

 

[SeekHer]

Statistics LIE.

I can go ask 500 people about a shirt I'm wearing, whether they like it or not. I can take 100 of those and say that "100 out of 100 people like my shirt", or "100% of people like my shirt". It's all a load of bull.

Statistics don't lie--only the people presenting them do! Just like you just did.

500 people asked, 100 liked it equals 20% in favour or 80% against...No other conclusion can be obtained!

Also, your figures are slewed, since of the 500, how many had no opinion at all one way or the other or abstained completely from answering and are those figures included? Did you actuallyask 750 people and only 500 responded then your figures would be 13.33% of asked people liked it, 53.33 didn't like it and 33.33% had no opinion or refused to answer...Of the latter group how many abstained and how many didn't answer? If the figures were say 100 and 150 then 40% of that group had no opinion or 13.33% overall and 60% or 20% overall didn't answer.

Was this a simple yes/no or maybe a scale of one to ten with one being hate totally and ten being love it unquestionably then you'd get a better indication of the exact numbers.

OP -- what constitutes death? Was it hunting related accidents only, gang slayings only or did it include all firearm related deaths including suicide and deaths inflicted by police officers?

 

[mortablunt]

I would like to see a graph of firearms deaths vs the number of legal gun owners. Then, I would break it down into suicide, murder, accidents (discharges, hunting, and otherwise), unsolved homicide, solved homicide, justifiable homicide, and police shootings. Lastly, put those against the figures for number of people shot in each of those categories, whether they survived or not. That ought to shine some light on the facts.

 

[Owen Sparks]

Suicide rates are relitivly high in Japan yet no one has a gun. Rape is rare there yet all the Japanese men are "armed". It has to do with the culture, not tools.

 

[Grey Morel]

While culture is a high level influence, I think its unwise to say that any issue is ALL about culture. You need to look are the current social dynamics of the situation.

If you look at that chart, you can't make any reasonable correlation to gun control.

There are multiple sates with all levels of gun control who have all levels of homicides. The data is all over the place.

What you could probably do is compare states with high pressures from both natural (hurricane/flood) and man made (immigration/unemployment) disasters, and then figure the per-capita rates Vs. states which are not currently experiencing those kinds of problems.

I think what you will find in the end is that people do 'bad' things more often when they are under a lot of stress, compared to others who have things good.

Culture can certainly guide the 'river' of a society, but how the fish therein behave is a function of many other things as well.

 

[southernconnection]

I would think that a chart showing crime rate in these states would prove that gun ownership is a must

 

[skua44]

Take 9 guys living in cardboard boxes under the overpass. Add 1 guy pulling down a $million/year. The average income for the 10 is $100,000/year. That is a statistical fact but is nowhere close to the true situation. Any statistical fact from the antis I put in about the same category.

 

[Neverwinter]

Take 9 guys living in cardboard boxes under the overpass. Add 1 guy pulling down a $million/year. The average income for the 10 is $100,000/year. That is a statistical fact but is nowhere close to the true situation. Any statistical fact from the antis I put in about the same category.

There are three averages, the other two are $1.

 

[mizzlep]

How many of these deaths were caused by the police?

 

[JellyJar]

I don't believe that you can isolate firearm related crimes from non-firearms related crimes because firearms, especially handguns, are supposed to be very good at preventing violent crime. Here is a list of states showing the per-capita rate of violent crime per state for 2009 with the states with the highest rates at the top. I don't have the Brady scores for that year but I bet the states with the highest Brady scores will tend to have higher rates of violent crime then those states with lowest Brady scores.

Violent Crime 2009


DC 1345.9
Nevada 702.2
South Carolina 670.8
Tennessee 667.7
Delaware 636.6
Alaska 633
New Mexico 619
Florida 612.5
Louisiana 620
Maryland 589.9
Arkansaw 517.7
Oklahoma 501.1
Illnois 497.2
Michigan 497
Missouri 491.8
Texas 490.9
California 472
Massachusetts 457.1
Alabama 449.8
Georgia 426.1
Arizona 408.3
North Carolina 404.3
Kansas 400.1
New York 384.7
Pennsylvania 380.5
Colorado 337.8
Indiana 333.2
Washington 331
Ohio 332.1
New Jersey 311.5
Connecticut 298.7
West Virginia 296.5
Nebraska 281.6
Mississippi 281.3
Iowa 279.2
Hawaii 274.8
Puerto Rico 264.5
Kentucky 258.7
Wisconsin 257
Oregon 254.7
Montana 253.6
Rhode Island 252.6
Minnesota 243.9
Idaho 228.4
Wyoming 228.2
Virginia 226.8
Utah 212.7
North Dakota 200.7
South Dakota 185.6
New Hampshire 159.8
Vermont 131.4
Maine 119.8

 

[mortablunt]

^ The places with the lowest rates have the sensible gun laws.

 

[Neverwinter]

^ The places with the lowest rates have the sensible gun laws.

Did you even look at the states with the highest rates? Many already have lax gun laws.

 

[Shadow 7D]

Right, but consider that 'violent' crime covers a HUGE category

In alaska, you aren't very likely to robbed, or die in a home invasion.

But if you are a female, 16-28, engage in the consumption of alcohol and a number of other 'at risk activities' you are some thing like 3 times as likely to 'sexually assaulted' and NO that isn't JUST rape, it includes all categories of 'sexual assault'. Now if you are native, times that by 3...

In each state, I am sure that I could analyze the numbers to show a strong correlation between 'violence' and guns, for both the pro (more guns = less violence) and the anti.

 

[KodiakBeer]

The people in the lower ranking states are just lousy shots...

 

[mortablunt]

@ Neverwinter: I did a research paper on this. I know what I'm talking about.

 

[Neverwinter]

@ Neverwinter: I did a research paper on this. I know what I'm talking about.

Are you using numbers other than the Brady score?

2009 per-capita violent crime rate and Brady Score

Top 5 states:
Nevada 702.2 9
South Carolina 670.8 10
Tennessee 667.7 8
Delaware 636.6 21
Alaska 633 2

Bottom 5 states:
North Dakota 200.7 4
South Dakota 185.6 4
New Hampshire 159.8 9
Vermont 131.4 8
Maine 119.8 11

 

[mortablunt]

*Neverwinter

I used the FBI statistics, John Lott, the CIA, and Nationmaster.