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| motomynd | Rogers |
A bold experiment in biology and sociology
By motomynd
The new “open carry” Mississippi gun law (mentioned in the correspondence in “Fish for Friday” on June 28), which seems designed to actively encourage Mississippians to carry guns with them at all times, has the potential to be a most interesting scientific experiment. “Guns don’t kill people, people kill people” is a popular pro-gun talking point, so putting guns on as many hips as possible, where everyone can see them—and quickly reach them—seems a great way to find out if gun violence is indeed spurred by mindset, or by a proliferation of guns.
At this writing the law has not been enacted because some law enforcement officials, apparently fearing chaos and possible carnage, sued the state. However, Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant is quoted in the media as being “confident” that the law will eventually take effect, even if the matter has to go all the way to the state Supreme Court.
Assuming the law does pass, we will need to look no further than Mississippi—and Vermont—to find out if ready access to guns is the problem that promotes violence, or if mindset is the problem that promotes violence.
Why Vermont? Unbeknownst to most people, Vermont has had an open carry law in effect for years. In fact, Vermont allows concealed carry without a permit, and it is the only state that does not bar convicted felons from possessing guns. Yes, somewhat shockingly, a state best known for its maple syrup, and an amazingly high number of liberal arts colleges per capita, is arguably the most gun-friendly state in the nation.
So is Vermont filled with the type of carnage that law enforcement officials fear may ensue in Mississippi if that state’s “open carry” laws take effect? No. Actually, that is a resounding NO! According to FBI statistics, Vermont has the lowest per capita gun murder rate in the country, recording only 0.3 murders per 100,000 people.
So why the concern about carnage in Mississippi? Well…FBI statistics show that Mississippi has a gun murder rate of 4.0 per 100,000, which is approximately 13 times higher per capita than Vermont.
This is because so many more people own guns in Mississippi than in Vermont, right? No again. The gun ownership rate is moderately higher in Mississippi than in Vermont, 55% versus 42%, but that doesn’t explain the 13 times higher gun murder rate. Nor does it explain the five times higher overall murder rate, which is 5.6 per 100,000 in Mississippi and only 1.1 in Vermont.
Is the problem that so many more people are packed closely together in Mississippi than in Vermont? No, yet again. Population density is actually a bit higher in Vermont than in Mississippi.
So what does explain the difference in murder rates in general, and gun murder rates in particular? Much as some people may not want to admit it, the statistics do indeed seem to show that “guns don’t kill people” nearly as often as other weapons, and “people kill people” at different rates in different places mainly due to a difference in mindset.
A gun in the hand will kill two birds in the bush: Gun laws in Mississippi
By Ed Rogers
I think I was seven the first time I fired a weapon. It was a .410 shotgun, given to me as a birthday present by my father. Most kids in the South start earlier than that. From that day till this I have always owned a gun. Until a few years ago all the weapons I owned were rifles. Now I own four hand guns. A .22, a .25, a .357, a Super .38—plus that old .410. I don’t have them with me, as Costa Rica makes it very hard to own a gun.
The point being, people in Mississippi grow up with guns. They own them, they talk about them, they trade them, and they sell them.
Most people in Mississippi are law-abiding hard-working folks. But under that sweet outside there is a lot of hatred. I wish I could say it was just a few bad apples, but the truth is—it’s hard to find what the rest of the world would describe as a good apple.
I have found that most Mississippians will give you the shirt off their back, unless you cross them in some way. If they use the ‘N’ word and you say something about it being wrong, you will become an outcast. Not just by the person that said the word but everybody. They will not say anything to your face, but you’ll be able to tell that the air has changed. Because in Mississippi you are part of us or you are one of them.
It will not be the sane Mississippians who carry these guns, it’ll be the crazy ones that will have the guns on their hip. I quit hunting because the type of hunter changed. When someone spends thousands of dollars on guns, and on an SUV with a trailer to haul an ATV, then when that person goes to the woods, he/she is going to kill something, and he/she doesn’t give a damn what it is.
The same goes for a gun on the hip, the wearer is looking for a reason to use it. And the first person that upsets one of these crazies or the first person that pisses someone off...they will pull that gun and they will kill somebody. It will give a whole new meaning to road rage.
There is a trial going on in Florida right now that would never have happened without a dumb gun law that says you have the right to stand your ground and kill someone. This law is not being used as a defense but it shows how people view the ownership of a gun. These laws pass because of a mindset that is willing to let unstable people walk around with guns, just so they can prove to that black man in the white house, he’s not going to take their guns. These are the sane ones that support these laws...don’t you wonder what the others are like?
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Copyright © 2013 by motomynd & Ed Rogers
| Please comment |
Ed, I am shocked to read you did not receive your first gun until age seven. Your father was an amazingly cautious parent.
ReplyDeleteDo you know any details about the percentage of people in Costa Rica who own guns? And how CR's gun murder rate, and overall murder rate, compare to Mississippi and Vermont?
We lived on military bases,and believe it or not they don't encourage private ownership of firearms. If you did have one on base it had to be locked up in the armory and you had to sign it out in order to use it. We were living off base when I got the .410.
ReplyDeleteThere are three Costa Ricas, East coast Central and West coast. The east coast has killings all the time, some with guns, some with knifes. Mainly they're robbing tourist as is the case on the west coast. Outside of San Jose(very large) there is not much killing taking place in the Central Valley. Most of the crimes are petty and committed by Nicaraguans. For the most part Costa Ricans are very peaceful people.
I don't have any stats but if I did they won't be dependable as a lot of crime is not reported.
It is interesting what a difference even a small variation in location can make, not only in Costa Rica, but in the U.S. as well.
ReplyDeleteVirginia, which receives a Brady Campaign score of only 16 out of 100 due to its relatively lax gun laws, has a gun murder rate of 3.1 per 100,000 people, and an overall murder rate of 4.6 per 100,000. Meanwhile, the District of Columbia, which is next door to Virginia and has arguably the most restrictive gun laws in the country - even if the Brady Campaign doesn't give it an official score and only 3.6% of the populace own guns - has a gun murder rate of 16.5 and an overall murder rate of 21.8, both of which are basically five times higher than Virginia. On the other side of DC, Maryland has a gun murder rate of 5.1 and an overall murder rate of 7.3, despite receiving a Brady Campaign score of 45.
Paul, THANK YOU for sharing such statistics with us, both in your essay and in your comments. Your reliable expertise in statistical reasoning is much appreciated on a blog that values both art and scientific rigor.
DeleteMorris, why people so often prefer to invest in hyperbole and personal prejudice, rather than facts, has always intrigued me.
ReplyDeleteUsing cars as an example: There is always a group that says car "A" is faster, and another group that believes car "B" is faster. So when 'Car & Driver' or 'Consumer Reports' or some other entity tests the cars on a track, and the results clearly show that car "A" is faster, that should end the debate. But it never does. There is always a group of people, sometimes a surprisingly large group, that still believes car "B" is faster.
When those people waste their time arguing about cars and believing what they want to believe, no matter the mountain of facts disproving their belief, it is one thing. When there are enough of them to force a completely ineffective public policy based in similar prejudice - as has happened with the issue of gun violence - it is another matter entirely.
Some areas of this country have a low to moderate murder rate. Other areas have a murder rate that rivals a war zone. Those areas are often adjacent, as with Virginia, the District of Columbia, and Maryland. The facts show that gun laws have no impact on the violence, yet people on the street, and public officials, choose to waste countless hours and dollars going on and on about guns, instead of addressing the real issues. Those same people would be quick to mock two stereotypical "rednecks" sitting on bar stools arguing Ford versus Chevy, yet in their own way they are doing the same thing. Only in their case, people are being killed, not just bottles of beer.
Paul, so true. I see two projects here: (1) To understand WHY policy-makers avoid the real issues and (2) to figure out something possible to do to overcome it. Have you already an answer to the first, and perhaps some ideas about the second? I think I even do myself—to the first at any rate. There's more money in it for the policy-makers if they continue to play the avoidance game?
DeleteBy the way, I noticed that the email notification I just received of your comment above included the option, from the email, to click to go make a comment. This is a great improvement, because it makes it so much easier to comment on the blog! (That's the way I got here to make this comment—in less than half the time.
Morris, policy-makers have so many incentives to avoid the real issues, I hardly know where to start, but here are three points to ponder:
ReplyDelete1) The bureaucracy works the same as most businesses, so most people get ahead by getting along and going along, rather than making waves and taking initiative.
2) If a politician launches a program to curtail violence, and it fails, then that failure can be used against them in the next election. But if they basically do nothing except maintain a low profile, and cut a bunch of ribbons at business grand openings, how does and opponent use that against them?
3) No one dares address the race issue: Statistics show that as of 2010 blacks made up roughly 13 percent of the U.S. population, but they suffered - and perpetrated - more than 54% of the fatal firearm violence. If a politician or law enforcement official dared propose a program to address a "black" problem instead of a "gun" problem, how long before they would be forced out of their job?
How does our society overcome the situation? Well, as long as voters continue to reward politicians and bureaucrats for playing it safe and avoiding dealing with problems, instead of boldly addressing them, our society won't overcome it. It all comes back to one person one vote, but that one vote has to be an educated and informed vote.
It's sad, Paul, but it seems to me that you have just outlined the thesis that our overall problem(s) are simply insoluble—or at least are not going to be solved, for I can't imagine that American voters in sufficient number are ever going to start rewarding politicians and bureaucrats for boldly addressing problems. Anyway, in order to reward them for that, some of them are going to have to do that, which sort of sounds like a vicious circle, doesn't it?
DeleteMorris, actually I think voters do reward politicians and bureaucrats who act boldly. George W. Bush barely won a suspect election, then took office and led as if he had a mandate, and was able to ramrod any number of bad ideas right past the American public. Barack Obama, on the other hand, won in a veritable landslide, then spent the next two years acting as if he was awaiting a recount or a recall, and was barely able to get anything done, even with all the numbers heavily on his side.
DeleteThe outcome of both may have been twinned disasters for America, but the public did follow the one that acted boldly. Now if we could just elect a politician who would go boldly in a positive direction...
Paul, I'm not sure that's a sound deduction. I think you may have latched onto a coincidental correlation and are assuming it's a cause. The result, though, is a pretty cool-sounding argument, I grant you that.
DeleteMorris, think of the presidents of "our time" who led boldly, no matter the numbers, and had people follow, for better or worse. Kennedy, Reagan, Clinton and "W" Bush went boldly, often in defiance of the numbers and their own campaign promises, and people followed. Clinton went boldly while being impeached, and his popularity rating went up! Carter, "H" Bush, and Obama, did the opposite. That is a 50-year track record of "coincidence" that may have not have always worked out well for the public, but it worked great for those in power.
DeleteSh*t, Paul, you seem to have out-logicked me again! Didn't I say already that you were a master of statistical reasoning? Good on you to the highest degree. Now I'm going to bed.
DeleteSheer indifference is important, of course - and I suspect largely driven by a sense of powerlessness.
ReplyDeleteHowever, most of the people I know who vote for vermin do so with passionate conviction. The problem is, that they are passionately convinced of things I consider to be false, or debatable, or unimportant. We cancel each other out, leaving the field to the politicians with sufficiently flexible convictions.
It seems safe to assume that many of my own convictions are also based on insufficient information.
Round 2, more to the point.
DeleteRationality is extremely hard to do. We don't do it nearly as well as we think. The latest exhibit: Kahneman, "Thinking, Fast and Slow". He's a Princeton psychologist, Nobel in economics for research in decision making. His arguments are depressing, and relentlessly supported by research.
Chuck, oh my, Daniel Kahneman. Using his logic, you would be infinitely better off to break a leg on one of your ski ventures, than to tweak a knee. For the leg would heal as good as new, and the knee would always be suspect. How do you feel about that?
DeleteAs for how this all relates to the Mississippi gun law: I saw a bumper sticker on an old pickup a few years back that read "Guns Kill People Like Spoons Make Rosie O'Donnell Fat," and even though it is a simplistic take on a complex subject, I am inclined to believe it nicely sums the matter.
I'm not sure what logic of Kahneman's you're talking about. I haven't finished the book yet, but haven't yet seen anything that I could describe that way.
DeleteAs to how I feel about that: I wrecked a knee skiing about twenty years ago, and it's been suspect ever since. Ya, on the whole I'd have paid a much lower price for the break.
I ain't going to enter the lists on gun laws. My brother in law will keep his NRA life membership, and me my Kentucky longrifle, regardless. Come to think of it, a recent letter to the editor suggested the Constitution should be amended to read, as the founders clearly intended, "...the right of the people to keep and bear flintlock, muzzle loading arms shall not be infringed". I can relate to that.
I think there's something else that goes on on besides being torn between alternatives and being indifferent. Soon after my wife and I moved into the development we live in now, I started a private social network for homeowners (or renters). One of its features is forum discussions. A fair number of members use the forums to start a discussion or to comment on one started by someone else. I see lots of talk but much less action.
DeleteThat is, people will say things like "Wouldn't it be nice if..." or "Someone should...." But are they willing to do something about it? Usually not. For example, there was discussion about starting a community watch program for MONTHS. I thought we had a fellow willing to head this up—anyway, he seemed to be saying he would do it. But nothing was happening. So...I met with a couple of officers in the Mebane Police Department and at the next Homeowners Association meeting (a month or two later) I declared we had a community watch program and started signing up block captains. We have signs at the entrances and near the children's playground. We meet. We report police call-ins. Etc.
Someone had to DO it. Often there just isn't anyone.
It's like indifference...except that several people were at least willing to say that something would be nice, or someone should do something....Such expressions of some kind of interest at least provide a sense that there's some community sentiment for moving ahead. For each person who says "it would be nice" there are probably a few more who agree but, for whatever reason, don't say so.