You should not be forced to remain defenseless because someone else has decided you aren’t capable of defending yourself.
I spend a lot of time correcting bad information about women and firearms, but occasionally, I come across a claim so ridiculous that I must wonder where on earth someone got it. This one certainly qualifies:
Really? Ninety-nine percent? Cool story bro’.
As a firearms instructor who has spent years training women to protect themselves, that number immediately set off my BS meter. So naturally, I went looking for the data to back it up. I couldn’t find it. What I found tells a very different story. A study published in the Journal of Criminal Justice, “Self-defense with guns: The consequences”, analyzed federal National Crime Victimization Survey data and looked at what happened when crime victims attempted to defend themselves, including when they used firearms.
If you’re not familiar, the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS)is the nation’s primary source of information on criminal victimization. It is sponsored by the Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Statistics and conducted by the U.S. Census Bureau. And this isn’t just data on crimes that someone reported to the police. The NCVS collects information directly from victims about both reported and unreported crimes. It also collects information about the victim’s sex, whether weapons were involved and whether the victim was injured. In other words, this is exactly the kind of federal crime-victimization data we should be looking at when someone makes a sweeping claim about what happens to women who defend themselves. It’s quickly apparent that the numbers for women tell a very different story.
By Kerry Slone
