wrote in message
...
On Jul 27, 10:36 pm, "Ed Huntress" wrote:




...you see some patterns, but they have only an uneven correspondence to
levels of gun control or gun ownership. I've seen correlation coefficients
that indicate a high rate of gun crime to rates of gun ownership and/or
lax
gun control, and I don't doubt the statistic. But I don't think it tells
us
very much in itself. Population density and a variety of demographics show
strong CCs as well, but they aren't uniform, either.


I also doubt that the correlation between high rates of violent crime
and gun ownership mean anything. Looking at the internet site you
posted, Louisiana has a high rate of violent crime, but it used to be
a state that did not issue permits to carry concealed. You could
carry a gun, but not concealed. And if you look at the requirements
to get a CCW in Louisiana, you will see it is not just a request and
get a license. Not with a 120 day processing time.

Hmm. Now that you've analyzed Louisiana, how about the other 49 states? g

That's fine cherry-picking, Dan. Now you can roll that one around until
you've completely obscured the general character of the issue and the
trends.

Of all the people I knew who owned guns, and that was almost every adult
and
most of the kids in western MD and northeast PA, I only remember two who
actually shot handguns. We just weren't interested. They had nothing to do
with our central interest, which was hunting, or our secondary interest,
which was target shooting. Shooting targets meant shooting skeet or making
holes in paper bullseyes at 100 - 500 yards. Handguns were useless crap,
unless you liked to collect rattlesnake skins while trout fishing, as one
of
my fishing buddies in PA did. He had a .22 revolver. The few handguns that
were around were mostly WWII trophies, in the hands of the adults who
served
there. And they stayed in the gun case almost all of their lives.


Not quite the same when I was growing up. There was an interest in
handguns, and there were people that competed in target shooting of
handguns.. But shotguns and .22 rifles were pretty much what people
had. I did not know anyone with a centerfire rifle. There was no use
for them as there was very few deer or other large game. And I did
not know of a range where one could shoot a centerfire rifle.

Well, I have no idea where you grew up. I identified where *I* grew up, and
both states were big deer-hunting states. There were centerfire rifles
aplenty.

We get into a discussion about guns here on this NG, and watch what
happens; it's all quick-draw and stopping power (in a human being, rather
than a deer or bear) before the first spit hits the ground.


I do not remember any RCM discussions on quick-draw and stopping power
of handguns. Might be because I just am not that interested in the
topic. But it certainly is not a topic that comes up a lot.

Jeez. There's an example right in THIS THREAD. Take a look at the
discussions of .380 ACP and 9mm, and holsters...holy cow. Most importantly,
notice how the thread steered that way.

It's one thing to calibrate a possible threat, as Don did in starting this
track of discussion, and make a judgment that the inconvenience of
carrying
is worth the extremely remote possibility that you might be glad that you
did, in a situation in which there are some mitigating circumstances that
make it worth more than ordinary consideration. It's another thing
altogether to build a culture around the minutiae of carrying concealed
guns
in society and to obsess about the remotest of statistical likelihoods,
and
to cook up fantastic scenarios that read like something from a cheap novel
but which have almost no referents in the real world.


The other side also cooks up a lot of fantastic scenarios too. A bad
guy on each side of a car for instance. A bad guy that finds you on
the ground after a heart attack and searches your body. The real
world is that you are not likely to ever need a concealed weapon. And
if you do, the bad guy probably has not done a lot of target
practice.

Well, there's a good argument about taking the fantasies out of the
discussion. I agree entirely.

When you boil it down to essentials, Ranger has the numbers. You won't be
able to build much of a logical argument against it. But you have every
right to self-defense, IMO, and to the means to defend yourself. In other
words, carry if you must, but if you make a big deal out of it, you're
probably in need of emotional help. One hopes that you don't lose your
cool
at the wrong time. Or that the fantasies carry you away and you wind up
giving everyone the creeps. And the way much of our gun culture has
morphed
into some kind of a soldier-of-fortune fantasy, it can be very creepy
indeed.

I do not remember Rangerssucks ever using any numbers or actual facts
in this discussion.

?? In terms of death rates, they favor his side of the issue. Please don't
try to tell us you don't agree.

His arguments seemed to be pretty much that one should not carry a
concealed weapon because you may be better off without a gun.

Hmm. You just may be. You could try looking at the numbers. d8-)

--
Ed Huntress