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Press release: The Fenway Institute of Fenway Health has released a policy brief showing that gun violence poses a substantial threat to the health of the LGBT community, and urging the LGBT community to join the movement to enact a reasonable gun control agenda in the United States.

“Much of the public’s focus on gun control is to prevent massacres like the one that took place in June at the Pulse nightclub in Orlando when 49 people, most of them Latino gay men, were murdered,” said Stephen L. Boswell, MD, FACP, President and CEO of Fenway Health. “But of the 33,000 people who are shot to death each year, about 21,000 die by suicide and 11,700 die by homicide. Enactment of a reasonable gun control agenda would surely result in fewer deaths of LGBT people by firearms, and this is an issue that LGBT healthcare organizations should embrace.”

Stricter gun control measures at the state level strongly correlate with lower rates of suicide, although data on death rates by suicide for sexual and gender minorities are not available because sexual orientation and gender identity are not recorded on death certificates. However, it is well established that sexual and gender minorities report substantially higher rates of suicide attempts than the general population in both adolescence and adulthood. Between 10 and 20 percent of sexual minority adults report having attempted suicide at least once in their lives, while up to 40 percent of transgender adults have. Both rates are substantially higher than the 4.6 percent lifetime suicide attempt rate for the overall US population.

LGBT people are also more likely to be the targets of hate crimes than any other group in the United States. When a gun or other deadly weapon is used in a hate crime, it is classified as aggravated assault. Anti-LGBT hate crimes are more likely to be classified as aggravated assaults than those motivated by bias against any other group.

“The LGBT community has long advocated for legislative and policy change to allow LGBT people to enjoy the same rights and privileges as other citizens. It has also worked to make the healthcare system more accessible to LGBT people in order to reduce the significant disparities in health that LGBT people experience,” said Sean Cahill, Director of Policy Research at The Fenway Institute. “The next chapter of the LGBT cultural and political movement must embrace gun control to improve the basic safety of the LGBT community.”

The gun control agenda outlined in the policy brief titled, Gun Violence and LGBT Health, includes the following:

-Reinstatement of the Congressional ban on assault weapons, which ended in 2004;

-State and federal bans on the purchase of guns by those who have been convicted of domestic abuse or hate crimes or who are included on the No Fly list maintained by the U.S. Transportation Security Administration;

-Background checks on those purchasing firearms at gun shows or online; and

-Promotion of safer gun design and storage.

The brief also includes ways for individuals to take action on gun control, with options ranging from learning about state gun control bills and advocating for their passage; suicide-proofing one’s home; joining a gun control advocacy group; and donating to organizations that fight gun violence.

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34 COMMENTS

  1. You know what we LGBT people love? It’s other people telling us what to do and think, especially when it comes to what we do with our persons and property.

    • Right!

      ‘You’ don’t really dig/support/foster any public health issues. It is really stupid of them how they continually try to co-opt ‘You’.

      Maybe it’s support [or support by silience] of all their other issues? Dunno.

      Suffice to say that gun control didn’t kill the poor victims in the night-club [and all decent people are both terribly saddened and enraged by that], it just won’t help either.

    • I especially like it when they say that we’re a threat to their way of life and use the government to force their ideas on us.

    • 40% of trans-gender respondents have admitted to attempting suicide. That only accounts for those that made the attempt and survived, not those that made an attempt and were successful.
      Psychiatrists long ago concluded that homosexuality isn’t a mental disorder on its own, rather is simply a sexual preference, a personal taste if you will.
      A so-called trans-gendered individual, on the other hand, is usually one that actually BELIEVES themselves to be the opposite o their biological gender. This delusion is often accompanied by many other mental and emotional disorders and can be viewed as a tell-tale symptom of a deeper, more potentially deadly problem.
      One of the worst things the LGBT “leaders” have done in recent years is to convince many emotionally unstable people that their delusion is not only normal, but desirable. Thus, many are no longer seeking out the psychological treatment they need to deal with their delusions. Thus, a significant number turn to drug abuse and suicide because they are told there is no help for them.
      If the LGBT leaders care about those (thankfully few) members of their group, they need to stress treatment, and not surgical mutilation, is a perfectly acceptable thing.

  2. Stricter gun control measures at the state level strongly correlate with lower rates of suicide

    No. It correlates with lower levels of suicide by firearm. Otherwise the US wouldn’t fit somewhere between the UK and France for suicide rates. From time to time someone will cook up a study looking only at one country, where they try to pass off a correlation between gun ownership and overall suicide by failing to control for social isolation, but that’s a fairly easy tactic to spot, once you know what they’re trying.

    • And you know they will NEVER use Japan as a focus, simply because they have such a high suicide rate and very low private firearm ownership.

      • It’s of no interest to the anti gunners that Japan has a high per capita suicide rate than the total combined per capita homicide and suicide rate in the US.

    • Yes, my inside the waistband holster MAY (however unlikely) cause a rash. That in and of itself is a health issue (sarc). On another topic, that Brownell’s popup is really getting to be a Fμ©|{ing pain…..

      • Thank you for mentioning the Brownell’s ad. I’m tired of chasing it to get rid of it, too. (Note to advertisers: You don’t gain customers by inconveniencing customers and pissing them off. Really.)

        • Note to advertisers/marketers. POPUP ads don’t work. Good for the scammers (see google) but PROVE a increase in net income.

          Really, does anyone intentionally click on a popup or other ad link and actually buy something???

          Get on the Midway email list if you want annoying vs Brownells. Some days 5 from Midway. If they would just quit with the chicom clothing BS would be good.

    • Amazing what a little well-placed cash can accomplish. All kinds of “policies”. Bloomberg has a big wallet.

  3. Advocating for minority groups to support causes outside their immediate concern is hardly a new tactic. Someone once called this process “convergence” during the cold war, whereby every popular social movement in America was hijacked by thinly veiled Soviet ideology. This hasn’t changed much, SJW news outlets often read like bullet points from a Politburo meeting.

  4. Not just “Gun” violence but “Violence” in general poses a threat to the LGBT community. Since guns are simple machines and easily and readily able to be fabricated or procured in the black market, my suggestion to LGBT groups is to empower themselves by making safety their own responsibility. It is easy to say agenda based buzz words like “gun violence” or “public health issue,” but not preparing could make you a future victim. “Reasonable” gun control will make obtaining and bearing a firearm for self defense more difficult for the LGBT community. Democrats should work on changing the culture of violence, intolerance, and criminality – not the culture of self reliance, embracing the responsibility of preparedness of the unknown and ones own safety, or if the culture of people who own guns for fun, sport, leisure, and/or self defense.

  5. A minority that has a long history of violence perpetrated against them is in favor of removing the ability to protect themselves? That makes so much sense………….

    Seriously, the only thing that makes sense for this angle is that they continue to portray themselves as ‘victims’. Professional victims gain a lot of support, sympathy and clout in the current political climate.

    • I really like how the press release recommends denying a constitutional right based on a secret government enemies list. It wasn’t very long ago that the entire LGBT community was on the government’s undesirables list…what makes them so sure they’ll never end up on one of those lists again?

  6. How the hell do you “suicide proof” your home? Do I have to lock up my car keys, sleeping pills, knives, razor blades, and any rope in the house, along with my guns?

    On a side note, the LGBT community has the same right as any of us to keep and bear arms. They just need to take advantage of it and protect themselves. Many are, and I applaud them for it.

  7. Suicide proofing one’s home.

    The only possible way to suicide proof a dwelling is to preemptively kill anyone in it.

    • LOL! Reminds of the interview with the serial killers neighbor –

      Neighbor – He was kind of a loner you know?
      Reporter – Of course he was a loner! He killed everyone he fucking met!

  8. According to the FBI Jews suffer the most hate crimes. LGBTQWERTY is way down the list. The biggest threat to homosexuals are other homosexuals. Lesbians have the highest rates of domestic abuse. Male homosexuals are second. Trannies get in trouble most often when they come on to someone before they disclose that they are pretending to be a woman.

    • Using the same logic in their report, Fenway investigators should urge Federal legislation to regulate LGBT sex, drug, and alcohol consumption. We have far higher injury and mortality rates from sexually transmitted diseases and substance abuse than from firearms.

  9. War is peace, slavery is freedom…. Making yourself defenseless makes you safer.

    I find the Fenway Institute to be double plus ungood.

  10. Elected Homosexuals are socialist progressive in their political orientation. The majority of activist homosexuals are the same.
    They have never believed in liberty. They don’t support the second amendment or the first amendment.

    Homosexual socialist will use the jack boot of government to stand on the neck of people until they get their way.
    State senator Tom Ammiano, the proud gay white man, wrote the law in California making stalking victims wait an extra 10 days to get a gun. He gets cheers from tens of thousands of people at homosexual pride parades.
    I wonder how many women have been raped while they waited to get a firearm in California???

    Palm Springs California gay mayor, Robert Moon, and his homosexual city council members voted to restrict civil rights in that city.

    The nasty as they want to be women of UT Austin are showing how most in the gay community, real think about the Bill of Rights.

    It’s too bad more homosexual people don’t read the Gay Patriot blog or listen to my favorite lesbian the gun toting Tammy Bruce.
    They have learned nothing from Orlando.

    They didn’t get a gun like Harvey Milk told them to.

  11. If you are NOT doing anything except with a consenting adult AND people want to destroy you – you need to be able to defend yourself and your loved ones. PERIOD.

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