Do Guns Make Us Safer? Seattle Can Be Our Test Case

October 26, 2024

mikethegunguy Blogs, Crime, Guns 6 Comments

One of the ways that the gun industry tries to maintain momentum is to promote the idea that if everyone would go around with a gun, we would all be a lot safer. Or to put it in the words of the chief gun guy in America, aka Wayne LaPierre, “a good guy with a gun will always stop a bad guy with a gun.” The only problem is that although concealed-carry permits are now available in all 50 states, there isn’t a single state that actually requires any special training before all those good guys put a gun on their hip and go out to find and stop the bad guys.

Which is one reason among others for gun-free zones. Because the real problem is that a lot of those good guys walking around with guns may not be able to do such a good job stopping the bad guys if they’ve had a couple of drinks, or maybe just lose control because it was a bad day at the office or the traffic on the way home just got to be too much. Don’t get me wrong; I’m not accusing gun owners of behaving any differently from anyone else. That’s exactly the point. If they behave like everyone else, a certain percentage are going to do something stupid or careless which could result in a good guy doing something very bad.

The truth is that the NRA is opposed to gun-free zones because they know that the more places where you can’t go with a gun, the more people will leave the gun at home. And the more they leave the gun at home, the less likely that they’ll buy more guns. The main reason that people have stopped smoking is not because of fears for their health, but because it’s just getting too difficult to find anywhere to light up. And the last thing the gun industry needs is for guns to be considered as much of a threat to our health as cigarettes.

In light of all this, it’s interesting that Seattle is making a big push in the business community to enroll business-owners to designate their shops, theaters and restaurants as gun-free zones. Yesterday the organization spearheading the drive announced their 100th business, a movie theater, that has agreed to post a sign asking patrons not to enter the theater with a gun. Of course the NRA and other gun activists immediately denounced the plan, claiming that they “knew” that gun-free zones resulted in more, not less gun violence. And what is their proof? An article on a Fox News blog by none other than John Lott, the gun researcher best known for inventing evidence about the alleged use of guns by armed citizens to prevent crime.

Lott claimed that the Aurora shooter, James Holmes, chose the Cinemark theater because it was the one theater near his residence that banned guns. Did Lott interview Holmes to learn this so-called evidence? Did anyone actually hear Holmes say that this was the reason? In all of the investigations that have taken place since the shooting has a single investigator stated that the theater’s no-gun policy is what motivated Holmes to walk into the Cinemark and start blasting away? And the answer is: no.

I really hope that authorities in Seattle will create a truly gun-free zone and then, at a later date, give us some hard data on the incidence of crime in that area before and after the gun-free zone came into effect. I don’t know whether crime will go up or down. But I do know this: every time the NRA parades someone like Lott out to support the use of guns by inventing evidence, an opportunity has been created to figure out whether we truly need to walk around with guns. Maybe we do and maybe we don’t. But Seattle may be giving us a real chance to find out.

Do We Need More Research On Gun Violence?

October 16, 2024

mikethegunguy Blogs, Crime, Guns , , , , , , , 5 Comments

 

 

coverFollowing Sandy Hook, the Obama Administration took upon itself to organize discussions that ultimately led to the publication of a new gun research agenda. Basically this report could be summed up as ‘new wine in old bottles,’ because it called for studies of the same issues that had been on the CDC agenda before gun research was closed down. I have analyzed this report in my own book and it’s been subject to the usual negative commentary by the minions of the NRA. And since no funding for any of the suggested research areas has been voted through the Congress, the report remains exactly that: another dead report.

 

But the inactivity of the CDC in this area doesn’t mean that gun violence research isn’t going on. To the contrary, it continues to be conducted by a number of different organizations and individual researchers, to the point that there’s very little about the issue of gun violence that isn’t understood. Most of the research has come out of the major advocacy organizations like the Violence Policy Center and the Brady Campaign. Mike Bloomberg has endowed a research program at Johns Hopkins that publishes significant work, as does David Hemenway’s Injury Control Research Center at Harvard’s School of Public Health.

 

This is hardly a comprehensive list of organizations or individuals who are conducting meaningful gun violence research. And I apologize to the many serious researchers for whom space limitations don’t allow me cite their works. But I did want to spend a few sentences on a particularly significant research effort being carried out for the past two decades by an emergency room physician in California, Garen Wintemute, because here we have a remarkable example of theory linked to practice by someone who deals with the net results of gun violence every day that he shows up at work.

 

Wintemute’s Violence Prevention Research Program, housed at UC/Davis, has conducted research on a wide variety of issues related to gun violence, but what makes his work so compelling is that it combines extensive analysis of data with hands-on contacts between himself and the subjects of his research: gun owners, gun-show exhibitors, gun dealers, gun manufacturers. He is the only medical or public health specialist I know who has actually verified his data by visiting gun shops, walking through and observing gun shows, walking onto gun factory floors and, it should be added, he’s been a gun owner himself.

 

Recently Wintemute and several colleagues published an article calling for physicians to become more visible advocates in the gun violence debate. I reviewed this article in a post that I published on September 26. At that time I was impressed by the fact that an article calling for physicians to get more involved in gun issues was published at all. But what really stands out is the fact that physicians, despite what the NRA says, can and should play a role in decisions about guns because doctors are experts in dealing with fears about disease and death, and many people decide to own a gun because they have fears about crime.

 

This is the kind of original thinking that comes from analysis that is grounded both in data and real life. And physicians should realize that no amount of research will convince the NRA or its supporters that medical professionals should and must play an important role in defining America’s relationship to guns. When the trigger of a gun is pulled and someone’s in the way, it’s physicians like Garen Wintemute who have to deal with the results. That’s enough of a reason to listen to what he has to say.

 

 

 

Related articles

 

  • NRA Tried To Stifle Study Showing Gun Retailers Support Background Checks (thinkprogress.org)

 

What Do We Know About Mass Shootings?

October 15, 2024

mikethegunguy Crime, Guns , , , , , , , 1 Comment

mass shootings I have spent enough time and words discussing the shortcomings of Mike Bloomberg’s approach to gun violence but now it’s time to give him a pat on the back. I’m referring to the report that his group published last month that gave a very detailed of mass shootings since 2009; mass shootings being defined by the FBI as an incident in which one individual shoots kills four or more people within a brief period of time. The report is based on data from the FBI’s supplement to the UCR, along with media and law enforcement descriptions of each event.

The report’s publication elicited the usual response: the NRA and its minions like John Lott derided or simply lied about it, the gun control crowd yawned, mentioned the report in this blog and that blog, and then went back to thinking about whatever they have been thinking about since Toomey-Manchin bit the dust. But the report really does deserve scrutiny because it not only contains some very significant information about multiple shootings, but also forces us to think about the most effective strategies for dealing with gun violence, if in fact we want to think about the issue at all.

The most important piece of evidence from the report is the correlation between multiple shootings and domestic, holiday environments. Want to see a gun-fight other than on television? Invite the whole family over for a party and then let an ex-spouse into the home. This was the single, most common environment in which multiple killings occurred, and in many cases the grand finale then involved the shooter turning the gun on himself.

More than half the 93 mass killings that took place between January 27, 2025 and the Navy Yard massacre on occurred this year on September 16, involved not just people who knew each other, but people who were related by marriage, blood or both. All of these killings took place in or adjacent to a family residence, as did many of the other mass murders which didn’t involve domestic relationships. NRA blather to the contrary, only 15% of all these killings took place in “gun-free” zones like schools, government buildings, etc. The idea that such environments create a greater opportunity for gun violence is not supported by the data collected by the FBI. I mean, who are you going to trust when it comes to information about crime - the NRA or the FBI?

Finally, the report also notes that 10% of the shooters had exhibited behavior which at some time or another resulted in some degree of contact with the mental health system. But it is not clear whether any of these individuals were ever treated for mental illness, nor were they prohibited from owning firearms due to their mental state. Slightly less than half of the perpetrators appeared to have previous criminal histories or other reasons that would have prohibited them from possessing guns.

Which brings us to the nub of the issue: Is the evidence contained in this report align itself with the strategies for controlling gun violence being advocated by Mike Bloomberg and his friends? Maybe yes and maybe no. Obviously the “prohibited” persons who committed roughly 40% of these mass killings would have had more difficulty acquiring a gun if private sales required a background check. Score one for universal background checks. On the other hand, of the 93 people who have committed mass murders over the past 4 and 3/4 years, only one had spent enough time in a mental health facility to forfeit his right to purchase or own a gun. Score zero for gathering mental health records.

Those of us who want to do something about gun violence face two daunting tasks: one is to figure out how to mobilize grass-roots support on a continuous and effective basis; the second is to figure out what to do. You’ll see some more posts on both issues shortly.

Related articles
  • Mike Weisser: If Gun Violence Is a Health Epidemic, Can We Quarantine It Like a Virus? (huffingtonpost.com)
  • Gun violence needs to be treated as a public-health issue > Readers may be tired of seeing us opine on gun violence. We understand. We get tired of writing about it. (newsreview.com)

Understanding Crime: A Tale Of Two Cities - Chapter 1

October 10, 2024

mikethegunguy Blogs, Crime , , , , , , , Leave a comment

springfield

Springfield

After I published my last blog I received an email from Susan W: “So why does Chicago have such a high murder rate?” She’s not the only one asking that question. Problem is that the answer isn’t a single answer because there’s no type of behavior that can be explained by one, single factor. In the preface to its report, the FBI lists thirteen factors that need to be taken into account, including economic conditions, culture, marital situations, crime reporting practices of the citizenry, population density, age cohorts, etc., etc., etc. And the report states that these are “some” of the factors that might influence crime levels.

Over the next couple of weeks I’m going to take the FBI at its word and use those factors plus others to try and construct a profile for two cities that have very different crime patterns even though they are extremely similar in many of the social, economic, cultural, demographic and law enforcement categories listed by the FBI. And just as important as the statistical data is the fact that I happen to live midway between these two cities, I travel through them all the time, and I know their histories and even some of their current residents very well.

I’m talking about two cities in Massachusetts: Springfield and Worcester. Let’s look at some quick numbers. Population: Worcester is 183,247; Springfield is 154,518. Per-capita income: Worcester is $24,544; Springfield is $18,483. Percentage of workforce in administrative or sales: Exactly the same (15% and 10%.) Unemployment: Worcester is 7.7%, Springfield is 8.4% Public school reading proficiency: Same for both - 69%. Data is all from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, whose websites are shut down at the moment.

One last demographic comparison which is usually relevant to discussions about crime. While the per-capita income is substantially higher for Worcester versus Springfield, population density which is considered a major factor in crime rates (more urban = more crime) is almost exactly the same: 4,845 for Worcester, 4803 for Springfield. When we turn to crime data, however, all similarities disappear. Let’s look at homicide first.

worcester

Worcester

 

In 2012, Springfield’s (per 100,000) homicide rate was 7.14, in Worcester it was 4.3. Rape was 25 to 18, robbery was 351 to 228, overall violent crime rates were 1,042 to 960, the parity due to a higher rate of assault in Worcester than Springfield. On the property crime side, there was no parity at all. Springfield’s rate for burglary, larceny and auto theft was 4,561, Worcester registered 3,514.

Let’s put these numbers into the national context. Worcester’s murder rate was slightly below the national rate; Springfield’s rate was nearly twice as high. Worcester’s property crime rate was 18.6% higher than the national number, Springfield’s was 37.3% higher. So if you live in Worcester, your body is a little safer than anywhere else in America but your property is somewhat more at risk. If you live in Springfield, I suggest you stay inside at all times, double-lock your doors and get rid of your car.

Back to the beginning. Susan W asked for reasons why there are so ,many murders in Chicago. We don’t know yet but if we analyze enough data, the answer may ultimately speak for itself. Stay tuned.

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  • 77th most dangerous city is Springfield (wwlp.com)
  • “Top 100 most dangerous cities in U.S.” (wwlp.com)

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