Would a significant decrease in suicides justify a gun ban?

As the title says; after the gun ban in Australia, there was a 65% drop in firearm based suicides, with no corresponding increase in non-firearm based suicides. Would that figure alone justify a gun ban? There are about 21,000 gun based suicides in the US each year; if that figure held, a gun ban would save 13,650 lives each year. Can the use of guns for defense really justify not banning them, if doing so can save that many lives from suicide?

What are your thoughts?

 

The above assumes that the people of the united states would simply refrain from ever selecting another option for committing suicide if firearms were not available, and simply go on living their lives without issue simply because they could not shoot themselves. There is no basis for this belief. Even if it were, to ask if stopping suicides is sufficient reason to restrict firearms ownership, is to completely ignore that countless thousands of examples of individuals protecting themselves from being harmed or murdered by having a firearm to actually use when it is needed. Should suicides be combated at the cost of increased suicides and sexual assaults? Save those that wish to die by ignoring those that do not wish to die, but may very well because they have no say in the situation?

 

No
what a load of feces.

 

There is a pretty good basis for it, in the Australian statistic above; firearm suicides decreased by 65%, while other suicides didn't rise. That implies something fairly significant, and isn't likely to differ from country to country. That would make for the above statistic of 13,650 lives. What we want to evaluate is if the number of lives lost to violence that could be prevented using guns is greater than the number lost to suicide; I've seen figures ranging from 100 thousand to 300 thousand in terms of people who somehow defended themselves using a gun, but it seems more difficult to evaluate how many of those situations were potentially fatal in the first place, or how many were simple burglaries. Robberies are much more common than murders, after all. That's not considering how a gun ban could potentially reduce aforementioned fatal situations that could be prevented using a gun. It's a complex thing, but hearing that statistic definitely shifted my view on gun control. As a libertarian, my instinct is to keep the government out of things, but if you can prevent that many people from dying, can you really justify it?

Also, nobody 'wants to die'. Being suicidal is a mental disorder, and an opinion that goes away once you've been medicated and had hormonal imbalances corrected isn't a real opinion, it's a symptom.

 

Key word; over Simplification,
Regardless, Suicide is not a disease, nor is it a Medically treatable condition persay, it is a most complex condition possible from any of a myriad of cause and effect, Suicide is not a Legitimate reason to eliminate the Right to keep and bear Arms, also, the numbers do not add up, I have been in Health Care a long time, and have seen enough cases of Suicide in My Official capacity, only a small percentage of those cases used Firearms, and in Countries where Firearms were not available, People still committed Suicide, the methods varied, most People used a form of hanging, poisons ran a second, death by defenestration or by motor vehicle impact / trains etc.....

Truth is, the Anti-Gun advocates seize on Suicide as a device to advance Gun control, not because Suicide is preventable by a simplistic but ineffective solution such as Gun Control.

 

Absolutely not.

First and foremost the Right to Bear Arms is a constitutional right.

Secondly those who want to commit suicide would just find another way to do it.

AA

 

I have the right to keep and bear arms regardless of the Constitution...the Constitution bars the government from infringing on that right.

The are many reasons people attempt suicide. Some because they are mentally ill, some because they are looking for help, some for a strange idea of revenge, etc. There are many reasons. In some cases you can intervene, in others, there is determination. And, for some. it is a rational control motive few others can understand. People do all sorts of risky things in their lives, some more than others, but we don't prevent people from driving, diving, flying, or many other things that can cause accidental or intentional death and banning guns for 120 million gun owners for those statistical few, the 0.00016 that use guns to commit suicide would be idiotic infringing on the rights and liberties we have sacrificed for these last 220+ years.

And, as far as I am concerned, I have the right to commit suicide if I so chose and use a gun if that is the method I choose. Stuff that in your pipe and smoke it.

 

Suicide attempts with a gun are much more likely to end in death than other options.

"About 85 percent of suicide attempts with a firearm end in death. (Drug overdose, the most widely used method in suicide attempts, is fatal in less than 3 percent of cases.) Moreover, guns are an irreversible solution to what is often a passing crisis. Suicidal individuals who take pills or inhale car exhaust or use razors have time to reconsider their actions or summon help. With a firearm, once the trigger is pulled, there’s no turning back."
https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/magazine-features/guns-and-suicide-the-hidden-toll/

 

And you actually think that is more important than human life? US Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer disagrees:

" 'Chicago says that their gun law has saved hundreds, including -- and they have statistics -- lots of women in domestic cases,' Breyer said. 'When you have the First Amendment, or some of the other amendments, there is always a big area where it's free speech versus a whole lot of things, but not often free speech versus life. When it's free speech versus life, we very often decide in favor of life.' "
http://www.cnn.com/2010/CRIME/03/02/scotus.gun.control/index.html

 

I don't fall for the BS of, "if it just saves one life". Guns save lives, that is a fact.
Tens of thousands have given their lives to preserve the right to keep and bear arms along with the rest of our Constitutional liberties. They have died to preserve free speech as well.

Chicago has the most stringent gun laws in the country and the highest death toll from crime. I'd sit down with Breyer over a beer and argue their laws have cost lives, are discriminatory, and, while I might respect his opinion, he's dead wrong.

If you don't want to carry or own a gun that is your right and I would respect that right. Don't tread on my rights.

 

Chicago, that issued permits to carry concealed weapons to every Gangster during Prohibition, and still the most Political corrupt City today.

 

You are making a presumptive error, Suicide is not dependent on a method, Firearms do not account for Suicide, Japans rate of Suicide is very high, and no Firearms are used, I have seen many Suicides in Countries where Firearms were restricted, Suicide rates are not diminished by not having Firearms available.

 

Breyer is a liberal jewish gun hater , his arguments are dishonest and based on outcome based "reasoning". He doesn't like the culture that supposedly supports gun rights, conservative Christian middle class white males

 

Apples and oranges. Unless you control for other factors that could affect the suicide rate, a comparison between America and Japan doesn't yield any relevant information. In an American context, there is plenty of evidence linking gun ownership to a higher suicide rate. Americans who own guns are more likely to commit suicide than those who don't.

 

How many Suicides have you responded to ???
How many have you personally investigated ?
What do you personally know about suicide ??

I know something about it having responded to many Suicides in an Official capacity, Firearms were used in very few of the Suicides I responded to, Hanging was the most common method of Suicide.

 

Suicide attempts with firearms have the highest fatality rate.



(the suicide attempt rate) x (the fatality rates of suicide methods) = the suicide rate

Japan could have a higher suicide rate because a lot more Japanese attempt suicide although they use less lethal means. That in no way eliminates gun ownership as a risk factor for suicide.

 

Gun Ownership has no Causal Relationship to Suicide, once a Person decides to commit Suicide, the method chosen is ancillary, Men tend to use a Firearm if they have one, Women are more likely to use a neater or less messy option, as Poison or hanging, although most of the Suicides I responded to were hangings.

 

That's the point, that in Australia (which has a very similar culture to the US), there was a 65% reduction in suicide by firearm by gun ban, while the rates of other deaths by suicide stayed the same. My instinct isn't for gun control, but I'm not convinced that more lives are saved by firearms than are killed.

Anecdotal evidence, quite frankly, is useless, and that's what your evidence consists of. I woke up one morning with my father lying on the floor, having cut himself all over his body (and actually cut off part of his scrotum), but I certainly don't consider that the most common method of suicide.

They do have a very high stress, high expectation culture.

You can't just say 'look at the second amendment', because the constitution isn't infallible. If it would genuinely be better for the country to have a gun ban, then the second amendment doesn't shift the pros and cons of a gun ban in the slightest. I'm very pro-freedom in general, but I have never so much as looked at a gun, and quite frankly being near guns terrifies me. People treat weapons of death, good for literally nothing but death and destruction even while used in defense, as toys and collector's items. The reactions of people who own a gun to a proposed gun ban is similar to someone reacting to you taking their comic book collection away. Generous estimates pose that 0.03% of the US population defends themselves using a gun each year, and I expect that the percentage of that percentage that defends themselves from a lethal situation is much smaller. The chances of you, personally, ever actually using a gun to defend yourself from a lethal situation is infinitesimal. The reason that gun control laws don't work is when they're scattered; where you have strict gun control in one county but the next one over is handing them out light used mattresses, and criminals can easily get guns from said county. Blanket bans, as a rule, would be much more effective, and even if my instincts are against it, I can't find a logical reason why guns should be legal. They're weapons of death, not cool toys that give you the added perk of some sort of self defense fantasy.

 

I've known 2 people who have committed suicide. One hanged himself and one shot himself. They are both equally dead. I know several people who have used a gun to protect themselves. They are all still alive. Let's outlaw nooses.

 

You are most IGNORANT !

Annecdotal evidence is hear say, My experiences with firearms as defensive devices is not something I once heard in a pub or bar, as a Police Officer I had often needed to use firearms in my defense and in defense of others, and even Retired, have need of my sidearm in my defense.

You admit to an irrational fear of firearms, there is a cure for that, take a firearms training class and get over your fear, you do not need to own guns in order to learn about them.

Firearms unlike comic books have legitimate uses you should learn about.

 

It is not an irrational fear, it's rather quite justified to fear something that can kill you in an instant. It's much like fearing a wild tiger, or poison. Most police only actually shoot their weapon a few times in their career; I don't know about your district, but that's the case in most, and Britain does just fine without their police having any firearms whatsoever, since their populace also lacks them. The only legitimate use a firearm has is to kill a person, injure a person, or scare a person (or hunting, but I oppose that on principle), and there are perfectly valid methods otherwise, such as carrying pepper spray and a baton. In Britain, they don't have the easy option of a firearm, so they actually use problem solving skills, rather than shooting first and then asking questions; you ought to try it.

Also, anecdotal evidence is not hearsay, it's any evidence based solely on your own experience, rather than on hard fact and statistic.

 

Math certainly doesn't appear to be your strong point. Let's suppose that 20 people per 100,000 in the US decide to shoot themselves (a 85% fatality rate) and 50 people per 100,000 in Japan decide to hang themselves (a 70% fatality rate). What will the suicide rate be in each country?

(50 suicide attempts per 100,000) x (a fatality rate of 70%) = 35 suicides per 100,000 people in Japan.

(20 suicide attempts per 100,000) x (a fatality rate of 85%) = 17 suicides per 100,000 people in the US.

So you can see that firearms still play a role in increasing the suicide rate in the US although Japan has an overall higher suicide rate due to a higher suicide attempt rate.

 

So let's outlaw guns, knives, poisons, and zoos.

Don't forget hardware stores.

 

That is a direct contradiction, My experiences are hard fact and statistics, and are supported by myriads of others with like experiences and results, compiled into statistics as in the Uniform Crime Report published by the FBI

What is the definition of anecdotal evidence?

Something anecdotal has to do with anecdotes — little stories. Anecdotal evidence is based on hearsay and little to do with hard facts.

 

None of which does anything to suggest that a lack of firearms will result in a corresponding reduction in successful suicides in the united states. You cannot present evidence that will prove the contrary, and show that suicidal individuals are willing to continue living so long as they cannot readily have a firearm for the purpose of ending their lives.