Supreme Court allows AR-15 ban in this state
abcnews.go.com
The Supreme Court turned away an appeal by a group of gun-rights advocates seeking to overturn Maryland's ban on AR-15 semi-automatic rifles under the Second Amendment.

The Supreme Court on Monday turned away an appeal by a group of gun rights advocates seeking to overturn Maryland’s ban on assault-style rifles and high-capacity magazines under the Second Amendment.

The decision, a major win for gun safety advocates, leaves in place a ruling by the Fourth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals which ruled that the state may constitutionally prohibit sale and possession of the weapons.

The state legislation, enacted in 2013 after the Sandy Hook elementary school shooting, specifically targets the AR-15 – the most popular rifle in America with 20-30 million in circulation. They are legal in 41 of the 50 states.

  • hperrin@lemmy.caEnglish
    22·
    4 days ago

    Here’s a study on gun ownership vs gun deaths:

    https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3828709/

    Results. Gun ownership was a significant predictor of firearm homicide rates (incidence rate ratio = 1.009; 95% confidence interval = 1.004, 1.014). This model indicated that for each percentage point increase in gun ownership, the firearm homicide rate increased by 0.9%.

    Conclusions. We observed a robust correlation between higher levels of gun ownership and higher firearm homicide rates. Although we could not determine causation, we found that states with higher rates of gun ownership had disproportionately large numbers of deaths from firearm-related homicides.

    Here’s a graphic showing gun ownership by country:

    https://www.graphicnews.com/en/pages/42747/firearms-civilian-gun-ownership-by-country

    As you can see, the US is almost 4 times higher than the next highest country.

    And here’s a graphic showing the number of mass shootings by country:

    https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/mass-shootings-by-country

    Again, you can see that the US tops the chart by a huge margin (more than 5 times).

    We can’t really compare based on just violence alone, because any country in active conflict severely skews the data. You’d have to include only countries in peacetime. But you can certainly compare based on gun violence, because the US always trends very high. Even when you include countries in active conflict, the US compares to them in gun violence. So, living in the US is similar to living in a country involved in active conflict with regard to gun violence.

    https://www.commonwealthfund.org/publications/2024/oct/comparing-deaths-gun-violence-us-other-countries

    Highlights

    • Globally, the U.S. ranks at the 93rd percentile for overall firearm mortality, 92nd percentile for children and teens, and 96th percentile for women.
    • The U.S. has among the highest overall firearm mortality rates, as well as among the highest firearm mortality rates for children, adolescents, and women, both globally and among high-income countries.
    • Nearly all U.S. states have a higher firearm mortality rate than most other countries. Death rates due to physical violence by firearm in U.S. states are closer to rates seen in countriesexperiencing active conflict.
    • Black and American Indian and Alaska Native (AIAN) people have the highest firearm mortality rates of any racial or ethnic group.