{"id":8223,"date":"2019-10-29T08:13:24","date_gmt":"2019-10-29T12:13:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8223"},"modified":"2020-10-13T13:02:03","modified_gmt":"2020-10-13T17:02:03","slug":"a-dose-of-reality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=8223","title":{"rendered":"A Dose of Reality"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
\"gun,<\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Although\nthe average American may not encounter diabolical teen serial killers, sociopathic\ntorturers, or gun-toting assassins with preternatural aim and massive martial\narts skills of the types found so frequently in novels, there are plenty of real-life\ntragedies to baffle our humanity and cry out for explication. Readers and\nwriters of crime fiction don\u2019t have to look further than national crime statistics\nto understand the interest crime stories hold. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

A friend\npassed on the following information from the October 2019 \u201cviolence and health\u201d\nissue of Health Affairs<\/em>, the nation\u2019s\ntop health policy journal. Here are some data points, drawn from the 20 or so\npeer-reviewed articles\u2014the real-life backdrop against which crime stories are\nwritten and read.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2017, the United States experienced about\n19,500 homicides and 47,000 suicides from all causes. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

US violent death rates, which had fallen dramatically\nsince the 1970s and held steady for fifteen years are rising again, driven by\nincreasing rates of homicide and suicide by firearms. Rates of firearm deaths increased\nbetween 1999 and 2017 in most states; in 29 states, the rate increased more\nthan 20%.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The firearm homicide rate in the United States is\n25 times higher than that of other industrialized countries, while the firearm\nsuicide rate is eight times higher. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many mass shootings involve domestic or family\nviolence, as when the shooter opens fire on a group that includes a target\nindividual.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More than one in five US children are physically\nabused, and about one in six are sexually abused. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

About three in ten emergency physicians are\nassaulted every year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

About three percent of homicides are police\nkillings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Research on violence is underfunded. The federal\ngovernment spends about $25 million per death on HIV research, about $200,000\nper death on cancer research, and $600 per death on violence research.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In four surveys conducted between 2013 and 2019, in which gun owners were over-represented, the National Survey of Gun Policy found greater than 75% of respondents supported such policy measures as universal background checks, temporary gun removals based on family concerns, mandatory licensing for concealed carry including a safety test, and a mandatory safety course for first-time gun owners.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Journal editor Alan Weil says, \u201cEven as media attention tends to focus on incidents of mass violence, it is the daily burden of violence in its many forms that takes the greatest toll.\u201d <\/p>\n\n\n\n

You can order a copy of this themed issue here<\/a>. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Photo: r. nial bradshaw, creative commons license<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Although the average American may not encounter diabolical teen serial killers, sociopathic torturers, or gun-toting assassins with preternatural aim and massive martial arts skills of the types found so frequently in novels, there are plenty of real-life tragedies to baffle … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7856,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"A Dose of Reality - authoritative data on violence in the United States. ","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[52,267,35,104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8223","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crime","category-non-fiction","category-real-life","category-the-morgue"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/vweisfeld.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/04\/ghost.jpg?fit=286%2C384&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-28D","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8223"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8225,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8223\/revisions\/8225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/7856"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8223"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8223"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8223"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}