Mathematically if there were no guns there would be no gun deaths, there would still be deaths but they would be harder to be done.
Sure, but “if there were no guns” is as meaningless a postulate as “if everyone was a millionaire.” There is no path by which the USA can get itself under a gun saturation limit by which guns would be scarce, so it’s literally not worth discussing. Purely because we have so many guns here. A dive into that:
Yes we have to contend with all the guns out there and it is not realistic to confiscate all of them. But availability of guns makes a huge difference in deaths by guns. (Note that availability doesn’t just mean how we are able to buy but also the safety practiced in storing them) Particularly in suicides as having a gun and a severe depression moment makes it so much easier to commit suicide than not having a gun (read Talking to Strangers)
I completely agree, and have written about that twice.
The trick with gun suicide is to educate the gun owning public to entrust their guns to a buddy if they’re having a hard time, and to make sure that government doesn’t prevent them from doing so. The trick cannot be to reduce the total number of guns down to a scarcity limit, because that’s unattainable. I would hold that opinion whether I was pro gun or anti gun, because of the mathematics.
