While listening to NPR today, I heard a report about a protest at Virginia Tech. about the role of gun laws in Virginia. Evidentially Abigail Spangler was upset about the recent Virginia legislative decision to not do anything about gun shows. Gun control activists like to complain about the “loophole” relating to gun shows, but in reality, there are no laws regarding the gun shows. All of the laws relate to registered gun sellers. Ms. Spangler decided to do a type of protest called a “lie in”.

To make a point, Ms. Spangler said that 30,000 people are killed every year in this country by guns. She further performed a feat of math by saying that every 2 years, more people are killed by guns that who were killed in the Vietnam war. She didn’t bother to note that most of those killed in the Vietnam war were killed by guns too.

Just out of curiosity, I checked a couple of places for the latest numbers. I’m patently lazy, so I didn’t check to hard. The Green Man has a nice table that shows that yes, the total number of deaths attributed to guns was just shy of 30,000 in 2001. However, neither Ms. Spangler nor anyone else mentions that over 50% of those gun deaths were suicide, not assaults or murders. And according to this CDC report, more people died from Septicemia, or “blood poisoning” than suicides, homicides and accidental gun death combined. This claim about the frequency of gun deaths is patently disingenuous, if not a purposeful lie. Less than 40% of gun related deaths was due to assault and murder.

Moving on, let’s compare the total number of guns deaths, including accidental, suicidal and homicidal to other forms on death in the US. First, is death via automobile. According to this Department of Transportation report, 42,642 people died in 38,588 automobile crashes. This includes drivers, passengers, pedestrians, and anyone else unfortunate enough to be in the way. I’d say that 38,588 is safely much more than 30,000. In other words, you are 31% more likely to die in an auto accident than to be killed by a gun.

Next, let’s compare abortion and gun death. I’m not going to wade into the debate about whether abortion is murder, especially on the 35th anniversary of legalized abortion in the United States. The old saying goes “even if you win a mud-fight with a pig, the pig enjoyed it and you still stink.” This Bloomberg article claims that there were 1.2 million abortions in 2005. That is over 40 times the number of gun deaths per year. Again remember that we’re talking about all forms of gun death, including suicide–the most prevalent form of gun death. So if you are a fetus, you are 4,000% more likely to be “terminated”, “killed”, or “removed” by your potential mother.

To summarize, Abigail Spangler is misleading you by telling you the truth. Yes, nearly 30,000 people died in 2001 in gun-related incidents. Less than 40% of those was in incidents like the Virginia Tech. college shooting. However, you are 30% more likely to die this year because of an auto accident than by a gun, especially if the gun is in your hand.