Tag Archives: Guns

Why We Can’t Talk About #GunControl |The Atlantic

By James Hamblin

ASPEN, Colo. — “I pose this question, Mr. Metcalf, as a hunter of birds. I have a concealed carry permit for a pistol. And I think the gun laws that are on the books today are ineffective because they’re not enforced.”

“When I got my concealed-carry permit,” the man in the audience continued, “one of the questions I had to answer was, ‘Are you a fugitive from justice?'”

“I asked the sheriff, does anyone ever answer yes to that? And he said, ‘You’d be surprised.’ But I think we need more regulation. And if I were your boss, and you’d written that column, I wouldn’t have terminated you. I’d have given you a promotion.” Continue reading Why We Can’t Talk About #GunControl |The Atlantic

ProPublica: Myth vs. Fact: Violence and Mental Health

by Lois Beckett ProPublica, June 10, 2014, 3:30 p.m.

After mass shootings, like the ones these past weeks in Las Vegas, Seattle and Santa Barbara, the national conversation often focuses on mental illness. So what do we actually know about the connections between mental illness, mass shootings and gun violence overall?

To separate the facts from the media hype, we talked to Dr. Jeffrey Swanson, a professor in psychiatry and behavioral sciences at the Duke University School of Medicine, and one of the leading researchers on mental health and violence. Swanson talked about the dangers of passing laws in the wake of tragedy and which new violence-prevention strategies might actually work. Continue reading ProPublica: Myth vs. Fact: Violence and Mental Health