https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/pressroom/sosmap/firearm_mortality/firearm.htm
Here we are again. The highest numbers in 25 years. Children are victims and witnesses and it is completely preventable. Let me specify some of the key points to create a safe and healthy environment - that means a gun-free environment.
Gun owners - even the legally owning, responsible, trained ones - are far more likely to be killed by their own weapon by family members and intruders.
LGBTQ+ teenagers are killed in suicide by firearm incidents than any other factor (car accidents, etc). Access to firearms in the home make committing suicide exponentially easier.
Victims of domestic violence, who are predominantly women, die by firearm more than any other method of homicide (and suicide).
* The last two are associated with mental illness and while the notion of making mental health more accessible might help - it is the access to firearms in the home that cause the deaths.
The following will be more in-depth but it is important to repeat this point. Legalization of private ownership of firearms did not originate with the United States Constitution. In fact, it took 200 years for the passion for gun ownership and an American's "Right" to gun ownership to take hold - thanks in large part to the National Rifle Association (NRA). No small point in that advocacy is that more private gun ownership led to higher membership in the NRA and more money to organizers of the NRA.
Let me repeat the words of the 2nd amendment of the United States Constitution:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
A well - regulated militia being necessary - NOT private ownership. NRA advocacy and lobbying has led the Congress and the SCOTUS to interpret the 2nd amendment that way it is twisted on the NRA site:
“The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.”
NOWHERE in the 2nd amendment does it say private ownership. They directly contradict the words of the Constitution by adding "unconnected with service in a militia". Private gun ownership in NO WAY decreases violence, victimization or firearms deaths - in fact, they increase the likelihood of all three.
In 2020, for the first time in our recorded history, firearm deaths became the NUMBER cause of young children's death.
It would seem like it would be an impossible feat to decrease firearm deaths in the United States because it is multifaceted and multi-leveled. However, it requires an effort matched in its number of facets and levels. Providing resources and opportunities in urban, poverty-stricken neighborhoods, providing mental health services, de-fetishizing handguns and violence in our country and regulating access to firearms and types of firearms would make a great deal of impact.
Unfortunately, until individuals choose to stop picking up a firearm and using them, there is little hope.
Here we are again. The highest numbers in 25 years. Children are victims and witnesses and it is completely preventable. Let me specify some of the key points to create a safe and healthy environment - that means a gun-free environment.
Gun owners - even the legally owning, responsible, trained ones - are far more likely to be killed by their own weapon by family members and intruders.
LGBTQ+ teenagers are killed in suicide by firearm incidents than any other factor (car accidents, etc). Access to firearms in the home make committing suicide exponentially easier.
Victims of domestic violence, who are predominantly women, die by firearm more than any other method of homicide (and suicide).
* The last two are associated with mental illness and while the notion of making mental health more accessible might help - it is the access to firearms in the home that cause the deaths.
The following will be more in-depth but it is important to repeat this point. Legalization of private ownership of firearms did not originate with the United States Constitution. In fact, it took 200 years for the passion for gun ownership and an American's "Right" to gun ownership to take hold - thanks in large part to the National Rifle Association (NRA). No small point in that advocacy is that more private gun ownership led to higher membership in the NRA and more money to organizers of the NRA.
Let me repeat the words of the 2nd amendment of the United States Constitution:
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
A well - regulated militia being necessary - NOT private ownership. NRA advocacy and lobbying has led the Congress and the SCOTUS to interpret the 2nd amendment that way it is twisted on the NRA site:
“The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as self-defense within the home.”
NOWHERE in the 2nd amendment does it say private ownership. They directly contradict the words of the Constitution by adding "unconnected with service in a militia". Private gun ownership in NO WAY decreases violence, victimization or firearms deaths - in fact, they increase the likelihood of all three.
In 2020, for the first time in our recorded history, firearm deaths became the NUMBER cause of young children's death.
It would seem like it would be an impossible feat to decrease firearm deaths in the United States because it is multifaceted and multi-leveled. However, it requires an effort matched in its number of facets and levels. Providing resources and opportunities in urban, poverty-stricken neighborhoods, providing mental health services, de-fetishizing handguns and violence in our country and regulating access to firearms and types of firearms would make a great deal of impact.
Unfortunately, until individuals choose to stop picking up a firearm and using them, there is little hope.