tap4154
VIP Member
All the focus on AR15s. 30 round magazines, and old white guys are FAR off target...
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This week much of the talk about gun control concerns New York Mayor Michael
Bloomberg's $12 million ad campaign to put pressure on senators in key states to
support legislation that he backs. Or the talk is about the National Rifle
Association's pushback against the Bloomberg campaign. Then there was last
week's mini-tempest over Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's decision not to
include Sen. Dianne Feinstein's assault-weapon ban in a comprehensive
gun-control bill the Senate will take up next month.
One thing you don't hear much about in the discussions of guns: race.
That is an astonishing omission, because race ought to be an inescapable part of
the debate. Gun-related violence and murders are concentrated among blacks and
Latinos in big cities. Murders with guns are the No. 1 cause of death for
African-American men between the ages of 15 and 34. But talking about race in
the context of guns would also mean taking on a subject that can't be addressed
by passing a law: the family-breakdown issues that lead too many minority
children to find social status and power in guns.
The statistics are staggering. In 2009, for example, the Centers for Disease
Control reported that 54% of all murders committed, overwhelmingly with guns,
are murders of black people. Black people are about 13% of the population.
The Justice Department reports that between 1980 and 2008, "blacks were six
times more likely than whites to be homicide victims and seven times more likely
than whites to commit homicide."
Juan Williams: Race and the Gun Debate - WSJ.com
==================================
This week much of the talk about gun control concerns New York Mayor Michael
Bloomberg's $12 million ad campaign to put pressure on senators in key states to
support legislation that he backs. Or the talk is about the National Rifle
Association's pushback against the Bloomberg campaign. Then there was last
week's mini-tempest over Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's decision not to
include Sen. Dianne Feinstein's assault-weapon ban in a comprehensive
gun-control bill the Senate will take up next month.
One thing you don't hear much about in the discussions of guns: race.
That is an astonishing omission, because race ought to be an inescapable part of
the debate. Gun-related violence and murders are concentrated among blacks and
Latinos in big cities. Murders with guns are the No. 1 cause of death for
African-American men between the ages of 15 and 34. But talking about race in
the context of guns would also mean taking on a subject that can't be addressed
by passing a law: the family-breakdown issues that lead too many minority
children to find social status and power in guns.
The statistics are staggering. In 2009, for example, the Centers for Disease
Control reported that 54% of all murders committed, overwhelmingly with guns,
are murders of black people. Black people are about 13% of the population.
The Justice Department reports that between 1980 and 2008, "blacks were six
times more likely than whites to be homicide victims and seven times more likely
than whites to commit homicide."
Juan Williams: Race and the Gun Debate - WSJ.com
