As the thread has continued, the firearms have gotten bigger along with the egos.
The only reference I’ve ever heard a woman make was " look at the guns on that guy!"
I didn’t understand. She told me the reference was to his biceps.
Sigh, I’m a dead eye shot with both long and hand guns but choose not to own one nor allow firearms on my own premises nor on wildeness trips that I have lead. I am well informed on the basic statistics, all of which reinforce the stark reality that just owning a frearm, no matter who you are and where you live, makes you and your family members more than 20 times more likely to be killed or wounded by a firearm than someone with no guns in tgeir home or on their person. It has also been repeatedly documented that you are 20 times more likely to have a gun that is discharged in your home injure or kill you, a loved one or an innocent visitor than to ever use one in successful “self defense”.
The 2021 statistics to date on national suicide rates, by the way, are 16.1 per 100,000 for the USA, 15.3 for Japan and 12.5 for Australia. The figures someone posted earlier are probably from NationMaster which is just a data bulk consolidator which. makes no effort to keep their content current. Note that the Aussie rate has dropped from 22 since the 1996 reduction in firearms ownership enacted by public demand, a whopping 43% drop. Yes, the ratio of non-firearm suicides (and homicides) went up (of course) but removing the “easy” way to off oneself or a loved one or crime victim reduced all such deaths significantly.
I will add that I have lost several people I cared deeply about to firearms. And though I am a single woman, who has always lived in diverse urban areas, traveled widely for work, much of it in rather rough circumstances, and have been threatened with guns in situations from an armed robbery to a drunk ex-boyfriend, even by an angry asshole boss, I have NEVER wished in any instance that I was armed myself. As I said, I am an expert target shot (have even fired an AK47) and also one of those people who maintains extreme composure in emergencies, yet I would NOT trust myself to be able to safely extract myself or anyone else from a threat event by wielding a gun. I know it would only be more likely to draw fire to me or result in my injuring someone I had not intended to target.
I view firearms this way: keeping a live cobra loose in your house would probably deter home invaders (which is a vanishingly low incidence crime that continues to drop anyway.) But odds are far greater that it’s going to bite somebody you don’t want it to, yourself included.
I will add that most women FA victims are shot by their own partners or family members, not random strangers. The urgent “need” to own and carry firearms is, in most cases, primarily emotional and irrational. And mainly a male impulse justified by delusional rationlizations about “protection.”. Love your wife and kids? Get the guns out of your house. Statistics don’t lie. Owning and carrying a gun makes you a more likely victim.
You can call me all the names you want (though, like most intelligent people I don’t consider “liberal” any sort of insult) but you’ll never convert me to your misguided fantasies about the “benefits” of a heavily armed population. For all your minority cohort’s crowing about “freedoms and rights” it’s difficult for those of us who are well aware of the dangers of massive high velocity weapons proliferation to feel relaxed and free knowing we are surrounded wherever we go by fools who think they are entitled to pull a gun out of a pocket no matter what circumstance presents itself. I view anyone who chooses to OC or CC with a mix of pity for their fragility and contempt for their sense of entitlement.
Not going to engage in any debate here. I have stated my position and won’t post again on this thread (which I dearly hope exhausts itself soon.).
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As this thread has degenerated into personal attacks and name calling, it’s being closed.
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