The whole Amir Locke death should put to rest the idea that having a gun

[AndyS]

will protect you. It as a cop that shot him but it just as well could have been an armed thief. Makes no difference. The bad guy, with or without badge, has his gun at the ready and is prepared. You with your home protection gun are not. Amir was asleep but it would have made no difference if he were watching TV and fully awake. The intruder with a gun entered and ten seconds later Amir was dead.

The gun sellers have convinced their frightened followers that a gun in the house makes them safe when science says it makes them 5x more likely to be harmed by a gun. The gun sellers have convinced their followers that instant access to a gun will allow them to defend themselves when it clearly does not. Amir's gun was not in a safe, it was in his hand yet he still didn't have time to bring it to bear against the unknown intruder who killed him.

It is sad that so many people have fallen prey to the marketing subterfuge that they have been fed.

Like a smoker with COPD who was fooled by Tabaco advertising we should treat them with loving concern whether they accept it or not. The are to be pitied, not argued with.

[3catwoman3]

1. One of my husband's friends from his Air Force years...

…told him that he kept a gun in every room of his house. My husband, half in humor and half in incredulity, asked, “Even in the bathrooms?” To his surprise and disgust, the answer was, “Yes.”

This man died a couple of years ago (not gun related). When his wife was cleaning out things in their garage, he had 11,000 rounds of ammunition!

[JohnSJ]

2. Actually it tells me thjere is something wrong with no knock warrants

[AndyS]

3. You missed the point. Forget the no knock warrant because an armed intruder

won't knock either. The gun does you no good because the intruder has an insurmountable advantage AND in either case if you don't have a gun the likelihood of you being shot decreases.

[Deuxcents]

4. Imo..there's a whole lot wrong with no knock warrants

They need to be forbidden..outlawed.,whatever the verbiage.

[JohnSJ]

5. Yes there is

[Hoyt]

6. Too many of these shootings have a gun involved. Doesn't excuse what happened, but the police

didn't shoot until they saw a gun.

Yeah, the no knock warrants should be limited to very few situations and if someone gets the address wrong or whatever, they get fired and sued for dereliction of duty.

It does appear that the police were looking for a suspected murder, again with a friggin gun.

[TomSlick]

7. At the risk of being TOO cynical,

I wonder what would have been the result if a white man was seen with a weapon.

Too many in the police see black males as inherently dangerous. With that mind set, a black man with a gun is an imminent threat which must be immediately dispatched. A white man with a gun bears watching. A black man with a gun must be shot.

The Second Amendment does not really apply to black men.

[Deuxcents]

8. It's a painful agreement to your point

I have no illusions things will change in my lifetime.. another painful acknowledgment

[Hoyt]

9. I agree. I did have a friend who lost her white son to police who shot him

thinking he was going for a gun. He tried to run from a road block.

But no question that Blacks are shot, harassed, treated like dirt, and worse. But if you are holding a gun, it’s highly likely you’ll be shot.

[DashOneBravo]

22. Sir, more whites are killed annually

https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/

And just so everyone knows, I’ve got a niece that’s an Air Force veteran and state trooper. Also have several friends who are approaching retirement from law enforcement.

[TomSlick]

27. Obviously correct - but - AA folks make up just over 12% of the population.

Non-Hispanic white folks make up almost 58% of the population. That means there are more than four times as many non-hispanic whites as AA.

Just based on the demographics, you would expect something like four times more police shootings of whites than of AAs. However, from the chart you linked to, roughly twice as many white folks are shot by police as AA folks - half what you would expect based on just the demographics. As a percentage of the population, AA folks are disproportionally more likely - by a lot - to be shot by police than white folks.

There has to be an explanation for why AA folks are so disproportionally more likely to be shot by police. I am open to any possible explanation other than police officers seeing AA men as threatening.

[DashOneBravo]

28. That's true about the percentage.

Now I’ll have to look at some other things. I do agree that the cops shoot way too many people.

And the fact that a cop wasn’t the least bit worried as he kept his knee on George Flyod Jr for 9 mins. I imagine that worse has happened when there were no video or phone and wasn’t reported.

And I’ll have to look at the other points.

When people started talking about systematic racism I started reading some more. I think it’s a pretty accurate word for the policing and prison system.

https://www.aclu.org/news/criminal-law-reform/what-100-years-of-history-tells-us-about-racism-in-policing/

And I won’t derail post anymore. If you have any links you’d like me to read. Just send by the DU mail sir.

[TomSlick]

29. Not a derail. A sincere discussion.

There is little point to a discussion board like DU if we cannot discuss - question each other's positions - and maybe, just maybe, make each other think. We're all on the same team. We ought to be able to discuss issues.

[FBaggins]

10. Your theory doesn't make any sense

Sure... if four or five armed and armored men break down the door ten feet from you they've "got the drop on you"... but that doesn't represent even a tiny fraction of home self-defense situations.

[AndyS]

11. Only one cop fired his weapon. Only one. Exactly who the fuck cares if it's

one or ten?

As someone sitting on a couch watching TV even with a gun on your hip you simply cannot react to a surprise fast enough.

.2 seconds is the reaction time IF the subject is prepared to act. It takes more than .2 sec to identify that there is a threat, .2 sec to react and any lag time to get the gun off your belt or wherever it is. A little late when the guy in your house has his gun in the ready.

A gun for home security increases the danger to the household 5x. It's science.

So yeah, my 'theory' backed up by science makes perfect sense regardless of what the gun industry has told you over the last 50 years. A lie oft repeated is still a lie.

[FBaggins]

12. Still not at all comparable to the more common self-defense situations

You simply can't plausibly claim that someone showing up with a gun in your face as you wake up is at all comparable to most robberies or break-ins.

Someone breaking the window of your kitchen downstairs with a tire iron is still a threat to your family if you're unarmed.

Feel free to make other arguments about the relative safety of guns in the home... but this argument is nonsense.

[AndyS]

13. I presented the stats, a gun in the home makes the household 5x

more likely to be hurt by gun.

I know the gun industry has told you for 50 years that guns make you safer. I under stand that a lie told a thousand time sounds like the truth. But it isn't. It's still a lie.

If I were a smart ass I'd ask you to show me stats on how many home invasions give the homeowner more notice. There aren't any so save your time.

However, about 2% of gunshot incidents are defensive which matches the 2% that are children under 11 and is 30% less than the 3% that are 'accidental shootings'. 40% of homicides are committed by someone with a felony conviction so I guess 60% were committed by law abiding citizens that could pass a background check? You pose an objection based on niggling minutia, I have the compiled numbers.

I have science to rely on. You have propaganda put out by gun makers and sellers without a conscience.

[FBaggins]

14. No you didn't... but that's also irrelevant

Making an unsupported claim is not "presenting the stats", let alone "science to rely on"

But again - that's irrelevant. Because your OP's claim is that the fact that Amir Locke was not defended by his handgun was proof that guns can't protect you in general.

That's simply an illogical claim - whether or not there might be other claims that are logical.

[AndyS]

15. Okay. I presented stats on defensive uses vs children and accidents.

Those stats show that guns do not protect you 'in general' but pose a greater threat 'in general'.

Your turn to present stats to support your side that guns protect you 'in general'.

[FBaggins]

16. Ok. Guns are sixteen times more likely to defend left-handed homeowners than harm them

There... now we've both "presented stats".

Now... back to the actual conversation. Your position is exactly as ridiculous as responding to news of an elderly woman shooting a home invader who tried to kill her dog with "This should put to rest the notion that guns are dangerous"

[AndyS]

17. I see your 2% of incidents in defense and raise you the 98% that resulted in homicide,

suicide and accidental death. My numbers beat yours by 49 to one. Care to continue?

edit: the 'actual conversation' was started when I said a gun in the home doesn't protect you. I've shown that to be true 98% of the times a gun is used. The other 2% is an anomaly. I know the gun industry has told you for 50 years that a gun protects you. It is a lie whether you believe it or not. Like Tabaco the gun industry has seduced you into using their product even though you know somewhere in your mind that it's not good for you.

[FBaggins]

18. Sure... as long as you admit that you're just making numbers up as you go along

And that none of them had anything to do with my initial reply to the OP.

[AndyS]

19. My numbers are not made up. Please do not call me a liar again you have all the lies you need from

the gun industry.

[FBaggins]

20. Of course they are

Last edited Wed Feb 9, 2022, 06:22 PM - Edit history (2)

You have yet to cite a single source and constantly change the description. First, it's the danger to the household... then it's a claim of defensive use vs "children and accidents". Or you're comparing gunshot incidents overall (entirely disconnected from home defense and not at all supportable) then it's just "incidents in defense" (which can't possibly be the same figure as gunshots since many defensive uses do not involve shooting someone yet essentially all homicides from a gun involve firing the weapon). And, of course, the second set of stats (50:1) contradicts the first set (5:1) yet you're blind to that because any number that means that gun ownership for home defense is useless is the same to you.

All in an attempt to dodge the simple fact that the OP was nonsense. One incident does not prove or disprove whether gun ownership can or will protect you.

[AndyS]

21. I have not dodged any "simple" fact. The premise is that a gun in the household

does not make you safer. I have shown repeatedly that that is true. You simply chose to attack me instead of addressing my data.
https://www.gunviolencearchive.org/

[FBaggins]

23. Nope

The premise was that a recent news event demonstrated that a gun in the home doesn’t make you safer - which was a ridiculous conclusion to draw from one event.

You did not, in fact, demonstrate anything… nor have I attacked you. I merely pointed out that waving your hands around and stating contradictory numbers without providing any foundation is not “science”

And now you’ve finally provided a link? I can see why you avoided doing so previously. The source is useful in many ways, but not for the discussion you were trying to have. The vast majority of home defense scenarios with a gun do not involve someone dying (or even being shot) - so their data necessarily misses the mark.

Racking a pump-action shotgun and yelling that the cops are on their way will scare away most burglars and never end up in a source that they would pick up… yet almost every gunshot victim will hit a database.

[AndyS]

25. *sigh* I am taken to task for not posting sources.

Last edited Wed Feb 9, 2022, 08:13 PM - Edit history (1)

I show you one and you disparage it (aka attack it as unreliable). However you are yet to post a stat much less a source for any of your claims of self defense. Why two standards?

You claim I 'make up numbers' and then post a gun fantasy about racking a pump-action shotgun and have the gall to follow it by pointing out such events can't be verified or quantified? You attack my sources and then admit that none even exist for your claims? Why do you get to use this as a foundation for an objection to my reliable and verifiable sources?

Oh, and accusing me of 'making up numbers' and then doubling down by saying 'of course they are(made up)' is calling me a liar in polite terms.

So far you have attacked my personal integrity, my sources and desperately tried to avoid recognizing my answers to your objections. Finally you make claims of self defense that by your own admission cannot be verified and have no basis in statistics or scientific inquiry.

Where do we go next? I have an idea. Go away. Don't go away mad, just go away.

[FBaggins]

24. First question for your link

Simple question. Do you really think that there have only been 109 defensive uses of a firearm in the US this year?

Really?

[AndyS]

26. Yes unless you can show me a more verifiable accurate number. nt