Have you been exposed to so-called gun violence?
Well, a lot of y’all may have served in either Iraq, Afghanistan, or both, so I suppose you have. Others live or lived in rough neighborhoods or communities, so maybe you have as well.
But, it also depends on what you mean by “exposed” here.
There are a lot of ways one can be exposed to a given thing, but a new study argues that exposure to so-called gun violence leads to depression and suicide, and it’s how they define one being exposed that gives me pause.
Study author Daniel C. Semenza and his colleagues sought to explore how the frequency, variety, and recency of exposure to gun violence are associated with depression, healthcare utilization, and suicide risk in the U.S. They hypothesized that repetitive and more recent exposure to gun violence would be associated with a greater risk of depression, increased suicide risk, and greater use of healthcare.
Survey participants included 8,009 non-institutionalized adults residing in the U.S. Data collection was carried out in 2024 in collaboration with Ipsos KnowledgePanel, a large probability-based online panel. The survey included assessments of depression symptoms (using the Patient Health Questionnaire–9) and suicidal ideation (via the Self-Injurious Thoughts and Behaviors Interview – Short Form – Self Report).
Participants were also asked whether they had ever attempted suicide and responded to several questions about their exposure to gun violence. Specifically, they were asked if they had ever: (1) known someone who died by firearm suicide, (2) been threatened with a firearm, (3) been shot by someone, (4) known a family member or friend who was shot, (5) witnessed a shooting, or (6) heard gunshots in their neighborhood. They also reported how often they had experienced each of these types of events as separate incidents and when they had last experienced them.
There are a lot of issues with this, but let’s start with the problem of “known someone who died by firearm suicide” for a moment.
Suicide is known to run in families. Depression, too, but as that tends to be present prior to suicide, that’s not overly surprising. Yet if someone kills themselves, and a relative is later diagnosed with depression or takes their own life, is it the result of someone else having been subject to “gun violence” or because of genetic factors?
If you’re going to make the case that exposure causes these mental health issues, you should probably account for that.
Further, they look at how often people experience these events, which also creates problems.
For example, people who live in poor urban neighborhoods are more likely to know someone who has been shot, including friends and family members, witness a shooting, and/or hear gunshots in the neighborhood. Some of them have also been threatened with a firearm before, too.
But the question one has to account for here is whether depression is the result of the so-called gun violence or the result of the living conditions that expose them to such things.
It’s not so much the violence in and of itself, but the inability to escape such an environment, that is frustrating. It’s also depressing.
It wouldn’t matter if it were stabbings, muggings, or anything else. It’s the presence of crime and the inability to escape that wears on the psyche.
I know this because I’ve been there. I’ve lived within 100 yards–less than a full football field–from two shooting incidents, including one where I had the gunman in my sights waiting to see if he’d raise the gun and pull the trigger again. I’ve lost friends to suicide and homicide.
And while I can’t say I don’t have depression, I can say that I had it before any of that happened.
In fact, let’s be real here, depression can actually impact you in ways that actually land you in those neighborhoods I mentioned above, as well as being the result of those previously discussed genetic issues.
It’s just pretty problematic to me to pronounce there’s this link when it seems that like that’s exactly what those who conducted this research were hoping to find.
Editor’s Note: Anti-gun academics and their allies in the mainstream media continue to gaslight, spin, and lie about our Second Amendment rights.
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