Public health strategies

Via a Tweet from Firearms Lawyer we have this article from Business Insider.

From looking at the map it appeared that Idaho was in third place and I was wondering if there might a be a prize for that:

gun-ownership-study-state-map

Instead I find this:

Gun cultures may need to be considered for public health strategies that aim to change gun ownership in the USA.

I considered there was a remote chance that the authors would consider it a “public health strategy” to increase gun ownership. But I got a copy of the report and of course they took just the opposite view:

Therefore, we cannot infer whether exposure to social gun culture predisposes one to gun ownership or whether the latter increases likelihood of participation in the former. However, this is not particularly germane to the observations being drawn here, suggesting simply that prudent gun policies that aim to reduce gun ownership and gun-related injury might need to actively consider the prevailing social gun culture in the USA.

Emphasis added.

This report confirms something we already were pretty certain of. Gun ownership is more likely when you have friends and family that own guns. If you want to be able to keep exercising your specific enumerated right to keep and bear arms you should “come out of the closet” about being a gun owner and take friends and family to the range.

And don’t ever let anyone get away with telling you that no one wants to take your guns.

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25 thoughts on “Public health strategies

  1. “This report confirms something we already were pretty certain of.”

    I thought you were coming to a different conclusion. The report clearly confirms that we are in a culture war.

    Look at how those people think. That’s Progressivism in a nut shell. Nothing about principles, liberty, justice, human rights, freedom or the protection thereof. Instead it’s all about; “How can ‘We’ find ways to mold and shape society so as to conform to our wishes?”

    They see free people as a problem to be “solved” and culture is the focal point.

    This dovetails nicely with Tuesdays quote of the day.

  2. I can’t be the only one who doesn’t believe that only 14.4% of New Hampshire residents own guns.

    • The other 80% replied, “None of your effing business, and get off my land.”

      Seriously: Have _you_ ever tolded an anonymous pollster how many guns you have?

      • ADDED: Frankly, in my area, more than 14% of the homes had private shooting ranges. So I’m guessing firearms ownership was fairly high.

        Although probably not as high as the Tree Streets in Nashua.

      • Well the fact that Many New Hampshire residents take the “Live Free or Die” motto VERY seriously, you’re probably not far off.

        Still Maine lists VERY low, yet I know for a fact if my Father was directly asked “Are you a gun owner” he would probably answer “No”, despite having his childhood shotgun and rifle tucked away in the basement.

        Same goes for my Mother In Law, No, she really wasn’t a “Gun Owner”, except there was her father’s 12 gauge in a box in the attic.

        In certain parts of the country people who might have hunted back when it was easier to, or when they were younger, or inherited a relative’s gun that they really didn’t have much interest in might consider themselves non-gun owners….despite the fact that if they were in England and Australia back in the banning years, they might find themselves in prison….tho probably not because they might not even think about their gun, and not being registered…

        Kinda like the old Dave Chapelle joke: “I don’t do drugs…Just weed.”

        • If I got a phone call that the caller I.D. said was “Acme Polling” I doubt I’d even pick up the phone, and if I did answer it, I would say “Hell, no” if they asked if I had guns in the house.

    • I know two people who live in New Hampshire. One is an ex-actress from NYC who still travels to teach in NYC and other places in New England. I’ve known her since *forever* and I can vouch for her “non-gunnieness.”

      The other is a cousin, originally from Massachusetts, who is also a nurse. She’d never own a gun.

      These are both people who moved to NH for the “back to nature” feel of the place and also because it is cheaper than NYC and Boston.

      So, for the two posters from NH who say “I’m a gun owner,” here’s two who cancel you out.

      • Yes, we do have some people like that in NH, unfortunately. We have a term for them, too: “massholes”.
        Count me as one who doesn’t believe that NH number, either. Way lower than Mass with its regressive gun laws? Not a chance. Polls aren’t going to produce a number that has any connection to reality.
        For those who didn’t get Carl’s reference to “Tree streets” — Nashua, the second largest town in NH, has a number of streets named after trees, a neighborhood where you don’t want to go if you don’t have to.

      • So yes you offered counter-people.

        Of course the people who are armed never claimed gun ownership was 100%….and You don’t seem to be claiming 0%.

        You do seem to be REALLY good at not thinking.

        But thank you for your empty-headed opinions that are TOTALLY valid, and we respect your being as a VERY stupid, and egotistical person.

        Thank you so much!

  3. Having lived in WI, I believe 34.7 % is too low. I think the household rate was darn close to 100 %. I own a few, but my wife doesn’t own any – so we’re down to 50 %, I guess. I’m in NJ, and I think their number is low too.

    Love the “…might need to actively consider the prevailing social gun culture…” Ya think? How about the culture of liberty? The real problem with gun violence is the criminals, of course – but they don’t like to talk about that.

    • In context, to “actively consider” means to solve, which means to target for destruction, e.g. in 1930s Germany it was, “We must actively consider the persistent Jewish Problem”.

      • May be.
        But there’s one distinctive difference between the two populations subsets.

        One has lots of guns and the way the buying trend has been going for the past several years, it’s not to just reverse course and turn them all in on the say-so of some bunch of bureaucrats….or politicians.

  4. Having been a resident of both low & high percentage states, I feel the need to point out that this is the percentage of people who *admit* to owning a firearm. If some polling type came to me in Newy Ork and asked about my weapons, there’s no way I would have admitted to owning anything.

    • Good,
      Let them delude themselves (if they actually believe their polls, which, I suppose, is possible) and, one day, get the surprise of a lifetime.

      If they don’t believe their polling data, why are they publishing it?
      Propaganda value?
      Who are they trying to propagandize?

      • An excellent question. I can’t imagine what sort of things pass for thoughts in that segment of the population.

        I would also say that the polling out here in Utah would get a hefty percentage of misdirection. 31.9% seems *really* low.

  5. MA has more gun ownership than NE? Really? Think there might be something wrong with the database?

  6. I find myself wondering if anyone would tell a pollster that he/she owns guns when he/she does not. (We have ample anecdotal evidence of misleading pollsters in the opposite direction.)

    In other words, I wonder: is it safe to assume that ALL of the numbers given are either accurate, or too low?

  7. As others have pointed out about their states, no way my state is as low as shown…maybe. I keep forgetting that Cleveland, Columbus, Toledo and Cincinnati skew heavily Donkey…and it’s the rest of us that own the guns.

    So…after thinking about it some more…20% may be closer to correct than I’d like to believe.

  8. Pingback: The accuracy of polls. | VolkStudio Blog

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