Why Studies Looking At ‘Homicides’ Tend To Be Flawed

By Tom Knighton

When the topic of gun control comes up, there are a few numbers most people are going to refer to. In particular, anti-gunners will almost always cite the total number of firearm-related fatalities in this country. That number is the total number of people who die as a result of a gunshot, and it’s a controversial number because it also includes suicides, which are a mental health issue rather than a criminal one.

Recently, one study did separate the two, at least to some degree.

However, it’s also seriously flawed in one key aspect.

I’ve written on this conflation of “gun violence” with “homicide” and “suicide” before (such as Faux Science: Claim that homicides surged under Florida’s “Stand-Your-Ground” law), but in the past few days another large “gun violence” study that does precisely this has been published–The Impact of State Firearm Laws on Homicide and Suicide Deaths in the USA, 1991–2016: a Panel Study–and we’ll be seeing a lot of “news” stories based on this study in the usual gun control media (but I repeat myself).

The stated objective of this study is: “To examine the relationship between state firearm laws and overall homicide and …Read the Rest

Source:: Bearing Arms