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What does a license, training, or a background check have to do with suicide rates? Pretty much everyone who wants to kill themselves with a gun could pass a background check, could get training, and could get a license.
I agree with the thrust of your argument though. More guns, more suicide. The only thing licensing does is make guns harder to get. Making them harder to get, means fewer people will take the effort to get them. And the harder it is to kill yourself, the fewer people will kill themselves.
Women are actually four-times more likely to attempt suicide, but men are four-times more-likely to actually kill themselves. Women usually try to kill themselves with pills, but men kill themselves with guns. Guns are far more-effective.
With that said, I don't think you are going to convince many people to take everyone's guns away to prevent people from killing themselves. You can't even convince me, and the very reason I refuse to get a gun is because I know I would kill myself.
Then if suicide by gun goes up in Oklahoma, don't complain about it, unless you got a suggestion on how to reduce it.
Last edited by StillwaterTownie; 04-15-2019 at 10:29 AM..
Ripping through the woods on quad with your buddies has risks but it is also a lot of fun. Just because you are willing to accept those risks doesn't mean you are suicidal. If you want to live in a bubble so be it but it sounds like a pretty boring life if you aren't willing to take some risks.
Back in the 80's I owned some of the first mountain bikes on the market when they weren't much more than glorified ten speeds. I crashed plenty of times with my head missing a tree by mere inches once. I wouldn't give those experiences up for anything.
I wasn't even thinking about lifestyles that are otherwise healthy (getting exercise via hiking, etc). After all, that kind of lifestyle is one reason why the folks in Colorado and some other states tend to be healthy.
I was thinking more in terms of smoking, heavy drinking, eating a poor diet and generally, not taking good care of your health. That seems to be an issue in many - if not all - of the states at the bottom of the rankings I've posted. I consider lifestyles like that to be a form of suicide.
why are people migrating out of these states when they get older? Why has NY State and IL lost population the last 10-20 years ?
The growth has been in the states where the life expectancy is lower and by your post has less to offer then the fantasy land up north.
Why is this ?
It's largely the weather. We moved from New England to Florida due to the weather with the long-term plan of eventually buying a summer home up north. We are probably 10 years from making that goal a reality. The drawbacks include difficulty in finding quality healthcare, a lack of culture, lots of transient weirdos, and terrible pizza. We have homeschooled our children to avoid the bad schools here. Many northerners move to Florida and other southern states to escape from the cold and snow; some do so permanently and others do so only in the winter, depending on their desires and budgets.
But there isn't a strong correlation, there really isn't any correlation at all.
Based on US News list that you posted--of the top 15 best overall States, 8 of them (including the first one) are Red States, 7 are Blue. That's a difference from the first list of "life expectency" where the top 10 are Blue States.
The "quality of life" rankings that I posted earlier where Red States claim 10 of the top 15 States, seem to have a stronger correlation in the overall rankings where they claim 8 of the top 15.
On the overall rankings list I linked, I see 7 of the top 10 states being blue states (or at least, mostly blue in presidential elections the last 20 years or so): Iowa, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Washington, Massachusetts, Vermont and Colorado. That's 7 of 10. Of the next 5, two - Wisconsin and Maryland - are blue. Florida is purple, and Idaho and SD are red.
So yes, that still strongly correlates with the life expectancy listings I've provided (again, particularly the whites-only list).
You can complain about high taxes, high prices, large numbers of homeless, illegal immigrants or whatever else you want about the blue states, but there are few indicators that are a better gauge of the well-being of the population than life expectancy. And in that category, blue states stand head-and-shoulders above the red states.
There are some red states in the Plains and Rocky Mountains that do pretty well, but they still aren't as good as the top 10 blue states.
New Jersey is also tops..yes tops in super fund sites, it even beats out California (#2)
top 10 Super fund states
NJ
CA
PA
NY
Michigan
FL
WA
IL/TX ( a tie for number 8)
WI
OH
On the overall rankings list I linked, I see 7 of the top 10 states being blue states (or at least, mostly blue in presidential elections the last 20 years or so): Iowa,
I'm guessing you aren't old...I'll be 80 next year, and it's the heat I can't deal with....The people that are killed by heat waves are the elderly.
I can understand where you're coming from. The 1995 Chicago heatwave killed many elderly people, who were often living in apartments without air conditioning.
I'm young and I live in Georgia. It gets hot down here. The heat could kill me if I'm not careful, but it will have a much more pronounced effect on an elderly person. However, I still have issues dealing with the heat. I tend to think more clearly when it's cool outside than in heat.
On the overall rankings list I linked, I see 7 of the top 10 states being blue states (or at least, mostly blue in presidential elections the last 20 years or so): Iowa, Minnesota, New Hampshire, Washington, Massachusetts, Vermont and Colorado. That's 7 of 10. Of the next 5, two - Wisconsin and Maryland - are blue. Florida is purple, and Idaho and SD are red.
So yes, that still strongly correlates with the life expectancy listings I've provided (again, particularly the whites-only list).
Nope.
Iowa, Utah, ND, Nebraska, Wisconsin, Idaho, SD and Florida are Red. That's 8
Minnesota, NH, Washington, Mass, Vermont, Colorado, and Maryland are Blue. That's 7
You then moved the goal posts by inaccurately saying "7 of 10" to make an argument...but if we move the goal posts again, then I can say 3 of the top 5 are Red...see how that works?
You can complain about high taxes, high prices, large numbers of homeless, illegal immigrants or whatever else you want about the blue states, but there are few indicators that are a better gauge of the well-being of the population than life expectancy. And in that category, blue states stand head-and-shoulders above the red states.
There are some red states in the Plains and Rocky Mountains that do pretty well, but they still aren't as good as the top 10 blue states.
talk about a simplistic picture: this has to be it. Do you realize many red states area are also rural states Rural states,normally have fewer doctors and do not offer top specialists plus they may not have more than one or two major urban areas. your study proves nothing except to show you are not understanding the overall reason for this and btw, what does life expectancy have to do with taxes, cost of living, homelessness, etc. That is a separate topic altogether.
I said, "or at least, mostly blue in presidential elections the last 20 years or so."
Iowa went for the democrat in 2012, 2008, 2000, 1996, 1992 and 1988. Only in 2004 and 2016 did it go for the republican. I would call that a blue state.
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Iowa
Minnesota
Utah
North Dakota
New Hampshire
Washington
Nebraska
Massachusetts
Vermont
Colorado
Wisconsin
Idaho
Maryland
South Dakota
Florida
