Loud movies and volunteers in today’s letters to the editor.

Pick of the day: A gun is more a threat than a defense

After Newtown, Conn., Second Amendment zealots will insist on their right to defend themselves without any rational sense that violence begets violence. They will submit that a knife can kill, while ignoring the fact that in China, on the same day as the Newtown massacre, a knife-wielder succeeded only in wounding, not killing, 22 children at a school.

They will yell, “Obama is coming for our guns!”

And they will chant the old, tired refrain, “You’ll get my gun when you pry it from my cold, dead hands.”

As a physician concerned with the public health effects of gun ownership, I applaud them for their honesty, about that last point at least.

Multiple studies have shown a net risk of harm or death from owning a gun. Gun ownership is associated with more risk of death, completed suicide, accidental gun death and risk of being shot in an assault.

So, gun owners, your gun may well lead to you having those “cold, dead hands” after all. That’s certainly what happened to “gun enthusiast” Nancy Lanza.

MARK A. SCHLEUPNER

ROANOKE