>to point out that suicide risk is still a public safety risk... ...

I disagree with about everything you mentioned about suicide. This does not mean I am saying you are wrong, you can be right as far as how you feel the impact and all that, I just don't feel the same about the impact, and I do not consider suicide a reason to consider banning anything.

> Gun deaths involved in illegal activities are definitely public safety issues.

I do not think this is statistically significant. How many members of public are also injured when a drug dealer is shot? There was a time when drive by shootings inuring and killing bystanders was more common in the news, but I think that is much less these days, and even at it's peak, if you take out the drug dealers, drug buyers, the thieves, etc - how many in the public are affected by being shot?

> only about 48% of homicides could be directly attributed to gangs, with the rest being due to interpersional relationships, and "unknown causes"

This is some information, it seems about than half the homicides are targeted deaths where a criminal is killing someone likely due to illegal activities, and about half are from people who have known each other a long time and were likely arguing about money or someone sleeping with someone kind of things.

Skimming the info via snopes it seems about 2/3 of the 'interpersonal relationship kind of homicides' happened with a gun and 1/3 of the kills used something else.

Here's the point I am / was trying to make above and here, I disagree that these deaths should be chalked up as public safety issues broadly. Most of these killings took out the intended target without collateral deaths of public bystanders, neighbors, etc.

If there were no guns, knives, other methods, and the only way to kill a human was the use of poison gas, and 10,000 a year people killed not just the intended target in the interpersonal relationship but also anyone living in adjacent apartments or others at such and such restaurant / pub / etc.. then I would be behind this as public safety issue.

> Gun crimes significantly affect minorities, which has a significant accumulative effect not just on public safety, but the health, safety and economic stability of significant portions of minority communities.

Understand the importance here, but disagree. If you had said "Violent crimes significantly affect minorities, which has a significant accumulative effect on the health, safety and economic stability of significant portions of minority communities" - I would say yes, and this is important stuff. Regardless of the tools that violent offenders use, the issue is complex and I think it's important for the whole community.

> Wait, cell phone use causes deaths? You lost me there.

"In 2016 alone, 3,450 people were killed. 391,000 were injured in motor vehicle crashes involving distracted drivers in 2015.

During daylight hours, approximately 481,000 drivers are using cell phones while driving" [1]

This does not include times when baby drowns in tub while mom is addicted to fbook. Also does not include the times when texts or social accounts on a cell phone lead to argument about interpersonal relationships that ends in death.

now here I agree:

>people are not rational, and we should be legislating based on real-world harms, not based purely on the "perception" of risk.

On that statement, we are on total agreement.

[1] https://www.nhtsa.gov/risky-driving/distracted-driving