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From: andy@SAIL.Stanford.EDU (Andy Freeman)
Subject: Re: guns in backcountry? no thanks
Message-ID: <1993Apr16.211654.16926@CSD-NewsHost.Stanford.EDU>
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Organization: Computer Science Department,  Stanford University.
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Date: Fri, 16 Apr 1993 21:16:54 GMT
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In article <1qkcok$s9i@usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu> ci946@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (John K. Gever) writes:
>Public health experts will tell you that you are far more likely
>have your gun stolen, use it yourself on a family member or
>have it used on you than you are to use it on an actual criminal.

Actually, they won't.  What they'll tell you is that if you add up the
number of suicides, murders of one drug dealer by another, legit
self-defenses of a battered spouse, and so on, you'll end up with a
number that is much larger than the number of self-defense killings
against strangers committed in the bedroom.  (BTW - they didn't
honestly count the latter either, but let's not quibble.)  They
try to claim that comparison is between the costs of self-defense
and the benefits, but they're wrong.

This comparison doesn't measure the costs of self-defense and it
doesn't measure the benefits either.  For example, the goal is not to
kill the attacker, whatever your relationship to him, but to stop him.
While the number of killings may be proportional to the number of
stops, it isn't equal.

Anyone who confuses that comparison with an honest evaluation
is either lying or....

-andy
--
