Child firearm deaths and other gun issues
A second response to an opinion essay
This is part 2 of my attempt to add clarity and nuance to the essay in our college student newspaper, The Ithacan, Commentary: Trump exacerbates gun violence in the U.S. (2/8/2024), written by a faculty member. Part 1 (2/13/2024) dealt with Guns and female homicides.
The main point is that even a near-complete removal of firearms in the United States will not cut firearm-related deaths as much as we might expect. Politically, I don't see all weapons becoming prohibited, and other gun control measures will have a much smaller impact. This is not to say that there are no legitimate gun control measures to be considered; nevertheless, do not expect a significant decrease in mortality. My second key point is that culture has a larger role in killings and suicides than we care to recognize, and cultural changes may be more effective in reducing mortality.
The data is from either the CDC WISQARS database or from OECD data. In the case of CDC data, I'll use five-year averages from 2016 to 2020, with 2020 being the most recent year. I'll now discuss particular quotes from the Ithacan editorial.
Guns as a cause of childhood deaths
Firearms continue to be the leading cause of death among children in the U.S.
I checked this, as I usually do. Using WISQARS data, the annual average for gun deaths from 2016 to 2020 is 3,433.2. This covers unintentional injury deaths, homicides, and suicides among people aged 1 to 19. There have been 3,531 deaths from unintentional injuries caused by motor vehicles. Last time I checked, 3,531 was larger than 3,433.2. I followed the link, and it appears the quote is from this in the paper:
Injuries and deaths from firearms impact many children and teens, their families, and their communities in the United States. Taking into account all types of firearm injuries, including homicides, suicides, and unintentional injuries, firearm injuries were the leading cause of death among children and teens ages 1-19 in 2020 and 2021.
I'm confident this is correct; however, I can't verify it with WISQARS because it doesn't have 2021 data, but it is true for 2020. from Pew (10/27/2021) explains some of the disparity: “The U.S. murder rate rose 30% between 2019 and 2020—the largest single-year increase in more than a century, according to data published this month by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).”
One of the reasons I'm using five-year averages from 2016 to 2020 is that COVID had a significant impact on society and fatalities. Making a statement regarding 2020–2021 without putting the data into historical context is misleading. Still, weapons are roughly equal to motor vehicles as a cause of death for people aged 1 to 19. We need to better understand child deaths. Let's go to the data.
Figure 1 shows the major causes of mortality for people aged 1 to 19, according to CDC categories. Unintentional injury deaths, or accidents, are nearly 2.4 times the number of suicides. To establish the claim that firearms kill more children than anything else, you must go down into each category to pinpoint the actual causes. Accidental deaths occur in a variety of ways; therefore, no single cause, other than motor vehicles, may dominate.
Let's now go down into the top three categories to have a deeper look at the causes, separating each one by race and ethnicity. Figure 2 depicts the causes of unintentional injury deaths by race and ethnicity.
To help make comparisons, remember my first piece on US demographics. Whites make up half of the population aged 1 to 19, followed by Hispanics (25%), Blacks (14%), and Asians (5%). For comparison, multiply the Hispanic number by two. If it exceeds the White number, Hispanics are overrepresented. If it is smaller, they are underrepresented. For motor vehicle traffic deaths, 814 x 2 = 1628, which is fewer than 1,897. White children die from motor vehicle traffic accidents at a higher rate than Hispanics. Similarly, we can use 3.6 to compare Black and White deaths. For example, 667 x 3.6 = 2401.2, indicating that Black children die in motor vehicle accidents at a far higher rate than White children.
The focus here is on firearms, and while Hispanics die at a lesser rate than whites, Blacks die at a significantly higher rate, as 48 x 3.6 = 172.8, which is more than three times the White accidental death rate from firearms. There are vast differences in cultures. One important item to note is that unintentional firearm deaths account for only 122 deaths, which is a small category within unintentional injury deaths.
Figure 3 is identical to Figure 2 but depicts suicides. Firearms are responsible for 43.5% of suicides, whereas suffocation accounts for 42.9%. It appears that bags are equally lethal as weaponry. The intriguing issue, which leads to one of my key conclusions, is: if firearms did not exist, how many firearm suicides would become suffocation suicides? I believe it is naïve to assume that all, or even most, firearm suicides will cease.
My second point concerns culture. It's worth noting that Black and Hispanic suicide rates are generally substantially lower than White rates. For example, for weapons, 133 x 3.6 = 478.8 is significantly less than 868. We’ll see in a moment that we can say that, in general, White children are better at killing themselves and Black children are better at getting killed. How can we reduce the White suicide rate to the Black suicide rate? Or better than the suicide rates of Hispanics and Asians? Can we achieve this without amending the gun laws? Why not?
Figure 4 depicts the same type of graph, but for homicides. I'm going to pause and let it sink in.
Black child deaths by homicide without correcting for population ratios are already 4 times larger than the White population. Hispanics also exceed the White value. If the Black rate were proportional to the population and the same as White homicides, it would be 90. I’ve already noted in Media's focus of White supremacy harms Black communities that homicides largely stay within races and ethnicities, at over 90%. So, the single biggest gun problem in the U.S. for children is homicide within the Black community. Recall that the average firearms deaths for children from 2016 to 2020 were 3,433.2. You can reduce this by about one-third if you can bring the Black child homicide deaths in proportion to the White deaths. I can drop it by about another 400 if we can get White suicides down to the Black suicide rate. Do those two things, and the number of child deaths by firearms drops to under 2000 a year. If one group can have lower rates with current gun laws, then why can’t the other?
Suicides
Some will note that the majority of firearm deaths are suicides, as though this was a sign of the gun’s neutrality in our devastating tally. But suicide with a gun has a finality and lethality unmatched by other methods, and suicide attempts that fail are rarely attempted again.
The last sentence here is a bit of a bait-and-switch. If you click the link, you will learn two things. First,
An international review of psychological autopsy studies found that approximately 40% of those dying by suicide had previously attempted (Cavanagh 2003).
This is an international result, so maybe it does or maybe it doesn’t apply to the U.S. It does point out that 60% of first-time suicides would be categorized as successful. How does this relate to guns? The second key quote:
A history of previous attempts is lower among those dying by firearm suicide and higher among those dying by overdose (NVISS data).
So, yes, gun-related suicides are more effective than overdoses, but actual rates are not provided, and the comparison is with overdoses rather than suffocation, which is comparable to firearms in terms of fatalities. So, is gun lethality truly unequaled by other methods? This link does not give such evidence because we need to compare firearms with suffocation. Again, I ask: how much will new gun legislation affect the suicide rate?
Also, I did not create a chart, but female and male suicides are considerably different in nature, with weapons accounting for fewer than 25% of female suicides for ages 1–19 (males just break 50% at 50.7%), and suffocation being the top reason at 55%. Again, there are cultural differences in the case between males and females.
How does the United States compare to the rest of the world? Given our arsenal of weaponry, we must be off the charts. Figure 5 demonstrates that this is not the case. Figure 5 shows age-adjusted data, as it should be. Suicide rates vary with age, and when comparing countries, suicide rates must be adjusted to reflect the country's age profile. With that said, reporting on what is or is not suicide differs by country, so don’t consider these exact apples-to-apples comparisons.
The United States has a high suicide rate, yet it is still lower than Japan. How much will it decline if we get rid of all firearms? Perhaps down to Finland? Canada? If you wish to argue for the abolition of firearms, focus on how many fatalities will be reduced. How many deaths will be reduced if you enact new gun control legislation? I believe I've demonstrated that culture is entwined with how we die, and it's unclear how much is due to access to firearms. On the other hand, as previously said, disparities between races provide solid evidence that changing cultures can have a significant effect and may be more feasible.
Some final quotes
Worse, they sanctify it as the “price of freedom,” referencing the Second Amendment as though it were divinely inspired. They reach for explanations for our singular affliction, blaming mental health, a coarsened culture, the lack of prayer in public schools or anything close at hand that might distract from the truth.
The Constitution does not protect cars, which kill as many children as firearms. Should we get rid of our cars? Suffocation is an effective method of suicide. Should we get rid of all bags? Obviously not. Are weapons to blame for the disproportionately high homicide rate in Black neighborhoods compared to White communities? Isn't this related to a coarse culture?
A brief Google search reveals that there are around 82,000,000 gun owners in the United States, 393,000,000 guns, and 50,000 gun deaths. Approximately 81,950,000 gun owners are not an issue. They hunt and shoot safely. They keep their firearms safe. They love target shooting and outdoor activities, or they simply admire the craftsmanship of an antique gun. Is it really OK to just say, "Sorry, but you can't do what you enjoy because of a small minority?" I understand that the author of the Ithacan piece likely does not see any of these gun uses as relevant, regardless of the Second Amendment, but perhaps try. In other words, should 81,950,000 individuals be penalized for the actions of 50,000?
As we have since learned, the militias that came to the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021 had an arsenal of weapons waiting for a second round of that day’s melee, with leaders of the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers texting each other about preparations for a proper armed coup.
Please, a hotel room full of weaponry will not deter the US military, no matter how many people you have. I spent some time attempting to determine how many guns were in the hotel room, but I failed. Even if the space was crammed like a closet, it wouldn't be enough. So no, this wasn’t a proper armed coup.
I promised this would be back.
Donald Trump’s Republican Party wants the daily scroll of death by guns to become the background noise to daily life in the country. They want to normalize mass shootings, and everyday gun violence. Why else would they proceed apace after 19 9 and 10-year-olds were slaughtered in their schoolroom in Uvalde, Texas?
While not an exact comparison, someone on the right might say:.
The Biden Democratic Party wants to hide the daily deaths of unborn children by focusing on guns. They want to normalize over 600,000 abortions each year, or approximately 1,600 a day. This is over 10 times the number of gun deaths. Why else would they proceed apace as 600,000 future children are slaughtered?
The point I want to make is that for many of these contentious issues, there are underlying values that are neither right nor wrong. Neither side wants to acknowledge this. It is not wrong to value an unborn child more than the mother, or vice versa. It is not wrong to prioritize gun rights over gun deaths, or vice versa. If we view someone with a different value system than ours as wrong or, worse, evil, then we have no chance of finding a compromise that we can all live with as one country.
For those who, like the Ithacan author, have problems with weapons and gun owners, I recommend taking a hunter's safety course. How concerned they are about gun use and safety might surprise you. Consider it a small step toward understanding the “other side,” and it is far cheaper than a college course.
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