Trigger Warning

By: Lana Del Raytheon

The stats are clear: the gun debate should be one mostly about how to prevent gun suicides.

The now-defunct Artbanka Museum of Young Art in Prague. Kota Shivaranjan / Flickr

Mortality rates for firearm homicide and suicide, 1981–2012. Source: “The Epidemiology of Firearm Violence in the Twenty-First Century United States“

In 2014 alone, there were 21,334 gun suicide deaths. That’s 58 per day — or the equivalent of one Las Vegas shooting every day for an entire year.

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Across the political spectrum, discussions about gun control tend to overlook a basic truth: for nearly a century, more Americans have died annually from gun suicides than gun homicides. In recent years, gun suicides have outnumbered gun homicides two to one. [Fig. (Untitled): Mortality rates for firearm homicide and suicide, 1981–2012. Source: “The Epidemiology of Firearm Violence in the Twenty-First Century United States“] In 2014 alone, there were 21,334 gun...

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