13 Dead in Shooting in Thousand Oaks California

[EricHiggin]

sundin13 said:

EricHiggin said:

First link was about Philly.

So if I got shot once and was injured but no too badly, but was also stabbed once and was injured considerably worse, that alone would be enough proof to turn a blind eye to everything you put forward, or would "whatabout" my links and claims come into effect? Why? Since they have more evidence than just what would've happened to me? Maybe that's why I posed those questions.

How many people in comparison to gun victims is that 1% though? My point about the vehicles is this. If guns should be heavily restricted or banned, so should vehicles. Lot's of bad, careless drivers around but nobody seems to care about that because they say, you can't just change the transportation system, it'll cause chaos. Well what about when you try to restrict gun ownership, or flat out try to take them all away? Won't that surely cause chaos? The answer to that seems to be 'who cares, we'll just change the second amendment, big deal, it'll be for the greater good.' Well so would banning vehicles based on that logic. It would decrease CO2 emissions, it would decrease healthcare spending do to less people in accidents or allow that to be put towards others who require medical attention, etc. There's a lot of things that could be done to fix a lot of problems in terms of deaths and injuries, but the left seems to like to go with the ones that least impact them first.

Okay, first of all "specific medical locations" means "cities"?! Okay, I clearly misunderstood you there. I thought you were talking about wound locations. That said, thats how studies work, friend. It would be almost fundamentally impossible to do a study covering all stab/gunshot wounds across the country without a system which reports these things independently which I don't believe exists.

As for your anecdote, I don't know why you brought it up. It is an anecdote. Like, a study across five years with thousands of cases is going to be a little more statistically valuable than one experience. To produce a usable statistic, you need wider data. While looking specifically at Philly isn't representative for the whole country, there are several studies presented from several different locations which all demonstrate the same trends, and there isn't really any reason presented within the study design to assume that these would have a high degree of regional variability. Extent of damage is the primarily variable driving the difference between the different types of wounds, as a stab vs gunshot wound would still typically be handled by the same individuals.

The "what about cars" argument is also just so played out and kind of ridiculous. Like, not only are the two things tremendously different, but vehicles are highly regulated, and safety is one of the primary things driving that market forward. Tremendous leaps have been made over the past few decades. And now we have a push for driverless vehicles which is getting tons of money and R&D pumped into it which would fundamentally change the market in what seems like the exact way you are requesting.

Would removing guns cause chaos? I mean, first of all, that isn't a position I support, but second, no. I really don't think so. The economy would not come to a screeching halt if guns suddenly disappeared. The worst outcome would likely be the gun nuts who decide to start shit. There is a widely different cost benefit analysis here. Cars run our country. Guns kill people.

This whole "whataboutist" argument is such a massive non-sequitur, that seems to fundamentally ignore reality as a way of avoiding the actual issues. It is saying "I don't have an argument to defend my stances (or "I don't feel like defending my stances") so I'll just distract you with some other nonsense for a while". I'm not going to get into that any more than this because it is fundamentally a distraction tactic.

EDIT: As I say this, I found a national study:

"There were unadjusted differences in prehospital mortality (GSW: early, 2.0% vs. late, 4.9%; SW: early, 0.2% vs. late, 1.1%) and in-hospital mortality (GSW: early, 13.8% vs. late, 9.5%; SW: early, 1.8% vs. late, 1.0%) by both mechanisms."

To translate:

Gunshot wound Prehospital mortality: 2.0 and 4.9
Stab wound Prehospital mortality: 0.2 and 1.1

Gunshot wound In Hospital mortality: 13.8 and 9.5
Stab wound In Hospital mortality: 1.8 and 1.0

So, you are about 5-10x more likely to die of a gunshot before you make it to the hospital and about 7-9x more likely to die of a gunshot after you make it into a hospital. The two data points are two different periods (I believe 2007-2010 and 2011-2014 respectively).

https://journals.lww.com/jtrauma/Citation/2018/07000/Nationwide_trends_in_mortality_following.25.aspx

Right off the bat you mention the problem. Not enough study and not enough data, and not enough collection and analysis of all that. Without that, we can take cases from certain places and certain time periods, but's that's far from hard evidence. You could't use GSW stats from Europe around the early 1940's because that wouldn't be an honest representation.

Guns are also highly regulated now, compared to when they first were produced. What, when, and who are we comparing them to exactly, and is that the correct comparison to use? We've made huge leaps in vehicle safety, like seat belts and speed limiters, yet some people still disregard them, and so we have cops to enforce it, yet people still die everyday. No mention of banning vehicles though.

The economy is practically based on those guns and the industry they come from. Just look at the defense budget. What do you think that money goes towards? What about it's direct and indirect effects on the rest of the economy? You think even a small civil war would be a lower cost than banning vehicles?

The returned "whatabout" is due to a lack of thought into the argument brought forward. Arguing something you haven't thought about enough is a case for disaster, like banning guns cold turkey would be.

How much more likely are you to be stabbed when guns are no longer legal? Carrying a knife isn't a big deal compared to a gun, and way more people are likely to carry a knife. If GSW decreased heavily due to banning them, but SW doubled or tripled because of it, would that be better or worse?