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Let's Call Gun Violence What It Is: A Public Health Disaster
thetyee.ca ^ | 10-7-15 | Crawford Kilian

Posted on 10/11/2015 5:23:59 PM PDT by smokingfrog

If a disease killed 30,000 a year in one country, you'd expect a travel warning. Not in America.

** snip **

The recent shootings in Roseburg, Oregon, were, in President Obama's words, "routine" -- just another disturbed young man taking his troubles out on his English teacher and classmates. (Having taught English in a community college for 40 years, I took this event more personally than most.) Obama expressed his frustration at the impossibility of controlling hundreds of millions of firearms, and the commentariat wrung its collective hands about it.

Others, including the ineffable Donald Trump, have blamed Roseburg on the lack of guns. If only the teacher and his students had been packing, he argued, they would have made short work of the shooter. Knowing what I do about teachers and soldiers, I doubt that arming them would have done anything but raise the body count through friendly fire.

Public-health experts have added up the "butcher's bill" of gun violence, but the message has not yet sunk in. If anything, the Americans seem increasingly deaf to it.

Ebola took almost two years to kill as many West Africans as gunshots have killed Americans so far this year. Since 2012, when it was first identified, MERS has killed just 568 people. Gunshots kill that many Americans every 19 days.

Admittedly, we have bigger public health problems than American gunshot deaths. According to Worldometers, by early October about 750,000 people worldwide had died of malaria this year, 1.2 million of HIV/AIDS, and 3.8 million from smoking.

(Excerpt) Read more at thetyee.ca ...


TOPICS: Chit/Chat; Society
KEYWORDS: banglist; canada; guncontrol
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The stupid is strong with this Canadian novelist ..
1 posted on 10/11/2015 5:23:59 PM PDT by smokingfrog
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To: smokingfrog

AIDS kills 10,000+ per year.

Where is the similar response from leftists?


2 posted on 10/11/2015 5:27:03 PM PDT by Red in Blue PA (war is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength, obama loves America)
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To: smokingfrog
Others, including the ineffable Donald Trump, have blamed Roseburg on the lack of guns. If only the teacher and his students had been packing, he argued, they would have made short work of the shooter. Knowing what I do about teachers and soldiers, I doubt that arming them would have done anything but raise the body count through friendly fire.

If guns can't solve the problem, then why does the IRS [OK, really us taxpeasants] employ armed guards in their Taxpayer NonAssistance Centers?

3 posted on 10/11/2015 5:27:34 PM PDT by kiryandil (Maya: "Liberalism Is What Smart Looks Like to Stupid People")
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To: smokingfrog
Well, he is Canadian, after all.
4 posted on 10/11/2015 5:27:43 PM PDT by arthurus (It's true.)
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To: smokingfrog
I fixed one of the paragraphs for him:

The country is the U.S., and the disease is mental illness. In 2013, 33,636 died that way, bringing the total since 2001 to 406,496 -- the figure includes mentally ill people involved in homicides, accidents and suicides.

5 posted on 10/11/2015 5:30:44 PM PDT by Portcall24
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To: smokingfrog

Are his numbers correct. If so three times that amount are killed by doctors through prescription mistakes. Should we execute doctors or Pharmacists? Democrats in their soft headed or soft headiness forced the release of most in mental hospitals so they must accept part blame for the murders. Look how many millions will not get the first breath because of abortion. We have a small amount of writers that think they are journalists spreading minority views thought the media.


6 posted on 10/11/2015 5:31:12 PM PDT by mountainlion (Live well for those that did not make it back.)
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To: Red in Blue PA

How many babies in the US are murdered by abortion each year?


7 posted on 10/11/2015 5:31:33 PM PDT by Arm_Bears (Biology is biology. Everything else is imagination.)
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To: smokingfrog

more’die in car accdents.

far, far, far more die in abortions.


8 posted on 10/11/2015 5:31:52 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: Red in Blue PA

plus they force us to subsidize incredibly expensive drugs for each one to keep doing their perverse sex life choices - ie screwing everything that moves - that got them aids in the first place.


9 posted on 10/11/2015 5:33:23 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: smokingfrog

Don’t forget buckets, swimming pools, garage doors,
and plastic bags too...


10 posted on 10/11/2015 5:34:22 PM PDT by tet68 ( " We would not die in that man's company, that fears his fellowship to die with us...." Henry V.)
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To: smokingfrog

Guns are not violent. People are. How about we ban people?


11 posted on 10/11/2015 5:34:52 PM PDT by dforest
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To: Red in Blue PA

if they treated guns like voting, aids or abortion, the libs would be demanding no waiting periods, no fed tracking, no showing licenses or papers, and demanding the government subsidize gun buyers for each firearm they purchase, because it’s in the constitution.


12 posted on 10/11/2015 5:36:05 PM PDT by Secret Agent Man (Gone Galt; Not averse to Going Bronson.)
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To: smokingfrog

If the teachers at Sandy Hook could have a do-over, I’m betting they prefer to have faced Adam Lanza with a gun of their own.


13 posted on 10/11/2015 5:36:18 PM PDT by umgud (v)
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To: smokingfrog

I note that he bravely accepts no comments on his treatise.


14 posted on 10/11/2015 5:37:02 PM PDT by D_Idaho ("For we wrestle not against flesh and blood...")
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To: smokingfrog

And car accidents, which such carnage dwarfs violence committed with a gun? Also a Public Health Disaster?


15 posted on 10/11/2015 5:38:46 PM PDT by Lazamataz (Ok. We won't call them 'Anchor Babies'. From now on, we shall call them 'Fetal Grappling Hooks'.)
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To: smokingfrog

As long as the Nazi and Commie liberals continue to blame inanimate objects, the killings will continue. To all you commie libs trying to disarm Americans, KMA!!!! If you want “gun control”, move to North Korea! Morons!


16 posted on 10/11/2015 5:39:19 PM PDT by FlingWingFlyer (Normal people don't vote Democrat.)
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To: D_Idaho

There are quite a few comments. One or two good ones.


17 posted on 10/11/2015 5:39:20 PM PDT by smokingfrog ( sleep with one eye open (<o> ---)
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To: smokingfrog
Semmelweiss broke down, was committed to an asylum, and within two weeks was dead after being beaten by his guards.

A similar fate awaits any American politician who even whispers about gun control.

Hope so.

The author does admit that 2/3rds of US gun deaths are suicides.

18 posted on 10/11/2015 5:39:44 PM PDT by MUDDOG
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To: smokingfrog

The answer is still NO, you can’t have them.


19 posted on 10/11/2015 5:40:22 PM PDT by skeeter
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To: smokingfrog

>>If a disease killed 30,000 a year in one country, you’d expect a travel warning.

You mean, like cigarettes or abortion?


20 posted on 10/11/2015 5:41:07 PM PDT by Bryanw92 (Sic semper tyrannis)
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