As Goldy posted earlier today, the State of Florida has determined that physicians should be imprisoned or fined if they merely ask if a patient owns a gun. (The bill has been somewhat watered down, as it has proceeded to becoming law; it is intact in principle, however.)
Why do physicians ask patients about gun ownership?
1. You have a reasonable chance of shooting yourself:
Between June 1, 1992, to May 31, 1994 about 34,485 accidentally injured themselves non-fatally with a firearm. This averages out to about 18,000 non-fatal injuries a year.
2. If you manage to not shoot yourself, you have a reasonable chance of harming yourself with the gun anyways:
Not counting those who shot themselves, about sixteen-thousand people injury themselves with firearms each year in the United States sufficiently to require a visit to the emergency room. Usually these injuries were the result of the routine handling of firearms, with 43% from recoil.
3. About half of children unintentionally shot are shot in their own homes, with their parents own gun. Another 40% are shot in the house of a friend or relative. To those of you working through the math, 90% of children injured by firearms are injured by a parent, relative or friend’s gun.
4. Somewhere between 2% and 12% of children live in a home with a firearm.
Four practices, in combination, can dramatically reduce the risk of these children injuring themselves with the household’s firearm:
i. Store the gun unloaded.
ii. Store the gun away from the ammo.
iii. Lock up the firearm.
iv. Lock up the ammo.
5. Programs that teach children gun safety—like the NRA Eddie Eagle Gun Safety Program—do not decrease the chance that young children will handle or attempt to fire a handgun they stumble upon.
Any doctor who does not ask about gun ownership during an annual physical, particularly a well-child check, is not practicing up to usual and customary practices—for the exact reason he or she should be asking about smoking, drug use, diet and domestic violence.
I’m becoming very tired of being asked by conservatives to spare their delicate sensibilities from reality. It’s not enough to have (essentially) unrestricted gun ownership in the country. No, conservatives cannot even allow medical professionals to cite scientific evidence.
Just like conservatives whimper about data demonstrating climate change, evolution, environmental harm from fracking, peak oil, and on and on and on.
Wouldn’t it be pleasant if—instead of expecting the rest of us to swallow their bullshit with grins on our faces, to spare their sensitive feelings—conservatives simply stated what they want, damn the concequences: Unfettered access to firearms, despite the proven dangers. Profligate burning of fossil fuels, despite mounting evidence of limited supplies and environmental disaster. Adherence to origin myths, despite crippling biology education. At least spare us the bullshit.
To add to what samktg said, American exceptionalism should not be something to congratulate ourselves about; rather, we should hold ourselves to a higher standard because of it.
@51: Not wearing a helmet while biking or skiing is like engaging in irresponsible promiscuity; sure, you may get away with it just fine, but there are risks you could easily avoid. And it’s your doctor’s place to inform you of the risks you’re taking. Whether you follow his advice or not is up to you.
The one time I seriously fell off my bike, my helmet didn’t protect me at all; I landed on my chin, which required seven stitches. I’m still going to wear my helmet, though, because there’s that chance it might stop me from denting my head. And if you think that wearing a helmet will ruin cycling or skiing, you’re a huge pussy. Frankly, I find that a helmet makes cycling more enjoyable by keeping my hair out of my face.
Seattleblues is the reason why Dr. House just breaks into people’s homes to get information on them rather than waste his time asking them questions they’ll either lie about or become enraged for being asked.
The American government has never comitted genocide. While it is tragically likely that around 90% of native populations of North and South America were killed by infectious disease after European contact, tragic is what it was. Not murder.
America has never had an empire. You must be confusing us with Brittain.
We have some work to do on equality, but come a great deal closer than anywhere else on the planet. And the wealthy have a voice disproportionate to their numbers, as they do in any society in the world now or in the past. Human nature, I’m afraid. But we do better than anywhere else to assure that those less fortunate have a voice too, if they choose to use it within the same Constitutional framework the wealthy do.
The Civil War was fought over slavery, but only as the emotional catalyst provoking an inevitable showdown between the Federal and State governments. The real test was whether we would be a confederation of semi-independent states, or a group of states with the power coming from the central federal government. The latter won when the South lost.
I guess I’m a racist for believing the Etruscans were doomed as a dominant people when they came into conflict with what would become the Romans. I guess I’m similarly racist for thinking that the French retaking of Normandy from the British was more or less inevitable given geographic realities in the 14th century. The native populations of the Americas lost because of massive depopulation caused by European diseases. They lost because they lacked the technological advances Europeans had militarily. And yes, they lost because they were more primitive peoples. These are facts, and if that makes me racist, so be it. But it doesn’t, thankfully.
And I don’t think you or most other liberals hate America, tempting as the thought may be. I just think you’re wrong about it, economics, and human nature. In your love for this country, you’d like to see us be better, as we certainly could be. But to forget what we are in hoping for better serves no-one.
Oy vei, Seattleblues, you hit that word primitive, and plant your face in the pavement. Your use of the word proves my point. You aren’t actively racist, but if you had any idea what the word ‘primitive’ means, you would know the only appropriate time to use that word in a historical context is when discussing dead cultures like the Etruscans. Without necessarily being conscious of it, the language you use assigns cultures to a hierarchy with Western cultures at the top. The word ‘primitive’ is value-loaded, it’s not just about technology, but about the concept of civilization and modernity. To apply it to living cultures is offensive. Use it seriously in an academic setting, and prepare to be censured by everyone. Combine such language with this “history” of yours divorced from the reality of Manifest Destiny and The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783, and what you are left with is racism. Not the flagrant “throw the Jews in the ovens” kind of racism, but a more subtle structural racism.
If I am guilty of forgetting who we are as Americans in hoping for better, at least it is no disservice. But to forget who we were, what we have been, what we have done, so we can say “this is the greatest nation on earth”, that is certain doom.
I hate this motherlovin’ state sometimes.
@55 – Dr. House….really???
it was a joke, dude.
admittedly not a good one.
Man, now I feel bad for all the poor lesbians who don’t realize what a terrible risk they’re at for HIV and anal cancer!