Why do you think so many country's with strict gun laws have higher suicide rates than the USA?
Again, Japan as a example has virtually no private ownership of firearms, yet their suicide rate is almost double that of the USA. France's suicide rate is about 50% higher than the US with strict gun control. Do you think tens of millions of people should lose their rights because some people choose to end their own life?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv...iciderate.html
Originally Posted by goodolboy
You’re conflating suicide
deaths and suicide
attempts. The two are related but caused by different factors. People
attempt suicide basically because they are experiencing acute depression and a sense of hopelessness. There are a myriad of factors (social, economic, mental health, cultural, etc.) that would cause someone to
attempt suicide. Suicide
deaths are a result of how many people
attempt suicide and what method they use. As I explained in my previous post, not all suicide
attempts result in death.
So let’s apply this to your example of Japan. (btw: The data in your link is a bit outdated. It’s from 2005. The numbers have changed since then. Japan’s rate has decreased to 17.5 and the US has increased to 13.5.) A study done in 2016 estimates that there are 530,000 suicide
attempts annually in Japan. That resulted in about 22,000 deaths. That means a little over
4% of attempts resulted in death. Again, as I stated in my previous post, 90% of attempts with a gun result in death.
https://mainichi.jp/english/articles...0m/0na/003000c
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/20.../#.WfguqXZrxfE
So what do you think would happen if guns were available in Japan and used to attempt suicide at the same rate as here in the US? Guns are used in about 6% of attempts in the US (and account for
half of the total deaths from suicide). If you do the math, it would result in
an additional 28,000 deaths. If you apply this to France, you will see a similar result.
https://www.thetrace.org/2016/09/10-...vention-month/
So my point is that guns may not have an effect on the number of suicide
attempts but it certainly has an effect on suicide deaths.
One last point. No one is talking about taking away people’s rights. Certainly not me. I’m just saying that we should have some common sense gun laws to try and reduce the number of deaths.