Are AR-15 Rifles a Public Safety Threat? Here's What the Data Say

Let's throw some reality into the mix, shall we?

Are AR-15 Rifles a Public Safety Threat? Here's What the Data Say

Friday, January 11, 2019


Image Credit: Flickr-Aero Precision AC-15 | by Tac6 Media | CC BY 2.0

Being Classically Liberal

From Parkland, Florida, to San Bernardino, California, the semi-automatic AR-15 rifle and its variants have seemingly become the weapons of choice for mass shooters in the United States.

Many people simply cannot believe that regular civilians should be able to legally own so-called “weapons of war,” which they believe should only be in the hands of the military.

According to Pew Research, for example, 81 percent of Democrats and even 50 percent of Republicans believe the federal government should ban “assault-style rifles” like the AR-15. Given the massive amount of carnage AR-15s and similar rifles have caused, it makes sense that the civilian population simply cannot be trusted to own such weapons, right?

Perhaps, but is it really true that the AR-15, a popular firearm owned by millions of Americans, is a unique threat to public safety, so dangerous that it deserves to be banned or even confiscated by the federal government?

It cannot be emphasized enough that any homicide is a tragedy, but in order to get a sense of how dangerous to public safety “assault-style” rifles are, it’s useful to compare their usage in homicide to other methods.

Data source and Methodology
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation(FBI) are the two authoritative sources for homicide statistics in the United States.

According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS), the CDC reports “produce more accurate homicide trends at the national level” because they capture less under-reporting than the FBI statistics.

However, the homicide data recorded by the CDC includes all homicides committed by civilians regardless of criminal intent. The FBI data instead focuses on intentional homicides (i.e murder) known to law enforcement and excludes non-negligent homicide (i.e manslaughter.)

According to the BJS, the FBI data is “better suited for understanding the circumstances surrounding homicide incidents.” This is especially true given that the FBI, but not the CDC, records the type of firearm used in a given homicide. For the purposes of this analysis, the data from the FBI will be used.

There are two further limitations of FBI data worth noting.

Firstly, the FBI reports do not look at “assault-style” rifles specifically, but rather, murders involving all types of rifles, whether they are committed with an AR-15 or a hunting rifle.

Between 2007 and 2017, nearly 1,700 people were murdered with a knife or sharp object per year. That’s almost four times the number of people murdered by an assailant with any sort of rifle.

Secondly, each year there are a few thousand homicide cases where the type of firearm used goes unreported to the FBI. This means that some murders listed under “unknown firearm” may, in fact, be rifle murders.

To account for this under-reporting, we will extrapolate from rifles’ share of firearm murders where the type of weapon is known in order to estimate the number of “unknown” firearms that were in actuality rifle homicides.

https://fee.org/articles/are-ar-15-...0pYEX6nGTRgq-F4NlUZCSTVcMfmJ5cHS7_AQR_UL0mLPY

 

Conclusion

Mass shootings involving rifles like the AR-15 can produce dozens of victims at one time, and combined with extensive media coverage of these events, many people have been led to believe that such rifles pose a significant threat to public safety.

However, such shootings are extremely rare, and a look at the FBI data informs us that homicide with these types of rifles represents an extremely small fraction of overall homicide violence. Banning or confiscating such firearms from the civilian population would likely produce little to no reduction in violent crime rates in America.

None the less the rifleman is cute looking.

 

Are AR-15 Rifles a Public Safety Threat?

Yes. They are sinister. Near where I live there was a recent incident where an AR jumped off the rack in a sporting goods store and assaulted three people, sending one to the hospital!

Oh, wait... I think I was watching the "wrong" network.

 

I have what could be considered one and I caught trying to open the door of my very secure gun closet, I took it out back and ran a couple of mags through it down range and it smiled, I put it back in the closet and it went back to sleep.

Like children make them work and they sleep well and get a good work ethic attitude, coddle them and they become brats.

 

But we live in a nation of pus rockets who can't take care of themselves, looking to mommy government for everything. Of course they're dangerous

 

Simple answer:
No

 

I think there are a couple of strikes against the AR. First off, for people who have not spent much time around guns it is 'frightening' in appearance. Secondly, I think of the AR type gun pretty far down on the list when it comes to self defense. For defense in a home I think a good old pump action 12 ga. is the way to go. After that any handgun would do and last on my list of 'home defense' weapons is the AR type gun. The gun type is attractive to militant groups and that could be strike three against the AR type gun among most of the public.

 

Beat me to it! LOL It only stopped because it couldn't reload it's self!

 

Irrational fears of the ignorant are a sound argument to limit the rights of the law abiding?

A carbine or pistol-length AR in a major pistol caliber is better choice for home defense than a shotgun/handgun in almost every circumstance.

 

in the end, facts & stats have little to do with anything, the dems will play with peoples emotions (akin to incitement) to get what they want...

that said, why is it that the libs are so adamant about gun bans/laws, yet say sqwat about all those vehicular deaths that occur every day (2016 had 37,461 traffic deaths, approx 1,750,000 deaths over the last 41 years)... why are they not lobbying to ban cars, afterall it's the car that kills, right?

 

They prey upon the unseasoned and ignorant, with their fallacious appeals to emotion, ignorance and dishonesty.

They seek a monopoly on force; dead bodies mean nothing to them when they cannot be applied to that purpose.

 

Gun control saves lives


Are you lobbying to prevent auto deaths?

 

Silly argument. Our entire society literally can't function without automobiles. You know this. Stop being silly. If you're going to argue on the side of guns please come up with a better argument.

And no, I am NOT in favor of gun control. Not. One. Bit.

 

it goes to their motive, can't have it both ways, eliminate all items that bring death, beginning with the item that kills/causes the most deaths and work your way down the list... stop the cherry picking !!!

 

You realize this is a gun control thread right? Therefore the topic discussed is gun control...not car control, smoking control, alcohol control....you see where I'm going with this right?

 

That idea is hilarious

 

To an anti it's not a two way street it's their way only.

According to them deaths by motor vehicles cannot be compared to firearms, because those deaths are different than deaths caused by firearms, their logic is warped which is why the anti's must be badgered harassed and destroyed as much as possible in the publics view.

They like using strong arm tactics, I say turn it around and run it through them.

Find out who they are harass them, their children and their supporters, make it so no one wants to be associated with the slime they are.

 

exactly... they say it's about saving lives, but that's just smoke/mirrors and furthest from the truth of what they actually want...

they are too frightened to tell the truth and so far, no one has done so...

 

yep, control based upon the fallacy of saving lives, for which i've demonstrated and for which you've no answer other than the idiocy of that if it's inconvenient , it isn't worth the fight... ergo cars good, guns bad...

 

But they love comparing guns to cars when it supports their narrative, otherwise such a comparison is not to be done and irrelevant.

 

What part of this did you not understand...."And no, I am NOT in favor of gun control. Not. One. Bit."

 

It's silly to compare cars to guns. Guns are much more dangerous

 

Come on now.

 

Lots of people in this country never touch a gun. Yet they have almost the same deaths as cars that everyone uses

 

They cause more injuries than cars?