Men and Their Guns

The New York Times article I read about had some interesting things to say and men and their guns. The article started out by examining NYC statistics as far as life expectancy goes. The average American woman can expect to like 81 years, and the average man 76. In NYC the average goes up for women but stays the same for men. In the long run, a year is a long time. The question then arose, Why do women live longer especially in NYC. The first thought was health related issues. After further examination both men and women have very similar rates of cancer related deaths, but men have a much higher risk of heart problems. This is just one of the 2 main reasons men in NYC, and also in general, are less likely to live past 65.

The other reason for men living a shorter live, especially in NYC, are their guns. As the article puts it, men settle their problems with guns. Men in NYC are 9 times more likely to die due to gun violence than women. Although overall the murder rate has gone in the last 20 years (2,200 to 500) men still make up a significant portion of the murders. Not only are only men more likely to be both victims and perpetrators, but race becomes a factor. The health department studied the demographics of gun related murders in NYC and had this to say about the probability that the perpetrator/victim was black, "The health department puts it at 3 times that of Latino men, 12 times that of white men and 70 that of men of Asian background."

So how do we fix it? Solution: we can't. We are not allowed to search people randomly on the streets and take away their weapons. Similarly we can't ban guns, simply because of our constitutional rights.

The article seems to have no clear solution in sight. Personally, neither do I. My only advice is to educate the public and hope. Although truthful, it seems like a shame that violence, life expectancy, and health problems all boils down to race and gender. In a perfect world, we would all be equally, but unfortunately, we aren't. My question is, why aren't we equal? Is it genetic, biological, or simply a fluke that men are more likely to die younger?

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/09/03/nyregion/03nyc.html?_r=1&scp=5&sq=gender&st=cse