Gun violence has overtaken motor vehicle accidents as a leading killer of young people in the US—second only to drug overdoses, says the Center for American Progress.There's no reason to doubt the statistics (which are only broadly stated), but there is reason to doubt the universal validity of the raw statistics cited by the Center for American Progress ... a liberal ("Progressive") website which is quick to blame the Second Amendment Rights of Americans for the tragic and all-too-pervasive slaughter wrought of American Youths.
The Report (see below) is quick to blame the "ready" availability of firearms for the high murder rates of young people on other young people.
Drill down the statistics, and you will see that the victims AND the victimizers are teen-age males residing in cities with an already too-high crime rate.
It's not the guns ... it's the society that is responsible for these high rates of gun violence.
If they weren't using guns (which are already illegal to possess by teenagers in all 50 states, without severe restrictions), they would be using knives.
(Search the crime rates by firearms in England, where possession of most guns are already either highly restricted, or completely forbidden; kids there are slaughtering each other using knives, and the anti-knife laws are as all-encompassing as are the anti-gun laws in, say, Chicago.)
The problem isn't guns, or knives; it's Society!
Young people who grow up in neighborhoods where opportunities for jobs, training and education are often limited because of the already prevalent reliance upon Cops rather that Jobs to keep the peace ... they don't have money, they can't support their families (parents without jobs; crime is too often the best way to support your family) ... and so they turn to crime.
These People who point the finger at "guns" as the source of societal ills, are using these teenagers as decoys. The community is so busy fighting "crime" that they have neither the resources nor the impetus to recognize and address the economic causes of teen-age gun crimes.
THEY find it easier to look good on the Six o'clock News, making palatable quotes, than to make the really tough decisions about jobs opportunities, psychological support, ans spending more money on job opportunities than on buying Assault Vehicles.
Guns Kill More Young People Than Road Accidents: Study | The Crime ReportThe Crime Report:
See Original Quote below The Fold
Gun violence has overtaken motor vehicle accidents as a leading killer of young people in the US—second only to drug overdoses, says the Center for American Progress. Between January and April this year alone, 820 youths aged 12-17 were killed or injured with a gun, underlining the Center’s findings that young Americans are now especially at risk from firearms—whether as victims of homicides, police shooting, or suicides. The figures were contained in a report entitled “America’s Youth Under Fire,” released jointly by the Center, a non-partisan Washington DC think tank, which advocates for a number of progressive-linked causes including gun safety, and Generation Progress, an advocacy group, as members of the National Rifle Association gathered last weekend for their annual convention in Dallas.
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Another study showed that if you took five major cities out of the tally, the U.S. would have one of the lowest gun violence rates in the world.
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