I wouldn't look at states as a whole I would look at cities, and based on that gun violence is a blue problem as most big cities are blue. To use your logic against you, if we have the most guns how come we don't have the highest "gun violence" as a country?

@Tejas The U.S. does have one of the highest rates of gun violence in the world, especially among industrialized nations. If you remove developing countries from the list then the U.S. is at the top. And it doesn't so well if a city or county or even a state has strict gun laws when a person can drive an hour or two to the next city or state and load up on all the guns they want.

If guns do make us safer, where's the evidence of that?

@Charles1971 big cities are the vast majority of "gun violence" so maybe it's the cities job to keep guns away from criminals. Why make all citizens defenseless because of thugs in the city? Again if someone is legally allowed to own/buy guns why shouldn't they be allowed?

Yes , guns do need better control , like in Canada.
To be licensed like a dog or car.

@Castlepaloma you need a license to defend yourself? Jeeze thats crazy to me.

@Tejas You need a license to drive a car, a license to hunt, a license to fish, a license to fly a plane, a license to be a doctor or a beautician. You don't need a license to defend yourself but you do need a license to buy and own a deadly weapon that can quickly kill many people from a distance.

@Charles1971 no actually you don't. You just have to be of age and legally allowed to own one.

@Tejas Few restrictions on owning a gun might be why there's a lot of gun violence. When people with criminal records, mental illnesses, and histories of domestic violence can all easily acquire a gun then that's absolutely going to result in a lot of murders.

@Charles1971 suicides are more than half of all gun deaths. Handguns are the most used gun in violence, so how come our politicians are trying to ban rifles over the weapons they are complaining about?

@Tejas Yes, suicides account for a significant number of gun deaths but that doesn't mean it doesn't count. I would imagine that politicians are trying to ban certain rifles because those rifles are repeatedly used in mash shootings. Rifles typically hold more ammunition, have much longer range, and fire larger and higher velocity bullets.

@Charles1971 rifles are used in less murders than bare hands knives and even hammers. Seems pretty silly to ban a weapon that has less bodies attributed to it than a bare hand

@Tejas I'd take my odds against someone with a knife or bare hands over my odds against someone with a gun. I can't outrun a bullet. A bare fist won't go through my front door. And nobody can mass strangle a group of innocent people in just a matter of seconds.

@Tejas Would you rather face someone coming at you with their bare hands or would you prefer someone coming at you with a loaded rifle?

@Charles1971 it depends on who's holding the gun and it depends on who the hand belongs to.