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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 5:43:43 GMT -5
Stuff that prevents suicidal people getting guns saves lives - waiting periods on purchases, restrictions on purchase/ownership for people having mental health crises, safe gun storage.
Waiting periods only matter if the person doesn't already have a gun. First-time purchase waiting periods aren't the worst idea but shouldn't be expected to have a major effect.
Restrictions on purchasing for people "having mental health crises" are wishful thinking. Other than being involuntarily committed (which already prevents you from buying or possessing a gun) there is no way for the police or gun sellers to know a person is having a mental health crisis without massive privacy violations. You're talking about ending doctor/patient confidentiality at minimum and even that isn't going to do anything if the person isn't seeking treatment. And such a policy would likely lead to an increase in suicide risks because people who have any concerns about mental health issues would be discouraged from seeking treatment.
Safe gun storage laws only matter in the edge case scenario where a gun owner lives with a suicidal person who does not have approved access to the guns, if the gun owner is suicidal or the suicidal person is allowed to have access then requiring them to open their own safe is not going to do much to prevent suicide. And such a law would be a de facto ban on keeping guns for self defense as any storage method capable of introducing more than a negligible delay in a suicide attempt would also make the gun inaccessible for defensive purposes. And that is not an acceptable outcome.
The reality is that suicide prevention by gun control is wishful thinking at best and nothing short of total bans and confiscation can be expected to have much of an effect. If you want to stop suicide you need to address the root causes: poverty, lack of access to mental health treatment, unrestrained bullying, etc. But unfortunately those are complex issues requiring solutions beyond the scope of a simple campaign slogan.
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Haighus
Ye Olde King of OT
Posts: 902
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Post by Haighus on Apr 19, 2024 5:53:48 GMT -5
Unacceptable to you This is a continuum, not an absolute. Total bans are not necessary to have an impact. However, significantly reduced access to firearms would be needed to have a significant impact, yes. Patient confidentiality is not absolute by the way. If I found out in a consultation that one of my patients was in a position where they may hurt others with a gun due to poor mental health, I'd be obliged to report it to the police. If they were only talking about suicide by firearm, I'm not sure where the law stands and would be seeking urgent advice (I'm not a psychiatrist or GP so this would be an exceptionally rare scenario for me). It would probably depend on whether they had dependents that could be harmed (I actually knew someone murdered in a firearm murder-suicide by their dad).
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skyth
OT Cowboy
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Post by skyth on Apr 19, 2024 6:32:29 GMT -5
And here we have the Nirvana fallacy...Where you have the idea that if it's not 100% effective, it shouldn't be done.
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Post by redchimera on Apr 19, 2024 6:49:51 GMT -5
Turns out that people who like guns find it easy to dismiss any concepts that paint guns in a bad light.
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herzlos
Ye Olde King of OT
Posts: 700
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Post by herzlos on Apr 19, 2024 6:53:26 GMT -5
Stuff that prevents suicidal people getting guns saves lives - waiting periods on purchases, restrictions on purchase/ownership for people having mental health crises, safe gun storage.
Waiting periods only matter if the person doesn't already have a gun.
Obviously, but it'd have an impact in that case?
Your point on safe storage is pretty valid, but you're ignoring that about 50% of gun owners self report that guns aren't stored safely, so are accessible to anyone who can access the house or truck or wherever it's abandoned.
Realistically, the only way to prevent suicide by gun is to remove all guns from the population, and that's not going to happen for another few generations. That doesn't mean you can't try and prevent some of them, given the US's huge tilt towards being pro-life lately.
I'd rather the problem was solved at root with the poverty and mental health crises, but you've probably got more chance of getting a total ban on guns.
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Post by bobtheinquisitor on Apr 19, 2024 11:50:33 GMT -5
Turns out that people who like guns find it easy to dismiss any concepts that paint guns in a bad light. These threads always tear me up a bit. I’m a gun owner who generally believes people should have the right to own guns for hunting, self defense* and even sport shooting. But in these threads, the arguments against “we should maybe do something to stop the mass shootings” always ring hollow and I end up feeling more convinced by the side of gun control. I’m positive there’s a middle ground where existing laws are better enforced, new measures are taken to train everyone on gun safety and reduce the access to guns for dangerous people, but I never see any iota of interest in finding that ground from the 2nd amendment absolutists. *I think guns have a place in self defense, but American culture and the Dunning-Krueger effect lead many people to vastly overestimate their usefulness (and underestimate their reaction time and capacity for error). For example the single best home defense item you can buy is still a dog.
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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 15:20:48 GMT -5
And here we have the Nirvana fallacy...Where you have the idea that if it's not 100% effective, it shouldn't be done. I am not rejecting ideas that are not quite perfect because only 100% is acceptable, I am rejecting poorly thought out ideas that would have minimal effect on the problem they are supposed to solve and have negative consequences that outweigh any benefits.
Unacceptable to you And to the majority of people in the US. Self defense is a right and that includes owning the appropriate tools for it. Any solution that de facto eliminates this right is not going to happen in the foreseeable future and probably never will.
The level of restrictions required to have a meaningful impact on suicide would be very close to a total ban. As I said, all of the restrictions on magazine size/concealed carry/etc are meaningless because none of those features are required for suicide. Even in the UK with all of its restrictions you can still get a single-shot shotgun that will be perfectly effective for committing suicide.
It is not but that's really making my point for me. We already have mandatory reporting laws allowing the most reasonable breaches of confidentiality that most people would support and it isn't enough for what you want. We would have to go far beyond that scope and expand the mandatory reporting events to cover anyone having a "crisis" (a vaguely defined term which will result in over-reporting for CYA reasons) and that information would have to be reported to some kind of publicly available source so that every gun seller could look up the buyer's information. Do you honestly think people are going to be willing to discuss their struggles honestly if it means getting fired from their job because their boss doesn't want to deal with a suicidal employee? We certainly have a strong example in aviation that policies like what you're asking for lead to people avoiding any treatment that doesn't come in a six pack no matter how desperately they need it.
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Post by easye on Apr 19, 2024 15:35:02 GMT -5
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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 15:36:35 GMT -5
Obviously, but it'd have an impact in that case? Which I acknowledged in the sentence following the one you quoted. But it's a pretty minimal impact. A suicidal person who already has guns is not delayed by a waiting period, and a suicidal who decides to buy their first gun for suicide may be deterred from the first attempt but unless they cancel the purchase instead of keeping it "just in case" the waiting period isn't going to be effective the next time they have suicidal feelings. The balance of harm done to people who have a sudden need for self defense tools vs. the harm prevented in suicide cases may favor first-time waiting periods but I wouldn't expect it to do much.
I agree, way too many gun owners are reckless with their gun storage and do things like keeping a "truck gun" accessible to any thief who happens to walk by. But we were talking about suicide prevention here, not theft prevention, and I doubt many suicidal people are going around breaking into houses and vehicles looking for a gun.
The US is not becoming pro-life at all, it's becoming (more) anti-woman. I'll grant that Catholics have a sincere pro-life doctrine that applies to more than just fetuses but the right-wing Christian "pro-life" movement is purely about controlling women and punishing sin. They barely care about the fetus and they don't care one bit about it once it is born. They don't want government funding for health care for babies, help with providing food, etc, that provide essential support for young children and give them a better shot at a successful life. The child is purely a punishment for a woman who dared to violate god's laws about keeping her husband's property pure before marriage. Conservatives will gleefully talk about homeless people, many of them homeless because they are struggling with mental illnesses, dying because they're "lazy" and "useless". If someone commits suicide more directly the only thing conservatives care about is that they did it privately instead of some poor abused conservative having to see a tent in the woods for a while first.
I never see any iota of interest in finding that ground from the 2nd amendment absolutists. And I never see any iota of interest in providing solutions that would actually work, not just Bloomberg's class warfare propaganda that would have a negligible impact at best.
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Post by redchimera on Apr 19, 2024 15:41:37 GMT -5
Observation: People are dying. Problem: Guns are very easy to acquire. Suggestion: Restrictions and/or requirements on gun ownership, to make guns less easy to acquire. Response: Guns will still be easy to get so don't bother. Repeat.
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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 15:42:06 GMT -5
17% is for homicide, not suicide. The number for suicides is only 6%, with the authors acknowledging that it is unclear what percentage of that 6% simply used a different method of suicide instead. If, for example, the waiting period causes a suicidal person to jump in front of a train instead of using a gun that's a pretty clear net loss for society.
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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 15:43:15 GMT -5
Observation: People are dying. Problem: Guns are very easy to acquire. Suggestion: Restrictions and/or requirements on gun ownership, to make guns less easy to acquire. Response: Guns will still be easy to get so don't bother. Repeat. I'm not sure why you think "this law will not be effective" is a bad argument. We should not pass wishful thinking laws just to feel good about Doing Something To Help.
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skyth
OT Cowboy
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Post by skyth on Apr 19, 2024 16:03:10 GMT -5
How many lives have to be saved for it to be 'significant'. I'd say even your 6% qualifies.
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Post by Peregrine on Apr 19, 2024 16:09:34 GMT -5
How many lives have to be saved for it to be 'significant'. I'd say even your 6% qualifies.
Less than 6%. Remember, some of that 6% just used a different means of suicide and TBH a suicide by gun is preferable to many of the alternative methods. And also remember that the prevented suicides are going to be offset to some degree by people who die because of the waiting period. For example, if someone has a bad breakup and their ex turns violent a waiting period before buying a gun gives their ex a guaranteed period where their victim will not be armed and able to fight back effectively.
But, like I said, I don't think first-time waiting periods are a major infringement and the balance of lives may favor them. I just don't think it's anywhere near the level of powerful solution it's often hyped up as.
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Post by A Town Called Malus on Apr 19, 2024 16:09:54 GMT -5
Here in the UK, limiting the amount of painkillers that can be bought in a single transaction resulted in a real, measurable drop in successful suicide attempts using painkillers overdoses.
This was a case where a suicidal person could just buy the same amount of pills as before by just going to multiple shops, or the same shop multiple times.
But people didn't do that. Even small, seemingly inconsequential hurdles can have a strong impact on reducing suicides.
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