Guns and Violence and Youth

A report showing from government data what violence among young people in this country, gang activity (drugs and racketeering), gang-related murders, and their relationships to rates handgun ownership.

1. the term "children" is used in the media when the data really show "(older) adolescents" and "(young) adults"
2. violence, murders with guns trend downwards where gun ownership tends upward
3. violence and murder are strongly related to gangs, which tend to be more violent, commit murder more readily, and tend more to commit their crimes using firearms

So, once again, as always, the message in the media and from the politicians who say guns are the problem seems to differ markedly from the truth and from logic, since it seems that:

1. Guns make people and communities safer
2. Violence is overwhelmingly gang-related
3. Gangs are motivated by the profits from illegal drugs
4. Drug prohibition = dealers have to fight for access to turf, to markets, since they cannot compete with one another in a legal, open market
5. Drug prohibition places this highly-profitable business in the hands of criminals, who are violent, instead of skilled business people, who have at least some feeling for customer relations, sales & marketing, and community responsibility
6. The same goes for prostitution, gambling and other so-called "vice crimes"
7. The enactment of "vice laws" leads directly to gang-related criminal violence (anybody ever hear about alcohol prohibition in the 1920s?)
8. If you want to cut violence in our communities, get rid of drug prohibition (and other so-called "vice laws" that impinge on Americans' freedom to do or not do "bad things")
9. Guns in the hands of citizens is part of the solution, and probably also a scapegoat

If you want to solve the problem, look at the data, and think about how things really work (guns, self-defense, gangs, crime, drugs, profit, violence, etc.).  It seems that the problems all stem from making drugs and other things that people want illegal, just like in the 1920s.  We tried it then, it didn't work, and Big Surpise! it's not working now, either.

If you want to solve the problem, push your elected officials to repeal prohibition laws.

If you don't want to solve the problem, the only other action you can take is between your legs.

(...I meant burying your head in the sand -- what did you think I meant...?)