Gun more likely to be used against a relative in the home?

[LightningJoe]

Yeah, maybe in my family.

 

[Deanimator]

It's based on an intentionally false premise.

It presumes that nobody has been defended with a firearm unless there's a corpse (or at least a shooting victim) somewhere. Apparently if a wouldbe assailant sees your firearm and flees, you haven't actually defended yourself.

Whenever somebody tries that trick on me, I just ask them:

"Do you believe in the use of the martial arts or chemical sprays for self-defense?"

"Yes."

"Then obviously you don't believe that you have defended yourself with the martial arts unless you beat or choke someone to death. And since you haven't defended yourself unless there's a corpse, what kind of spray do you carry, Sarin or mustard gas?"

 

[06]

I have a bragging story--two yrs ago my pastor friend(moved to NC from Mass.) told me that he would bar me from his church if I tried to carry inside. Now he and his wife have CCPs, several long guns, 3/4 ton 4X4, gator, preps, water storage, garden, and a defense strategy outlined. He has come a long way in two years. He carries in my home and I in his.
I told you this story to say that he was an anti till he "saw the light". Not being able to defend oneself or family is tatamount to asking to be murdered in today's mad drug crazed unrestrained world. There is a Bible passage that says-a man that will not provide for his family is worse than an infidel. Now to extend that a bit-providing for their safety is just as important as putting a roof over their head and food on the table. Jesus told His disciples in Luke 23(?) that if they did not have a sword then to sell one of their cloaks and buy one. I raised our kids around guns of all kinds and they came up able to fire safely and effectively. We hunted together and there has never been an accidental discharge. wc

 

[Hungry Seagull]

It might be rather necessary in those parts of the woods near that town in North Carolina.

But out here, domestics are not that common, if they happened it's usually too much drink, drugs or something else making situation worse beyond the initial cause.

There is a certain amount of ... restraint in Family all around when we were raised. Even today when that taste of violence is in the blood and you want to punch spouse's lights out or something stupid, you dont do it.

Until people understand this and restrain themselves then this will continue to be a problem.

However, it did not reduce in any way a problem between myself and my brother when things got bad over something really of little value. All that wrestling, shoving and yelling and for what? Growing up as a teen was really difficult in those days.

It was more fun and proper to pound a School Bully into submission =)

 

[Elvishead]

I thought this was! "what is the best caliber to use!"?

 

[seanie!]

If you have to worry about your significant other shooting you, it may be time to kick out the significant other, rather than get rid of the guns.

If I had to worry about my significant other shooting me, I'd probably buy another gun

 

[Kleanbore]

As Deanimator pointed out this is based on a false premise.

Also, as I recall, the original contention was that a gun was more likely to kill a family member or friend or acquaintance (than a burglar). i first heard that from Dr. Milton Eisenhower. I later saw something in The American Rifleman to the effect that the stat counted drug dealers who had met each other!

 

[sacp81170a]

Remove sucides and you get 2.4 accidental or criminal deaths by firearm per 1 self defense justifiable homicide. Also, no adjustment was made for those charged and found not-guilty by reason of self defense, they got counted as criminal deaths, same with those overturned on appeal. Again, spin back to College Park. 1 criminal was killed in a justifiable homicide. However, if no gun would have been present, you'd have had 10 students killed in 'accidental or criminal death' that's a 10:1 ratio presented in the same way as Kellerman's 2.4:1 ratio (adjusted for sucide)...you just aren't going to have a 1:1 ratio, because take the example of the College Park case, where is the armed student supposed to find 9 more criminals to kill in self defense so there is a 10 to 10 balance.

Add to that Kellerman's unnecessarily bloodthirsty assumption that the only thing that counted as a DGU was when the criminal intruder was killed and the ratio is even more out of whack. The great majority of times a gun is presented in the face of a criminal attack it is not even fired and the attack is broken off. According to Kellerman, that doesn't count as a DGU. Again, cherry picking data.

 

[Phil Lee]

One comment about this thread is that it displays two bad habits of pro-gun commentators. Many of them do not read prior comments (compare #13 with #15) and many do not know a source as well as they think (#13 correctly sources Kleck for 2,500,000 DFUs per year, #5 and #15 incorrectly source the FBI).

We can all make mistakes, but citing references to original sources is a good habit which #5 and #15 didn't (and they didn't check their sources). This sloppiness by some makes it more difficult for our side since it gives our opponent an error to attack.

 

[CountGlockula]

The rule of "being fully aware of your target" doesn't apply to some.

 

[catspa]

News flash, fellas.

This just in: when so-called "researchers" want to advance some bullshiite argument, they can easily find a statistic to twist into some kind of "evidence" for it. We could ban statistics to prevent them being used to support lying, I suppose, but then anti-gunners would just make up other lies from scratch to replace them.

Also, don't believe everything you hear on a plane. I sat next to a guy who said, "drinks are free on this flight", and the guy next to him got all excited. When the stewardess brought the drink cart around, I asked for apple juice, the first guy chose coffee, and the other guy ordered two beers for which she charged him 6 bucks apiece. He was all p*ssed off, but the guy next to me just pointed at the coffee and juice (which was free).

The whole thing reminded me of the one attorney I ever liked (now deceased). He used to say, "I'm not going to lie to you, but listen VERY closely to what I'm saying."

Anyway, to the OP, your dude had made up his mind. Let him go, and decide for yourself.

Parker

 

[blackops]

That comment most likely came from a liberal. They won’t understand the right to bear arms until that right has been taken away. Then they will be knocking on the gun owners doors for protection.

 

[foghornl]

Myth....

Unless you have a verrrry baaaaaaaaad family

 

[rscalzo]

2007 Annual FBI Crime Report

The UCR does not measure the data you are referring to in your statement. While it does measure crimes involving firearms, it does not measure crimes prevented. In fact trying to make a determination either way would be next to impossible.

 

[Phil Lee]

In fact trying to make a determination either way would be next to impossible.

Not impossible -- Kleck did so in 1993 and so have others -- see
www.guncite.com/gun_control_gcdguse.html

 

[woad_yurt]

Simply put, a gun is more likely to be used on those who are around the gun the most. Family and friends have been killing each other forever.

I mean, if there's a gun in a house and if it gets used, it'll probably be against someone in the house and that person would probably be someone who lives there or hangs out there.

 

[Phil Lee]

Simply put, a gun is more likely to be used on those who are around the gun the most.

Rubbish! The use of guns for self-defense is so much higher than for murder, suicide, and accident, that the quoted statement is wrong -- in fact a gun is more likely to be used for self-defense compared to murders, accidents, and suicides by approximately the ratio 2,500,000/30,000 or 83 to 1 in rough numbers.

 

[KingMedicine]

This is why i keep inviting my mother in law over and keeping my front door unlocked...

 

[woad_yurt]

Define "used." Does that include merely pointing it at someone in addition to actually firing at someone? I just can't fathom how any form of violence is more commonly directed at strangers than at family and friends. Where is this parade of strangers?

 

[Blackbeard]

Simply put, a gun is more likely to be used on those who are around the gun the most. Family and friends have been killing each other forever.

While that is probably true, it's also a pointless statistic. Everything in your house is more likely to be used against family members.

Your vase is more likely to be thrown at a spouse than an intruder.

The drugs in your medicine cabinet are more likely to cause an overdose in a family member than an intruder.

Your chainsaw is more likely to lop off the arm of a family member than an intruder.

Your car is more likely to run over a family member than an intruder.

Your knitting needles are more likely to impale a family member than an intruder.

Your bathtub is more likely to drown a family member than an intruder.

All of these are true and yet none of them suggest that you are better off without them. The real question, which Kellerman didn't even attempt to answer, is whether you're more likely to be murdered if you have a gun or not.

 

[Librarian]

A correction to my #13 - the Kleck/Gertz study was 1995; 1991's Point Blank was a summary of that kind of research. It was Kleck's 1997 book Targeting Guns that expanded the 1995 study, and addressed criticisms of it.

 

[SCKimberFan]

Anyone who fires on a relative is sick in the head and deserves to be sent to the sanitarium.

You've never met any of my relatives.