@Joe
It’s an interesting point and made me think about a parallel in German society. If for a lot of Americans freedom and democracy would end if some more sensible gun laws were passed, a lot of Germany would think that the world was about to end if there was a speed limit on the Autobahn

People think they are entitled to own a gun, and entitled to drive. Getting a license is easier than graduating high school. I personally don’t know anyone who doesn’t have their driver’s license. The longest I’ve ever heard of licenses being revoked is 5 years. That’s because North American culture frames driving as a right, rather than a privledge, just like guns.

I think with any deadly weapon, you should be held accountable for it’s care and use. What I can’t understand is that people are allowed to do something that they have clearly shown they are so criminally incompetent at doing, that someone is permanently injured or dies. Maybe the threat of permanently losing ones ability to drive, own guns, own vicious dogs, etc would force people to treat these things with respect, regardless of if the incompetent fool has “suffered enough”. At the very least, it might stop them from doing it again.

Ohh Shoot highlights unintentional shootings. Some might refer to these as accidental shootings, but accident is too often interpreted as unavoidable. The shootings on this blog did not have to happen.

I’m not sure it relates at all.

Do you have sources for those numbers, they’re very interesting. I’ve seen similar things.

In canada, there are like 10 million people 50 million guns and no one ever shoots anyone.

I think the attitude in the US is changing and can change.

But yes, I think there’s more to guns and deaths as just “ownership”.
Looking at some statistics I found some interesting numbers about the number of killings compared to the number of guns owned.
While in very poor countries with high crime rates few guns are used for a large number of killings, in the first world, the numbers vary a lot. While in Germany, with quite some regulation and a rather “no guns in public” culture, there are about 150.000 weapons for each gun-related murder, it’s only 26.000 for the USA.

As for the car/bike analogy: please somebody explain to me how the risks of gun-ownership relates to the benefits and then compare that to risk/benefit analysis of cars.

Are there too many cars on the road driven by idiots that have no self-control? Indubitably. Must that change? Without question. And think about this – it’s actually harder for them to legally obtain and drive a car, than it is for most people to legally obtain a gun.

Also, as a bicyclist, I do want to reduce the cars on the road and I do blame the car culture of the US for bicycle related deaths.