“Every country is home to domestic abusers.
Only America gives them easy access to
an arsenal and ammunition.”
– Shannon Watts, founder gun control advocacy group “Moms Demand Action”
Scioto County commissioners recently passed a resolution that declared the opposition of the county “to any restrictions on the Second Amendment” and stated the Board of Commissioners in Scioto County “wished to resolve to protect the right to bear arms in Scioto County, Ohio, even if state and federal laws are passed restricting ownership or possession.”
The county commissioners did this in spite of statistics that show in 2017 gun deaths reached their highest level since 1968 with 39,773 deaths by firearm, of which 23,854 were by suicide and 14,542 were homicides. To refuse to engage in meaningful dialogue to stop the epidemic of gun violence by exalting the weapon responsible is disturbing.
What innocent segment of the population is most vulnerable to gun violence? Without a doubt, women have the unfortunate distinction of suffering the most immediate risks.
Although the gun lobby and its advocates like Wayne LaPierre, executive vice-president of the National Rifle Association, have argued that firearms are a great equalizer between the sexes, the reality is that a gun in the home is a strong risk factor for both homicide and suicide, and females are uniquely impacted by the availability of a firearm.
No doubt, firearm access helps to fuel domestic violence. Every year, millions of Americans report domestic violence. And, of course, it disproportionately affects women. Such fights become much more frequent and lethal when firearms are involved, and the violence is nearly unidirectional, inflicted by males upon females. An abuser’s access to a firearm (most likely a male privilege) is a serious threat to victims, making it five times more likely that a woman will be killed.
(J.C. Campbell, et al., “Risk Factors for Femicide in Abusive Relationships: Results from a Multisite Case Control Study,” American Journal of
Public Health 93, no.7 2003.)
People say a gun is “just another weapon.” However, domestic violence assaults involving a gun are 12 times more likely to result in death than those involving other weapons or bodily force. And, American women are 11 times more likely to be murdered with a firearm than women in any other developed nations. In fact, over the ten-year period between 2008 and 2017, there was a reduction in intimate partner homicides of women in the U.S. involving weapons – except homicides by guns, which increased by 15 percent.
(E.E. Fridel and J.A. Fox. “Gender differences in patterns and trends in the US homicide, 1976-2017.” Violence and Gender. 2019.)
(Linda E. Saltzman, et al., “Weapon Involvement and Injury Outcomes in Family and Intimate Assaults,” Journal American Medical Association 267, no. 22 1992.)
It really comes as no surprise that 80 percent of people killed by firearms annually in the U.S. by intimate partners are women. Every year, 600 American women are shot to death by their intimate partners. In fact, of all women shot to death by others in the U.S., half were shot by their intimate partners.
(Federal Bureau of Investigation, Uniform Crime Reporting Program: Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR), 2012-2016.)⤴︎
(A.L. Kellermann and J.A. Mercy JA. “Men, women, and murder: gender-specific differences in rates of fatal violence and victimization.” J Trauma.1992 Jul;33.)
A gun in the home is a real threat to a woman in many ways – it is often used as an instrument to inflict physical harm, and it is frequently employed as a weapon to induce serious mental abuse. Guns kill and also maim survivors of domestic violence. Nearly 1 million women alive today report being shot or shot at by an intimate partner, and 4.5 million women alive today report that an intimate partner threatened them using a gun.
(Susan B. Sorenson and Rebecca A. Schut, “Nonfatal Gun Use in Intimate Partner Violence: A Systematic Review of the Literature,”
Trauma, Violence, & Abuse 19, no. 4. 2018.)
“Coercive control,” a term popularized in 2007 by the forensic social worker Evan Stark, PhD, refers to the sinister ways people nonviolently manipulate their intimate partners (physical assault often coexists with coercive control, but it doesn’t have to). A gun makes a ruthless tool of intimidation.
A husband might keep a gun on the mantel in the living room, where he and his wife watch TV. A boyfriend might polish his weapon during arguments. While asking his partner where she’s been, a guy might casually remove his coat to reveal a pistol clipped to his belt. Susan B. Sorenson, PhD, executive director of the Ortner Center on Violence and Abuse in Relationships at the University of Pennsylvania, says …
“This (phenomenon of coercive control) is almost exclusively male on female. When you have a gun, you can control someone without touching them, without even speaking a word.”
Tami Sullivan, PhD, the director of Family-Violence Research at Yale, found that 33 percent of women in the Greater New Haven, Connecticut, area who were victims of abuse had also been menaced with a firearm. She also says ….
“And that doesn’t count the implied stuff, like when he cleans the gun in front of them.”
An American Journal of Public Health study of clients in battered women’s shelters, found that nearly a third of the women had lived in homes with firearms, and of those, 7 in 10 had been threatened with the gun by their partners.
(Susan B. Sorenson, PhD and Douglas J. Wiebe, PhD. Weapons in the Lives of Battered Women.” Am J Public Health. 2004 August; 94(8): 1412–1417.)
It is imperative to consider the disproportionate danger faced by minority females. Blackwomen are twice as likely as white women to be fatally shot by an intimate partner. Younger Black women – between the ages of 18 and 34 – are at the greatest risk: They are nearly three times more likely to be shot and killed by an intimate partner than are white women in the same age group.
(Federal Bureau of Investigation. Uniform Crime Reporting Program: Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR), 2013-2017.)
These facts should be as chilling to men as they are to women. A 2005 study examining mortality data from 1998-2000 found that when a female was shot by her intimate partner, the perpetrator subsequently killed himself in two thirds of the cases. Imagine the tremendous toll on surviving family and friends.
(S. Walsh and D. Hemenway. “Intimate partner violence: homicides followed by suicides in Kentucky.” J Ky Med Assoc. 2005 Jan;103(1):10-3.)
Gun advocates and gun marketers claim a gun is the best defense to the threat of gun violence, so they have pushed women to arm themselves. Many studies show that the NRA and its allies grossly misrepresent the actual dangers women face. It is people these women know, not strangers, who pose the greatest threat. The claim that intimate partner homicide can be prevented by arming victims with firearms is a harmful distraction. There is no research to support the idea that women’s gun ownership increases their safety.
Many still hang on to the necessity of having a weapon for home defense. According to the Pew Research Center, 48 percent of gun owners say they own a gun mainly for protection. Successful defensive gun use is, in fact, extremely rare among all people: There are fewer than 1,600 verified instances in the U.S. each year, according to the Gun Violence Archive. By comparison, annually, 118,000 people are injured, killed, or kill themselves with a gun.
According to a Harvard University analysis of figures from the National Crime Victimization Survey, people defended themselves with a gun in nearly 0.9 percent of crimes from 2007 to 2011. Compared to other protective actions, the National Crime Victimization Surveys provide little evidence that self-defense gun use is uniquely beneficial in reducing the likelihood of injury or property loss.
(David Hemenway and Sara J.Solnick. “The epidemiology of self-defense gun use: Evidence from the National Crime Victimization Surveys 2007–2011.” Preventive Medicine. Volume 79, October 2015,)
(“United States Firearm Deaths and Rates per 100,000: All Races, Both Sexes, All Ages.” National Center for Injury Prevention and Control,)
What is the reality of guns and their widespread availability on women?
Women in the United States account for 84 percent of all female firearm victims in the developed world, even though they make up only a third of the developed world’s female population. Within American borders, women die at higher rates from suicide, homicide, and accidental firearm deaths in states where guns are more widely available. This is true even after controlling for factors such as urbanization, alcohol use, education, poverty, and divorce rates.
(Evan Defilippis. “Having a Gun in the House Doesn't Make a Woman Safer.”
The Atlantic. February 23, 2014.)
To the Commissioners of Scioto County in answer to the declaration of becoming a Second Amendment sanctuary:
I believe Scioto County should rescind the resolution declaring our county a “Second Amendment Sanctuary.” If the political declaration has any meaning, it supports a stand against any and all changes in gun legislation. I feel the denotation and the resulting connotation of the resolution hampers well-documented reform to aid in ending gun violence in America while, at the same time, feeding false theories that law-abiding people will have their guns confiscated by much-needed legislation.
In order to protect the population of Scioto County, particularly to insure the safety of females, Congress and state legislatures should pass comprehensive gun safety laws to disarm abusive partners and save lives.
Forty-one states states don’t require those prohibited from purchasing a firearm due to domestic violence charges to relinquish the firearms they already own.
Ohio has no law to address the following:
• Prohibiting individuals convicted of domestic violence misdemeanors from purchasing or possessing firearms or ammunition, although federal law applies;
• Prohibiting individuals subject to domestic violence protective orders from possessing firearms or ammunition, although federal law applies; or
• Requiring the removal or surrender of firearms at the time a domestic violence protective order is issued.
(“Domestic Violence & Firearms in Ohio.” Giffords Law Center.
November 6, 2019.)
Ohio is not among the thirty states and the District of Columbia that prohibit purchase or possession of firearms or ammunition by at least some people convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence offenses.
The strongest laws prohibit the purchase or possession of firearms by individuals convicted of violent misdemeanors generally, regardless of the victim’s relationship to the offender. Ohio does not authorize or require relinquishment of firearms after domestic violence criminal convictions.
Ohio has not closed the so-called “Boyfriend Loophole.” Abusers often victimize their dating partners. In what’s known as the “Boyfriend Loophole.” Federal law does not prohibit people from purchasing or possessing guns if in a dating relationship and subject to a protective order. Under federal law, the abuser must have cohabitated as a spouse or have a child in common with the victim in order to be prevented from accessing firearms.
This gap in the law allows abusers, who are at an increased risk of committing an act of deadly violence against their partners, to purchase and keep guns in the home. Abusive people in dating relationship pose just as much of a threat to their partners as abusers in marital relationships.
More than half of all intimate partner homicides are committed by dating partners. Research shows that when states broaden their firearm prohibition laws beyond federal law to cover abusive dating partners, the states experience a 16% reduction in intimate partner gun homicides.
Ohio does not prohibit subjects of domestic violence orders issued after notice and a hearing from purchasing or possessing firearms: States in this list may require a finding that the respondent poses a credible or imminent threat to the petitioner for the firearm prohibition to apply.
Ohio is not among 9 states that prohibit the purchase and possession of firearms by people convicted of a misdemeanor crime of stalking. One study of female murder victims in 10 cities found that 76% of women murdered and 85% who survived a murder attempt by a current or former intimate partner experienced stalking in the year preceding the murder. Given that stalking is a strong predictor of future violence, closing the so-called “stalking gap” could help protect women from intimate partner homicides.
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine’s control plan is currently being considered. The proposal in this bill is being called an “enhanced safety protection order.” It’s built on the existing “pink slip” law, which allows for people assessed by mental health experts in a psychiatric facility. This would add substance abuse as a reason for allows a person to be pink slipped, along with mental illness. It would also require anyone who is deemed to be a danger to themselves or others to surrender their weapons.
In my opinion, declaring opposition to any and all restrictions on the Second Amendment – Second Amendment Sanctuary declaration – is more than misguided: it is illogical and unresponsive to the common good. I clearly hear the objections – people defending their “God-given right” and their “infrangible Second Amendment.” However, they stand on shaky ground when confronted with the facts.
The facts are clear. Women face a credible and ever-present threat when a gun – a deadly weapon often issued and maintained without proper and sensible legal supervision – is present in their homes. How many adults – men and women alike – would say, “That's true, but domestic violence would never occur in our home”?
Yet …
Statistics show 1 in 4 women (and 1 in 9 men) experience severe intimate partner physical violence, intimate partner contact sexual violence, and/or intimate partner stalking with impacts such as injury, fearfulness, post-traumatic stress disorder, use of victim services, contraction of sexually transmitted diseases.
In addition, 1 in 3 women (and 1 in 4 men) have experienced some form of physical violence by an intimate partner. This includes a range of behaviors (e.g. slapping, shoving, pushing) and in some cases might not be considered "domestic violence."
(Thomas R. Frieden, MD. “The National Intimate Partner and Sexual Violence Survey: 2010 Summary Report. National Center for Injury Prevention and Control of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. 2010.)
(Jennifer L. Truman, Ph.D., and Rachel E. Morgan, Ph.D. “BJS Statisticians Nonfatal Domestic Violence.” 2003–2012.)
I think you can see not only that domestic violence is one of the most frequent violent crimes in America but also that the presence of a loaded gun in an abusive American home puts a woman at a higher risk of experiencing injury and death during any and all confrontations – including likely parallel confrontations (1) in a home that houses those with substance abuse issues, (2) in a home that houses those with mental health issues, or (3) in a home that houses criminals who profit from any kind of dangerous illegal activity. In my view, that puts much of the county at risk.
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