LYING ABOUT GUNS

Anti-Gun Politics Abuses Statistics

Some Background About Statistics

If you work with statistics, you know that you can make them say almost anything, if you manage the data and choose the statistic carefully.  I even wrote a paper about lying with stats – mostly to point out things people did wrong in analyzing and presenting data in IT capacity planning and performance.  Bottom line: if you have an agenda, you can make the data say what you need it to say.

The Anti-Gun Lobby

This lobby basically believes that the Bill of Rights is a malleable document, not a statement of rights inherent to each individual in our country.  “Shall make no law” has no meaning to them, as they make excuses as to why the original meaning should be ignored.  God-given rights can be changed by any politician, as long as he/she can make a case.  It doesn’t even have to be a good case if you can scare people thinking that the inanimate object – the gun – is at fault.  These same people rarely want to come down on a shooter if it is a non-White person.

In fact, when you look at ALL the data, many more people have been saved by “good guys with guns” than you’ll ever hear about.  First, you have to understand that the FBI doesn’t include all shootings by criminals in its Active Shooter database.  They only include cases where someone is trying to kill people in a populated, public place.  If there are other criminal activities going on and someone is shot, that data isn’t included. 

John Lott, economist and founder of the Crime Prevention Research Center, has included all the data in his analysis.  The FBI says only 4.6% of active murderers were stopped by citizens carrying guns.  The number is at least 37.5%.  In places where lawful citizens can carry, the numbers are much higher, approximately 63.5% in 2022.  Given that, don’t you feel a bit better knowing that some people around you could be carrying?  It might be the difference between life and death for you and those you love.

Where does the data come from?  It’s actually voluntarily supplied by law enforcement agencies.  In the past, the FBI didn’t care how they submitted it, but now they have to use a kludgy platform, NIBRS, which results in less accurate reporting.  Of 18,000 agencies, only half filled in an entire year’s worth of data.  Not surprisingly, New York and Los Angeles, supplied NO data at all.

Conclusions are often drawn from a small percentage of all those who report and can easily be skewed to tell the story they want you to hear. 

Even those trying to do the right thing won’t always get usable data.  In some cases, an officer may interpret a crime scene differently.  They might have pressure to downgrade a crime, leaving it out of the data.  (Ex.  BLM riots where people were killed.  How many were prosecuted as “active shooter” situations?)

The FBI doesn’t provide data on lawful gun use.  We need a comparison of this information where guns are prohibited and where people can lawfully carry.  How many of us would pull out a weapon, except in self-defense, when they can be tried simply for having the gun on them?  The FBI also gathers data from newspapers and various researchers who may have biases.  The difference between what the FBI says and what Lott and others have found cannot be explained by chance.  It is calculated.

Last year, the CDC deleted some data on defensive gun uses from their website.  They really have no place in this discussion, but have taken on gun laws, as the number of people dying of bacterial infections (their original charter) has plummeted.  The last record on the site for the year was 2.5MM uses of guns to stop crime. 

Of course, the media relies on this suspect data to report in line with political objectives.  Most people might be shocked by the data revealed by John Lott.  Another thing that is too often missed is that most active shooter situations occur in “gun-free” zones.  Law-abiding citizens leave their guns at home when they know they are prohibited: criminals do not.  Shooting in movie theaters is more likely when the evil-doer knows he will be the only one armed.

The Purpose

I believe there are two reasons for this bias.  One is that the government wants to disarm us, as all totalitarian governments do, prior to revealing how much they want to control. Note: gun stores were closed during the China virus days.  If you believe you aren’t safer having the right to defend yourself, you will be more likely to go along with what is pitched as “sensible gun restrictions.”

The other purpose is to instill fear along with the idea that we can be protected by our government.  Look to your police and other officials to shoot bad guys.  Be afraid and you’ll be happier staying home when it suits the government.  It’s interesting that the people most opposed to lawful handgun ownership and use are those who have armed security protecting them, either because they have the wealth to pay for it, or because they are sticking it to the vulnerable taxpayer to provide protection.  Why does Joe Biden deserve/need armed protection more than the many single mothers living paycheck to paycheck in the ghetto? 

Freedom can disappear in a heartbeat.  Even if you will never carry a gun, and maybe even don’t like them, consider how much safer you are when others serve to protect you.  If they don’t have the right to carry, you are faced only with those who carry to rob or harm you.  Don’t fear an inanimate object.  Fear the government who won’t let people try to save your life.