Women are buying more guns, though studies suggest self-defense use is rare… A Harvard University analysis found people defended themselves with a gun in less than 1% of crimes from 2007 to 2011. More recently, a Stanford University study of 17.6 million Californians found that people who lived with handgun owners but did not own a gun themselves died by homicide more than twice as often as their gun-free neighbors. [More]
If what they say is true, NRA families must be self-destructing at an astonishing rate.
Somebody at Faux News decided it was important to offset reality by citing “statistics” and talking points from people who want to ban guns. Nothing like assigning such stories to a self-described “cat lady.”
A Harvard University analysis found people defended themselves with a gun in less than 1% of crimes from 2007 to 2011.
Would that be “less than 1% of ALL crimes”, or “less than 1% of crimes against persons”, or “less than 1% of violent felonies“?
IOW, are they counting burglaries in which the homeowners weren’t home? Car break-ins? Vandalism? Are they counting non-violent offenses that wouldn’t justify a lethal-force response?
That methodological context is important, which I suspect is why they didn’t provide it.
And “defended themselves” is often limited to some tight fraction of the spectrum between firing a shot and killing a perp. Incidents where a perp ran at the sight of a gun are never counted by such people.