Reply #132: Just for you, jgraz

[TPaine7]

It didn't seem to merit response--and I recall having the same thought the first time I read it. But just for you, jgraz:

..."approximately 2.5 million legitimate defensive gun uses take place a year".

....

How many people actually are victims of officially recorded crimes every year? This table:
http://www.disastercenter.com/crime/uscrime.htm
seems to tell us that there were 11,401,313 crimes against the person + crimes against property in the US in 2006 -- 1,417,745 person, 9,983,568 property.

Ok, 11,401,313 crimes officially reported.

And somebody wants us to believe that there might have been another million or two had people not been flashing or firing firearms?

Another million or two officially recorded crimes? Not really.

Issue 1: Apples and oranges.

The property offences shown there aren't the kind generally committed when the victims are even in the vicinity -- theft, burglary, vehicle theft.

OK.

If people are there, they tend to fall into the "robbery" category, and get included in the violent/against the person numbers.

I don't think so. If a man takes off sick the day robbers decide to break in, and chases them off with a shotgun they have not committed a crime against the person. The shotgun helped to ensure that they didn't. That doesn't work in any circumstance where the person intended a property crime and was chased off by an conspicuously armed property owner.

I dunno. I just can't think of much to say. There are about 1.5 million crimes of violence officially recorded in a year in the US, and somebody wants me to believe that that many crimes, or half that many, or even half again as many, were averted by somebody doing something with a firearm.

Frankly, I don't think that any level of evidence will suffice to make iverglas believe anything she doesn't want to believe about DGUs.

Damned if I can find the bit I'm actually looking for -- the number of people who engaged in "defensive gun use" who believed that a death would probably have resulted if they had not done something with a gun. It was some multiple of the number of homicides that actually occur in the US in a year -- leading us to conclude that perhaps having a gun handy somehow increases one's risk of being murdered.

This "conclusion" is asinine. It is either extreme intellectual dishonesty, extreme bias, or both. Of course the data would show that, even if collected by an omniscient, infallible observer. Thugs often put their victims in fear of their lives so that they can obtain their objectives. Think about a few crimes:

1) Carjacking
2) Rape
3) Armed robbery

If the felon could get to give him what he wanted without putting you in fear of your life (or at least in fear of serious bodily injury) there would be no crime. It wouldn't be a carjacking; it would be a car borrowing or the generous gift of a car. It wouldn't be rape; it would be seduction. It wouldn't be armed robbery; it would be panhandling.

Those aren't crimes. They wouldn't show up on official records. They wouldn't show up in surveys. They wouldn't even show up on our omniscient, infallible observer's crime records.

Now in some people's thinking, the fact that most of the people who are put in legitimate, rational fear for their lives aren't actually killed is very significant in indicating proper gun policy. I disagree.

Let us say that only 1 in 20 of those people was correct that they would have been killed without their DGU. Let us say that Joe Blow is one of those people. He is cornered by two thugs with knives who ask for his wallet and watch. He judges the situation and determines that he can defend himself with his concealed weapon. Should he give them his wallet? Odds are, they won't hurt him if he pays the "thug tax."

Let's change the picture slightly, but not the odds. Let's say that a felon has an innocent person tied up. He has a special revolver with 20 cylinders, and he is playing a game of Russian roulette. He has been going around "playing" with lots of people; Joe Blow has read the stories and knows how this psychopath works. He uses one bullet, puts the gun to the terrified victim's head, counts down, and pulls the trigger one time and one time only. The vast majority of victims survive with only psychic scars.

Anyway, Joe Blow is armed and has a very clear shot at the psychopath's head. He is absolutely certain he can destroy the his brain and leave the victim untouched. The thug is counting down--3, 2,... Should Joe pull the trigger? Or should he endanger the innocent person out of regard for the psychopath's safety? Do you think it a moral imperative to preserve the life of the felon at the 5% possible expense of the innocent victims life?

I absolutely don't.