Why don't they have the Virginia Tech massacre in 2007?
This data seems to be missing what a lot of people would call "school shootings".
Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
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Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#22[deleted]
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#23Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that because it is such a rare event, efficacy of any intervention is extremely hard to evaluate. So essentially whatever you do is guesswork. To put it simply: how's do you know if whatever you did has an effect instead of the numbers being a result of a random downswing? (You can know if you can know by employing Bayesian statistics - with these low rates you really cannot.)
well what about the idea that other countries adjusted their laws after such incidents and it made a difference in crime statistics?
I hate guns and I want them banned in America. But, crime goes up after gun bans https://crimeresearch.org/2013/12/murder-and-homicide-rates-...
I am okay with that because it spreads the violence but each instance of violence is less deadly. So for the sake of no school schootings, I will accept increase in general violence. Let's repeal the 2A.
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#24it’s unlikely that any of them will prevent mass school shootings “The thing to remember is that these are extremely rare events, and no matter what you can come up with to prevent it, the shooter will have a workaround,” Fox said, adding that over the past 35 years, there have been only five cases in which someone ages 18 to 20 used an assault rifle in a mass shooting. this seems weak. if shootings are rare events s…
Also, how come the incidence of these types of shootings are so much lower in other parts of the world if there is no policy that will help prevent them?
Law is not the only variable and is not deterministic. Social environment and cultural values are of great influence.
The US media glorifies violence and yet censors the reality of it.
How many of those other countries with stricter gun control laws have been involved in as many violent conflicts across the globe as the US?
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#25I have seen those studies pop up from time to time on HN with conclusions altering between "it's reachin worrying proportions", "there is an increase", "there is no increase", "they are so rare as to not worth considering".
From what I understand, the decision of what kinds of shootings are included has a large influence on the conclusion - e.g., the "there have been 18 shootings in 2018 so far" articles from a while ago used a comparatively low threshold for inclusion.
The threshold for this study seems to be "4 or more victims", which I think is similar to the threshold official publications used at the beginning of the Obama administration. I believe there were complaints that the threshold is unreasonably high which caused it to be adjusted - however, I don't have any sources for that ready, so if anyone knows more, please correct me.
In any case, it's important to look at the criteria if one wants to compare those studies.
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#26Shouldn't the comparison be made against school shootings world wide? Or at least be normalized for overall crime rate or something?
The numbers are so tiny that comparisons are pretty much irrelevant. Since 1996 there have been just 8 mass k-12 shootings (incidents involving 4 or more school deaths, excluding the assailant), in a nation of 330 million people. That's so far into small numbers territory that any comparisons are guaranteed to be overwhelmed by noise.
> incidents involving 4 or more school deaths
That number seems suspicious; you'd get a very different answer if your criterion was "any gunshot wound at a school", for example. But that definition might be a better match for what people think of as a school shooting.
(e.g. Northern Ireland had a very large number of terrorist attacks where a warning was given allowing evacuation - would they not count as terrorist incidents even if nobody was killed? I suspect not)
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#27Can someone say "Security Theater"? In cases like these I like to take the Freakonomics formula for risk, that outrage factors more into observed risk than actual danger. We're more worried about Terrorism than Heart Disease, even as we have far more control over the latter.
I like to ask my "ban the AR-15" friends how they feel about the TSA.
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#28Can someone say "Security Theater"? In cases like these I like to take the Freakonomics formula for risk, that outrage factors more into observed risk than actual danger. We're more worried about Terrorism than Heart Disease, even as we have far more control over the latter.
It's precisely because we have far more control over heart disease that we do not fear it.
I can accept getting heart disease—maybe it was my fault?—much more readily that being actively, senselessly, killed by someone else. Terrorists know this too, which is why definitionally terrorism is meant to induce fear by way of its unpredictability.
You wrote "security theater" to imply that we shouldn't attempt to address terrorism and school shootings because they don't kill enough people. I think that we ought to fund research into good, effective, ways to reduce gun violence _because_ it's something that we don't control ourselves.
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#29Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem is that because it is such a rare event, efficacy of any intervention is extremely hard to evaluate. So essentially whatever you do is guesswork. To put it simply: how's do you know if whatever you did has an effect instead of the numbers being a result of a random downswing? (You can know if you can know by employing Bayesian statistics - with these low rates you really cannot.)
https://twitter.com/CoyoteToledo/status/966832602383552513 US: I'm on fire CANADA: jump in the water US: water won't work, i need more fire UK: we used water when we caught fire US: it won't work for us we like fire too much US: I'm burning AUSTRALIA: here is a video of water putting out fire US: *stuffs fire in pockets*
Actually crime rates in Australia and the USA decreased similarly in the period following Australia's gun ban, despite America's inaction.
Re: Schools are safer than they were in the 90s
#30Can someone say "Security Theater"? In cases like these I like to take the Freakonomics formula for risk, that outrage factors more into observed risk than actual danger. We're more worried about Terrorism than Heart Disease, even as we have far more control over the latter.
Terrorism and gun violence is and has always been about economic impact. 9/11 had more concentrated economic impact than heart disease ever will.
If you think people are being overly emotional over these issues try to imagine a plausible reason why.