Gun lobby has opposed research on effects of gun ownership/gun laws

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Last week, after giving myself an initial overview of the scientific research on how gun ownership and gun laws affect violent crime, I told you that it seems like there's not a solid consensus on this issue. At least not in the United States. Different studies, of different laws, in different places seem to produce a wide variety of results.

On the one hand, this is kind of to be expected with social science. People are hard to pin down. Harder, often, than the Higgs Boson particle. And you can't just do a clean, controlled laboratory study of these issues. Instead, you're left trying to compare specific places, laws, and enforcement techniques that may not be easily comparable, in an attempt to draw a broad conclusion. That's hard.

But, it seems, the National Rifle Association has gone out of its way to make this work even more difficult than it would otherwise be. Since the early 1990s, NRA-backed politicians have attacked firearms research they believe is biased against guns. Alex Seitz-Wald at Salon.com wrote a piece on this back in July, after an earlier mass shooting. He describes how a vaguely worded clause has lead researchers to avoid doing firearms studies at all, for fear of losing their funding.

The Centers for Disease Control funds research into the causes of death in the United States, including firearms — or at least it used to. In 1996, after various studies funded by the agency found that guns can be dangerous, the gun lobby mobilized to punish the agency. First, Republicans tried to eliminate entirely the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control, the bureau responsible for the research. When that failed, Rep. Jay Dickey, a Republican from Arkansas, successfully pushed through an amendment that stripped $2.6 million from the CDC’s budget (the amount it had spent on gun research in the previous year) and outlawed research on gun control with a provision that reads: “None of the funds made available for injury prevention and control at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention may be used to advocate or promote gun control.”

Dickey’s clause, which remains in effect today, has had a chilling effect on all scientific research into gun safety, as gun rights advocates view “advocacy” as any research that notices that guns are dangerous. Stephen Teret, who co-directs the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, told Salon: “They sent a message and the message was heard loud and clear. People [at the CDC], then and now, know that if they start going down that road, their budget is going to be vulnerable. And the way public agencies work, they know how this works and they’re not going to stick their necks out.”

In January, the New York Times reported that the CDC goes so far as to “ask researchers it finances to give it a heads-up anytime they are publishing studies that have anything to do with firearms. The agency, in turn, relays this information to the NRA as a courtesy.”

Read the rest

Via Dave Ng

Image: IMG_0362, a Creative Commons Attribution Share-Alike (2.0) image from neontommy's photostream

Maggie Koerth-Baker is the science editor at BoingBoing.net. She writes a monthly column for The New York Times Magazine and is the author of Before the Lights Go Out, a book about electricity, infrastructure, and the future of energy. You can find Maggie on Twitter and Facebook.

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MORE: guns • lobbying • politics • research • Science • social science

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shutz

My own studies have concluded that you’ll shoot your eye out.
Massive Missive

This was the first thought I had when I read your previous post. If you’re surprised by this, you’ve been politically living under a rock for the last forty years.

I’ll believe in the new progressive era when there’s an effective left-wing counter to the NRA. Right now, the dems are so cowed that the president refuses to even address the possibility. Bipartisanship fuck yeah!
Brainspore

I haven’t been this shocked since that story about Samuel L. Jackson using the F word.
john lardner

We have strict gun controls in New Zealand so we beat each other to death with our fists instead . Us Consumanbeings . We’ll find a way . Strip out the Humanity in the collective Us and the possibilities are endless .
- Brainspore
  
  We have strict gun controls in New Zealand so we beat each other to death with our fists instead.
  
  And when was the last time a Kiwi beat a couple of dozen people to death in one go?
  - eviladrian
    
    Outside of the Rugby World Cup season?
- http://www.ikaink.net Itsumishi
  
  New Zealand also has less than a quater of the intentional homicide rate of the US.
  - Johnny Come Lately
    
    Per capita or total?
    - eviladrian
      
      NZ has about 1% of the US population, so if it’s total the place must be a constant bloodbath…
      - Johnny Come Lately
        
        Yeah I’m just looking for detail since that unsourced stat is pretty broad as it’s presented. I’m not saying I don’t believe it, I’d just like a slightly clearer picture.
    - http://www.ikaink.net Itsumishi
      
      evildrian is right. New Zealand isn’t the pleasant land of beaches, mountains and sheep people have been led to believe. It’s a bloody rampage. The vast majority the population is murdered by fighting fists of fury.
      - Johnny Come Lately
        
        Did I say any of this stuff? Or did I just ask for more illustrative detail?
        
        I think it’s a fair question. I’m not trying to be cheeky I’m genuinely curious and his statement is pretty bare.
      - http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
        
        Statement: I’ve drawn a stick figure.
        
        Q. So is it like a Pollock painting or is it more like a stick figure? I need more information.
Daedalus

It’s easy to be cynical, but the real takeaway here is that there’s something we can do in the next election cycle about it: ask our running politiicians if they’re interested in stripping away the Dickey clause — the clause that outlaws research on guns.
- http://www.youtube.com/user/Freethinkersanon Christopher
  
  I’d like to, but since one of my local legislators* is still in office in spite of being arrested with a loaded gun in his car while driving drunk I won’t hold my breath waiting for a response.
  
  *Curry Todd, Tennessee. The silver lining to this cloud is it cast such a pall over his bill to allow people to carry concealed weapons in bars and restaurants that the measure never came up for a vote.
  - http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
    
    He’ll use the incident to support his legislation.
    
    “Did I shoot someone? No!”
    - http://www.youtube.com/user/Freethinkersanon Christopher
      
      Actually what’s even worse is the claim he and other legislators made in defense of the legislation. According to their reasoning it would make restaurants and bars safer because if a deranged shooter came in patrons would be able to defend themselves. And of course no innocent bystanders would be harmed in the ensuing firefight.
      - morcheeba
        
        The concealed weapon didn’t help Gifford … in fact, there were almost two killers that day. http://news.firedoglake.com/2011/01/11/concealed-carrying-bystander-nearly-killed-innocent-man-during-tucson-shooting/
  - Daedalus
    
    Then you’ve got work to do on the people in your community first and foremost. The bright side of that is that there’s nothing stopping you from inviting a pile of likely voters (or conservative relatives, or whatever) over for a Bar-B-Que in your backyard or something TODAY. If they can start to understand you, and you them, there’s a chance for change there!
- http://www.facebook.com/harry.bethke Harry Jorge Bethke
  
  Hey I just created a petition for that! http://wh.gov/nlCi
Michael Rosefield

That’s pretty blatantly disgusting.
Rephlex

Of course the gun lobby is going to go absolutely bonkers with a government funded CDC research study on the “health effects” of guns, especially when it was initially proposed just prior to a sweeping healthcare reform bill being passed.

The fear was that you could technically declare guns a “health hazard” and approach gun control that way, which isn’t really that outlandish of a concern on their part.

Speaking of Sociology however, what I find more interesting to examine is the fact that the shooter was apparently home-schooled and attended church regularly. Which happens to be the two exact things that the religious right cling to. Ie. Removing their children from the Public School system because of “Indoctrination” and the lack of “God’s word” in the curriculum.

If the CDC really wants to do research, perhaps they could start with how poorly equipped this country is in terms of dealing with mental health. Which has been a commonality among most of the shooters, being that most of them had early signs of failing mental health.
Ito Kagehisa

Another thing the NRA opposes is legislation requiring better safeties on firearms.

You’d think that the bloody-handed gun nuts and the dirty facists who want to disarm everyone would be able to come together on one of these simple premises: It should be harder to accidentally shoot someone or Requiring safety mechanisms more sophisticated and effective than those of a hundred years ago wouldn’t be overly burdensome to gun buyers. Maybe they could even agree that it should be impossible for anyone but a gun’s owner to fire it – this is the 21st century, we do have some technology available.

But it’s like occutards and teabaggers, you know? If they’d work together they might get something done about corruption in government. But I guess activists often hate each other more than they hate the things they are supposedly fighting against.

I remember how the auto industry fought tooth and nail against seat belt legislation. We didn’t let Detroit get away with that nonsense, why do we let the gun industry continue to use safeties that haven’t significantly advanced since the 19th century? I think it’s because We The People are too busy fighting the NRA .vs Brady Foundation wars to get anything useful done.
- millie fink
  
  “occutards”?
  
  Bye bye, credibility!
  - Ito Kagehisa
    
    Can you explain to me why you didn’t object to disgraceful epithets directed at three other groups in the same posting?
    
    Really, Ms. Fink. I’m honestly ashamed for you.
    
    Edit: I am usually impressed with your posts, but this time you fell into a rhetorical bear trap; you have demonized your opposition to the point that you cannot see commonalities that are obvious to many others.
    - Navin_Johnson
      
      Occupy and the Tea Party are directly at odds when it comes to election/campaign finance that enables essentially criminal groups like the NRA. Your comment makes no sense. Tea Party is funded/created by the groups that are pro-Citizens United, unlimited spending, against lobbying restrictions etc.
      - Ito Kagehisa
        
        Maybe you should consider what I was actually talking about.
        
        Edit: although it is sort of fascinating to see you and millie fink give such excellent demonstrations of my point.
        
        2nd Edit: any emotion you found on that mountain you brought with you. But I guess you are right about coherence – I’m not eloquent enough to reach the True Believers like yourself, who are incapable of compromise with your Evil Enemies.
      - Navin_Johnson
        
        Maybe you should work on being more coherent with your points? Your comment makes no sense. Maybe you didn’t think it through. It was pretty emotional after all: “OccuTARDS”..
      - millie fink
        
        Edit: although it is sort of fascinating to see you and millie fink give such excellent demonstrations of my point.
        
        What point? As stated above, your comment makes no sense.
        
        As for other epithets, I have no problem at all with people who hang teabags from their hats being called “teabaggers.” The double-meaning doesn’t escape me, though knowing that it probably would escape many of them makes it all that much more delightful.
        
        As for your being “ashamed” of me — wtf? Tres bizarre!
      - wysinwyg
        
        You made a comparison to Occupy vs. Tea Party. They argued that the comparison doesn’t work, because despite their rhetoric, the Tea Party is demonstrably pro-corruption in terms of policies.
        
        It really undermines your whole premise: “Well, if they could just work together on this issue!” Well, they can’t because in reality they are on opposite sides of that issue.
        
        The gun-control issue is similar. You act as though the NRA has some moral equivalence with people saying, “Well, gee, maybe stricter gun laws should be on the table.” One side here is willing to compromise, one is not, and you’re pretending to be the high-minded reasonable one by suggesting: “Hey, guys, can’t we just compromise?”
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    Teach The Controversy!
Gerald Mander

NRA = Non Rational Americans. And fuck them fully.
http://billmcgonigle.com bill_mcgonigle

Just another way the NRA is tripping-over-itself stupid. I just so happened to use that database this weekend to answer some questions I had. I found out that there are approximately 123 accidental gun-related deaths per year among children from the database. I also found out that there are approximately 60,000 homicides that are prevented by gun owners using that data. I learned that swimming pools are nine times more dangerous to children than guns.
Anybody who is arguing to suppress data, on any side of any question, is wrong.
The NRA is a purely political creature – they even support anti-gun bills that data and statistics don’t support as having any benefit if they think it will score them political points. It’s just a shame so many pro-rights people donate money to them.
- DrunkenOrangetree
  
  60K homicides prevented? I’d love to see the stats backing that claim up.
  - http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
    
    They did a poll wherein NRA members were asked to respond affirmatively if they often day-dreamed about being able to shoot someone in self-defense.
    - Johnny Come Lately
      
      Kleck-Gertz study.
      - http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
        
        Kleck admitted his work was all fucked up, then claimed that the errors proved he was right, because other errors similar to his in unrelated studies favoured the proposed result of the studies.
        
        He’s practically a criminal.
nnu-16121

The background of this, as explicitly stated in the linked article, is a study from 1993 called “Gun Ownership as a Risk Factor for Homicide in the Home”
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199310073291506
The study, the letters to the New England Journal of medicine in response, the authors’ responses to those letters, and the critiques of the study easily found elsewhere are very interesting reading for someone interested in how science should be done.
http://twitter.com/chrisjimson chris jimson

In the aftermath of these kinds of mass-shootings I always find myself angrily fantasizing that someday the shooting will happen at an NRA convention.
- http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
  
  Meh, if that happened then the NRA would beatify whoever was left alive as heroes who defended themselves…
  
  even if the only one left alive was the person who started shooting.
EH

So the NRA is like the tobacco industry now.
- Navin_Johnson
  
  Except more secretive and under less scrutiny.
  - Betsumei
    
    And better at suppressing research that they don’t like.
drew millecchia

Society: We are doing it all wrong!
Everything. And we need to change.

Protection: Why do we always need more protection? Metal detectors and locks on schools, owning guns to protect ourselves? From whom? terrorists? No, other Americans in our supposed civil society. This isn’t what we wish this country to be, and the government really cant help too much because of the constitution, so We the People can and must change ourselves. We have Failed on this

Mental Health: We always just wait to hear from the news that the killer was insane, or a loner, mentally disabled, troubled youth with a tragic upbringing. That satisfies our conscience and we say we’ll put into place things that can identify these individuals, which is obviously not working.
The problem is we failed 20 years ago. We need better assessments and counseling, not to find these ‘violent types’, but just to give kids that need more assistance the tools they need to cope, as well as the understanding of their peers, teaching kindness and patience. This would put a very good foundation on our children. We have Failed on this.

School: There is no amount of money that is too much to give to schools. We should give until their accounts overflow, then the kids should donate all that extra to charities in their communities. There should be no political argument that would limit funding to school. We have Failed on this.

Religion: I am an atheist, and all the crackpot creationists and their like make me crazy. However… 90+% of religious people are normal middle of the road. They really don’t push their way into the schools because they actually understand the separation between church and state. But it really makes me wonder if the general moderate religions had more input, that would push the extremists to the fringe and add some of the moral and ethical thought that their belief brings. Because, the secular way to try and teach that is pretty lame.

Entertainment: The 1st amendment is the core of our country and should never be oppressed, but that does not mean that we cant change our views and choose not to watch movies and TV with such excessive violence. It is true that entertainment just reflects society, and makes what people want. And entertainment is very clear and obvious as to what our society accepts. We have Failed miserably on this. Entertainment doesn’t create killers, it does worse, it creates our society that can be shocked and outraged, but when the movie (or reality) is over, we can go on with our lives, and save the change for later. Remember Aurora, Columbine, and too many others. We have really Failed on this.

Finally, Guns: Those who say that the better gun control wouldn’t have prevented this is total bullshit. An those who say that if the principal had a gun it wouldn’t have been so bad, is from another reality altogether. Tighter gun control would have absolutely 100% prevented this. And even if it would have had 0% why would it be an excuse to not do something about it! Gun = 20 dead kids. seriously just do that math. People are gun enthusiasts because guns are definitely awesome things, the mechanics, the style, the sheer power. I’ve always been fascinated by them and learned how to shoot as well. But we idolize them as powerful protectors, when in reality they should be feared as killers.
Maybe we should all look through the eyes of some 6 or 7 year old children cowering in a corner about to be shot to death, to truly understand that fear.

I have two 7 year old boys, and this event was the most terrifying nightmare that could ever happen to a parent.

There is no one solution here, there is no justice, no redemption.
This is a situation that we have born upon ourselves.
We have Failed, but We can fix it if we care enough to, and We have to care enough to fix it.
- http://twitter.com/xjosh Josh Tibbs
  
  Why are you willing to go to the mat for the first amendment, but not the second?
  - wysinwyg
    
    Well, the first amendment is vastly more important. The second is barely even relevant 250 years after its authorship since if the US military WAS used against the US populace there would be shit all a few idiots with guns could do about it.
    
    But that said, I would absolutely go to the mat for your right to be part of a well-regulated militia. What’s that you say? You just want to own guns and not have that tied to the responsibility and discipline involved in being in a militia? Then maybe you’re not taking the second amendment as seriously as you claim to.
    - SexBobOmb
      
      This is by far the most outstanding comment I’ve read on this issue.
  - http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy
    
    Why don’t you understand the meaning of the word amendment?
    
    The second amendment needs to be interpreted in a reasonable fashion, rather like the bible, then it would serve all Americans. Do you think you should be stoned to death for wearing a nylon shirt with cotton pants?
    
    Or are you under the impressionable impression that gun control equals an end to private ownership rather than what it would realistically mean in the USA?
  - drew millecchia
    
    All the amendments are a part of the core of our society. but none should be allowed to impact the unalienable rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.
    Life being the most important one there.
    So we say the 2nd amendment as helping to protect these things, but it unquestionably has the ability to take away those things, that’s where the tragedy lies.
    
    The constitution is a living document, we have added amendments and repealed them, slavery, suffrage, prohibition. Things that help further the good society we wish to live in are kept and revered, the ones that are harmful or aren’t working as we expected, are amended again or repealed. The 2nd amendment is looking like it might be doing more harm than the good that it intended.
    
    It’s doubtful that anyone in the current congress will attempt to take on an bill or rights repeal.. obviously a very big deal. But there is plenty that can be done for safety and rationality.
  - feetleet
    
    The 1st is mitochondrial. The 2nd is a spandrel. Like male nipples. The rest of us are trying to disarm warheads while you dickheads play knife-fight game theory.
wysinwyg

I’m sick of arguing with these NRA idiots. You guys win. In fact, let’s give a gun AND a hit of PCP to every man, woman, and child in the USA and let them do what comes naturally.
Johnny Come Lately

Is that the gun from Robocop?
Quinx

As a former ‘government’ scientist, I have to tell you that not all agencies are free from political bias. Among those where bias is endemic are the CDC and the EPA. CDC was enjoined from spending money on firearms research both because of obvious bias and and poor study design in several flawed projects, and because gun ownership is not a disease.
- DrunkenOrangetree
  
  Source for this contention?
Nadreck

Well every time a dozen or more kids get their heads blown off the gun lobby points out that this could have just as easily been done by a maniac with a corkscrew. Let’s take them at their word and legislate a compulsory exchange of automatic weapons for corkscrews. It’s a win-win situation. The gun owners get something that, as they have been telling us for years, is just as good as their old rifles for self defence and the gun control lobby gets lots of guns off the streets.
feetleet

Avoid the word ‘society.’ You’ll discover that, like prosody, the exercise makes you more thoughtful.

‘C*nt,’ however, is more context-specific. As in: “the c*nt-y NRA may not agree with that c*nt, but they will defend to the death his right to c*nt.”
http://www.facebook.com/laden.greg Greg Laden

Don’t be pessimistic about changing gun laws!!!!!
http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

I wonder how many of the parents of the children lost in Newtown wish to God and all else that they were one of the parents in China?

Wounded.

(Just a guy in Canada, currently freer than you, with a lower crime rate, less oppressive police, funded healthcare and safe children)
SheriffFatman

I wouldn’t call > 1 a month extremely rare.
DrunkenOrangetree

I just love statements like this:

There are about 15 to 20 mass shootings in the US every year. That number has stayed the same for decades. Is the extremely rare event of a mass shooting a price we are willing to pay to have a free society?

I would first ask what freedom I would be giving up. As far as I can see the only freedom you’re worried about is the right to own as many stupidly lethal guns as possible. So you need the freedom to own guns so you can own guns. Right?

Then I’d love to have you ask one of those parents in Connecticut if they thought your stupid conception of honor and freedom was worth the death of their child. Oh, and give them a gun before you ask.
grimc

the allowance of the citizen to own and bear arms is the ultimate way for a government to show its commitment to freedom and to show its trust in the sovereign citizen.

No, the ultimate way for a government to show that is by maintaining a system in which citizens can remake said government every four years.

By the way, the FBI considers “sovereign citizens” a domestic threat. And you know who else thought of himself as a “sovereign citizen”? Jared Loughner. Just FYI.
Navin_Johnson

Is the extremely rare event of a mass shooting a price we are willing to pay to have a free society? I would think so.

Uh no. And there’s nothing that even remotely suggests that the right to have an assault weapon creates a “free society”. So much for the freedom of the scores of men, women, and children murdered by assault weapon wielding nuts to be allowed to live their lives.
carl Martin

I’m having trouble coming up with an “honorable and noble purpose” for using a gun. Maybe a “mostly harmless purpose” like target practice, but then what exactly are you practicing to get better at?

And what’s up with this notion that unfettered access to firearms equals a free society? You will never have enough firepower to protect your freedom by force – you’re outgunned from the start. Access to education, health care, jobs, and participation in the political process will ensure your freedom.
aeon

15 to 20 mass shootings A YEAR in the USA? And that’s acceptable and rare? HOLY CRAP, AMERICA!?

Sorry, didn’t mean to shout…

But, SERIOUSLY WTF ARE YOU THINKING?!

I’ve lived and worked in the UK, Oz and NZ. I can think of only a handful of mass shootings in all those countries in my lifetime. I can name them off the top of my head —Hungerford, Dunblane, Port Arthur and Aramoana. Those names are seared into my brain, they were so horrific. 15 to 20 mass shootings per annum? I’m almost speechless…
http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

Ha, quick to latch onto something akin to your own fantasy?

The fact is that an all-volunteer army of citizens who are the sons and daughters, mothers and fathers, brothers and sisters of non-military citizens is what would protect you if your government were as awful as some extremists would even now have us believe.

If things got so bad that a majority decided to hoist their own flag, nothing they could muster would faze the US armed forces sent to crush the seditionists.

Except one thing, the US Armed Forces themselves.

Don’t pretend you NRA types could do anything but resort to insurgent, ultimately failed tactics against the US Army if that Army decided to follow it’s orders as justified and crush an unjustified revolt.

As for domestic and criminal threats, (putting aside that they are one and the same) The people that give their weapons so much power are far and away closer to living in caves defending their food stores than people who act collectively with reason to foster change and advancement.

So much closer that some of them are already living in caves pretending to defend their food stores. Only venturing out to go to Wal-Mart and buy more.
Ito Kagehisa

In my case I own a gun specifically to protect the lives of my family, who have been threatened with death because we are “race mixers”. So that’s the freedom I’d be giving up; the freedom to fight for my family against the attacks of violent extremists (who have many sympathizers in police forces).

And thus your angry and self-righteous appeal to emotion falls a little flat on my ears. I’m already emotionally involved, and consequently have more than enough obnoxious self-righteousness for the both of us.

Edit to reply to DO below: Nobody comes up to me and says anything, nor do I own an assault rifle, nor do I shoot bigots for speaking out, nor am I an NRA supporter. The threats I referred to were made at night, with spray paint, while my children were toddlers. It is reasonable to suppose that the lethal attacks explicitly promised by the vandals would also come at night, and what I am equipped for is self defense, not revenge fantasy street violence.
DrunkenOrangetree

You are peddling, with all due respect, horseshit. As all you gun nuts do.
http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

It isn’t a weapon that allows you the freedom defend your family.

Gun control does not eradicate private gun ownership, it prevents unchecked proliferation and would -far- more likely restrict gun ownership among the ones you feel you are defending your family from than it would you.

The best home defense firearm, the shotgun, is not the sort of weapon that would be restricted the prospect of private ownership.
Navin_Johnson

You need a military grade “Bushmaster” to do that? Why not a hunting rifle or shotgun? This seems to be the difference between those for sensible gun control vs. those that think no kind of weapon should be off limits.

Anyway, I’m sorry to hear that you’re being threatened by racists. I mean that genuinely, that stinks.
http://twitter.com/fossilfuels Funk Daddy

What makes you think risk can be averted?

For that matter, what makes you think you can see what side I’m on or that I propose the Army would be on either for any reason?
wysinwyg

Whether or not the army would be on anyone’s “side”, the point stands. Military capabilities have evolved over the course of the last 250 years to the point where US citizens could not hope to protect themselves against the military if the shit hit the fan.
gwailo_joe

It’s ok…we’re getting used to it. The dead kids: that’s pretty rough, makes people sad. But the mass killing of adults…a price we as Americans are -seemingly- willing to pay for the freedom to potentially kill other Americans.

Don’t tread on me and all that…
Antinous / Moderator

Don’t tread on me

Everyone ignores the first two words and worships the last two.
Stupendousman

Wow, you make an excellent point. People who feel, and many even make great arguments, that self-defense is a fundamental right are just peddling horseshit. If only I’d been informed earlier.
I’m sure you have a prefect plan to arrange society so all people are happy and safe.
DrunkenOrangetree

Right, someone comes up to Ito and calls him a “race mixer.” Ito pulls out his semi-automatic assault rifle and blows him away.

Or Ito goes for his semi-automatic assault rifle but the bigot pulls his glock first and blows Ito away.

Or both of them pull out their respective weapons–perfect for self-defense–and spray bullets around the neighborhood, maybe killing Ito’s relatives in the process, a quite likely result incidentally.

I don’t have a plan to guarantee all people are safe and happy, but I don’t rely on stupid fantasies of redemption through violence to keep me from fear.
Shane Simmons

‘Maybe a “mostly harmless purpose” like target practice, but then what exactly are you practicing to get better at?’
I take it you don’ t live in a rural area. When you have a rabid skunk dashing by, you don’t want to wait 30 minutes for animal control to show up.