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No, you actually quoted things that are supported by the data I provided and added the assumption that that means we shouldn't care about non-gun related deaths.
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If you like, I could go back through all your posts and produce all of your comments that caused me to conclude that you are not concerned about non-gun related mass-murders, but there are quite a number of them.
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What do you think my argument is, exactly? That we should have gun control but not bomb control?
Not exactly. You just seem, for reasons not at all clear to me, not to be at all worried about things like bombs or chemical weapons, so apparently you think that whatever we are doing already is more than sufficient. Your opinion seems to be more reactive than proactive.
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I have made it super clear where we disagree. Not only have I made the point of our disagreement clear, but I've asked repeatedly for data that supports your point of view in an attempt to understand why you so fervently believe it. That you think asking you to support your beliefs is 'arguing" says a fair amount.
Actually, you have argued with me about things we agree on, leaving things quite muddy about where we actually disagree. This post, finally, helps to clarify it a bit.
Perhaps we can narrow it down if I turn my position into a list. I have consistently taken the following positions:
1. Reasonable gun control is appropriate
2. Gun buyback programs are appropriate
3. Steps 1 and 2 will significantly reduce the rate of gun related suicides, which are often spur of the moment decisions, and will also reduce accidental shootings.
4. Steps 1 and 2 will probably also reduce the rate of gun-related violent crime, including road rage incidents and armed robberies.
We agree on everything here. What you don't include, however, is homicides. I believe -- and have presented data that strongly supports the idea -- that gun control would also reduce the homicide rate.
That's a point of disagreement. I'm curious how you could look at the data presented and assume that fewer guns would have no impact on the homicide rate.
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I consider homicides to be "gun-related violent crime". Therefore I consider them to be a included in #4, which I believe will also be reduced.
5. They may also reduce the rate of gun-related mass murders.
6. Something has changed over the last fifty years that has led to a dramatic increase in mass murders. This is the core problem, and we need to try to understand it and address it.
7. People have already demonstrated that mass murders can be committed without guns.
8. Methods for killing without guns will continue to improve as mass murderers learn from those that go before them.
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This is the core point that we've disagreed on. I don't see how it's possible to look at the data presented and conclude that there wouldn't be a decrease in the mass murder rate with strong gun control. I have asked for actual hard data that supports that. You've provided anecdotes.
So you disagree with all of 5-8???
5. Regarding, #5, I haven't said gun control won't reduce mass murder rate. In fact, I said that it "may reduce mass murder rate". The problem is, how much, I don't know. I'm unclear why you think data is necessary to support my assertion that I don't know how much. I can give you reasons why I don't know, however. First, my informal observation is that most gun-related mass murders seem to have been done with guns that were legally obtained. Therefore, it is unclear to me how much impact gun control would have actually had. Secondly, again an informal observation, but most mass murders seem to be planned in advance, not spur of the moment things. I have no doubt that when there are less guns, there will be a reduction of spur of the moment events involving guns. Well planned events involving guns may also be reduced, but how much, I don't know.
6. Yes. I suspected this was a point of disagreement, though you haven't specifically voiced it. Even now I'm not clear which part of #6 you disagree with. Do you disagree that something has changed? Or that we should try to understand it?
In support of the fact that something has changed, here is some data:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Total_deaths_in_US_mas... This chart shows the growth rate in gun-related mass murders.
Eyeballing the chart, there is exponential growth. I believe that shows that something has changed, and, that something continues to change.
Also, to be super clear, your argument isn't merely that the mass murder rate won't decrease. You're actually arguing that it's going to increase.
Here's what you said:
I do think that this is a relatively temporary problem, however, and that in the future gun deaths will decline, as other more effective forms of mass murder become more common. I do favor reasonable gun controls, but I don't have any illusion that it will change the rate of mass murders.
Yes, that's what I believe. I do believe we can reduce the rate of gun-related death, though how much. I believe that the overall growth rate of mass murders will continue to grow exponentially for at least awhile as I see no new social changes that will reverse the trend.
As for my projection that the growth rate in gun deaths will slow, and the growth rate in non-gun related mass murders will grow is just that, a projection. It is based primarily on the realization that just as there is a limit to how many people a person with a knife can kill, a person with a gun can kill more, and a person with chemical weapons can kill far, far more. For mass murders to continue to grow exponentially, they will have to move beyond guns.
7. All it takes to prove my assertion is a single point. I don't need hundreds of cases. Thus, "an example" is all the data that is required. But, moving beyond the specific example, here is an article that claims that 25% of mass murders in the last decade were committed by means other than guns:
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2015/10/03/mass-kille... /
8. This is my prediction. Considering that all technology improves over time, it doesn't seem to be an unusual prediction.
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This entire time, all I've done is ask you repeatedly to provide some statistical support for those points.
The points where we disagree, 5-8 seem to primarily be projections into the future, i.e. opinions. I'm not disagreeing with you about the facts, at least, not so far as I have been able to tell.
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I don't see any of these as controversial. You asked for data to support point 7, so I gave you some examples.
This is correct. I asked for data. You provided examples. Those are different things.
As I said above, for my statement to be true, I only need one case. Thus, a single example was all that was required.
You ridiculed that data by blending in data from all crimes, showing that people tend to survive knife fights, for example.
It wasn't data. And I didn't ridicule it. I provided data that refutes the point you're trying to make.
No, you didn't. You provided irrelevant data that most people wounded with knives don't die. Now, if you could refine that data to include only cases where the person wielding the knife intended for the victim to die, then the data would be relevant. More on this below.
I mean, in your own words, "These mass murders seem to obtain weapons, map out their area, and plan their crimes in detail." If they thought knives or bombs were just as effective as guns, why do the vast majority of mass killers choose to use guns in the United States?
You're arguing that knives and other methods are just as likely to lead to death, right? So why does this subset of people, who are intent on killing as many people as possible, and tend to be meticulously detailed, always choose guns?...
No, that's not what I'm arguing. I'm arguing that they can be used for mass murder. Like you, I believe people intent on becoming mass murderers will choose the method they believe will be most effective. Today that method is usually guns. I believe that in the future they will shift to other methods.
We could also show that people tend to survive car accidents, but how is the survival rate if someone deliberately drives a semi at full speed into a crowd?
In the most deadly truck attack, which took place in Nice a few years back, the survival rate amongst injured people was 84.2%. And that was the most successful truck attack. In Barcelona, the survival rate was 91%. In Levallois-Perret, it was 100%. On the Champs-Elysse, it was 100%. In Finsbury Park it was 90%. In Charlottesville, it was 96.7%.
That is interesting survival information. In the recent Canadian van attack, the survival rate was 58%, with 10 dead, and 14 injured. Nevertheless, this survival data nicely makes the point that I was trying to make. The survival rate of people in car accidents is not in any way related to the survival rate of people in truck attacks. The two are not related in any way, and not even on the same order of magnitude, just as the survival rate of people in knife accidents has nothing to do with the survival rate where the knife was being used with an intent to murder.
Knives, vehicles, poison, and bombs are merely examples of methods other than guns that a mass murder could use. Of these, I think poison/chemical weapons will end up being the biggest threat.
Maybe chemical weapons and poison will end up the biggest threat. Right now, it's the smallest threat on the list.
Also worth noting that chemical weapons are very, very illegal. There's already chemical weapon control.
And that's a good thing, and I favor making them increasingly controlled, since I believe they are by far the biggest threat. As a side note, this week my company tried to buy a chemical that we have used for probably well over 30 years. For the first time ever we had to jump through many, many new hoops to explain why we wanted it before we could get it. I support that.
That brings up to to point 8. Perhaps it is point 8 you disagree with? Yet, from what I have seen, these mass murders are not spur of the moment decisions. These mass murders seem to obtain weapons, map out their area, and plan their crimes in detail. If they make these sorts of plans currently using guns, and somehow we keep them from having guns, why should we believe they will not plan carefully for non-gun related mass murders, and learn from other mass murderers that went before them?
I've been very clear that I do expect mass murders to continue to try and kill people en masse.
I'm trying to make it harder for them by forcing them to rely on methods of killing that are currently far less efficient. As illustrated by hard data.
I would disagree. You have not been clear that you are concerned about methods other than guns, and that is why we have, apparently, disagreed, when perhaps we didn't disagree at all.
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That you feel their success is an inevitability is a key point of difference between the two of us. I don't think terrorists are an unstoppable force and that it's just a matter of time before they kill us all, or whatever. I think they are, for the most part, disorganized cells of untrained people who are successful in killing only when it's easy.
There are exceptions to that rule, certainly. But the goal should be to make those exceptions harder and harder and as a result, more rare.
This hits at our point of disagreement. I hope they aren't unstoppable, but I look at the exponential growth, and I see every reason to believe that it could grow for awhile. That's why I favor not only approaching it from a gun control perspective, but also from a social perspective, trying to understand what changes in our society have led to this new trend.
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You seem to think these deaths are inevitable. I don't. You are, fundamentally, asking me to care as much about hypothetical deaths as actual deaths.
I'm trying to address what's actually happening. You're insisting we talk about your predictions for the future, without providing any reasons that I should accept your predictions for the future as likely.