… of complications related to being shot in the head by either his 4 year old brother or his 13 year old brother. They were playing with a gun in their parents house in Morristown, Tennessee. Tennessee law is pretty weak on personal firarm responsibility. No charges will be fired. They have suffered enough.
A bunch of people cleaning up after a church fundraiser in Wentzville, Missouri, started popping balloons for fun and, I’m guessing, some nimrod decided it would be fun to shoot one (this has not been established, but you can read the story and decide for yourself) and accidentially shot Aaron Dwan. Dwan will live, but he’s in serious condition. We await word on charges.
The husband of a newlywed couple shot his bride and himself with the 9mm she gave him as a gift because he didn’t know about the part where a bullet stays in the chamber if you rack the gun and pull out the clip. The injuries were minor but I’m thinking there are some regrets. Some guy shot his friend on the shooting range in Painesville, Ohio because he didn’t know how to clear his .357 properly. Nineteen year old Facebooker Jared Hyndrich who posted numerious photos of himself and his extensive gun collection is dead. He put an unloaded gun to his head and pulled the trigger. But it was loaded after all. Lee Allan Miars of Oregon did roughly the same thing; He was telling a story about a gun, and he happened to have a gun handy, so he used it as a prop. I’m not sure if the story was supposed to end with someone getting shot fatally in the head, but Miars himself certainly did end that way.
So, in case you were wondering, that’s what’s been going on in the world of personal firearms antics over the last ten days in the US.
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Exactly why I sold mine years ago when my son was born.
But, Greg, for the NRA and other ‘true believers’ , these stories will just provide further ‘proof’ that ”guns don’t kill people, bullets kill them.”
Sadly, In these cases, even that single, last bullet is still as deadly as the other 17.
During the Iraq War, as civil liberties were being scuttled in the name of anti-terrorism, I often heard defenders of President Bush say “The Bill of Rights is not a suicide pact”.
But I never hear conservatives apply that line of reasoning to the Second Amendment.
Also, a 13 year old boy has died in a shooting accident at an American base in the UK.
No, that’s just a small sample of how incredibly stupid people behave and there is nothing in the world that will ever get the stupid to behave any more intelligently.
The idiots in the first paragraph of the above story have not been charged. That’s criminally stupid.
Would banning handguns stop the Darwinian culling of the herd? Probably not. There are just too many ways to be stupid. Is it sad for the children? Of course it is but for the adults, not so much.
On the other hand, it would be nice if the NRA put as much money and effort into gun safety as it puts into jawboning about gun rights. Then, those owning the guns would at least act responsibly. Except for the stupid ones.
From what I can find quickly, there are about 33,000 gun deaths per year but less than 1500 are accidents and somewhere around 500 involve children. There are some 440,000 deaths from smoking and 40,000+ deaths in car crashes, 14,000 of them alcohol related (more than .08 BAC).
I’m not sure what all this says but it might be a good idea to trade a gun for a no smoking pledge. There are lots of ways to be safe but there are an infinite number of ways to be stupid.
T. Hunt
Sorry, link vanished, I’ll try this:
http://www.momlogic.com/2008/08/protect_your_kids_from_guns.php
T. Hunt
I meant to send this story in when it happened but never got around to it. Hopefully it’s not a repost.
To answer those who would say that crime would go down if everyone is armed this NY Times article shows what *actually* happens when a whole bunch of people with guns get involved in a shoot out:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/01/nyregion/off-duty-atf-officer-is-killed-intervening-after-robbery.html?_r=1
I was always taught, by my dad, that there is no such thing as an unloaded weapon. Period, end of story. Even taken apart, one is to treat the barrel as if it contains a live round. (So many people are injured or killed by a weapon that has been or is in the process of being disassembled.)
Also, to never, ever, point it at someone (especially myself!) unless I intended to use it on them, and if I did, to not waste time talking, but to just pull the damn trigger.
Basic, basic, basic weapon safety rules that should be taught to every child on the planet, whether they or anyone they know has a weapon.
A serious question: do you support swimming pool control? I fail to see any difference between the two issues. In both cases, an item that millions of people own for pleasure leads to hundreds of accidental deaths every year, which could be prevented if we outlawed the item.
Gee, T. Hunt, what a horrible, callous, and circular attitude.
“They were accidentally killed by a gun? Well, that just means they
weren’t praying hard enoughshouldn’t have worn a short skirtwere stupid and deserved to die”.Oh, and your darwinian crap is crap. No deleterious genetic traits are being selected against in these pointless accidents.
Nathan:
Swimming pools are intended for pleasure. Owning a swimming pool for pleasure = normal.
Guns are intended for killing*. Owning a gun for pleasure = stupid and dangerous.
*And are much better at it than swimming pools, another point you fail to take into account
@Nathan
Yes, swimming pools can be extremely dangerous, especially for children. But here’s the thing: I don’t have to worry that someone will bring a swimming pool to my child’s school, or to a political rally, or to the local bar. If I choose to stay away from swimming pools, I can do so. It’s because I can’t choose to stay away from guns that they’re a problem.
Forbidden snowflake–guns can be used to kill, but many gun owners own them for pleasure or utility, in the exact same way one would own a pool or a steak knife. I fail to see the difference. Let me restate the analogy, even clearer:
Adam owns several guns. He uses only them for target shooting, which he finds pleasurable. There is a small chance that someone will accidentally die as a result of this gun ownership, a chance which would reduce to zero if he did not own the guns.
Betty owns a swimming pool. She uses it for swimming, which she finds pleasurable. There is a small chance that someone will accidentally die as a result of this pool ownership, a chance which would reduce to zero if she did not own the pool.
What’s the difference? The only argument I can see is that a gun is either much more likely to cause accidental death, or much less pleasurable than a pool. As to the latter, I know of no reliable way to compare the pleasure Adam gets from target shooting to the pleasure Betty gets from swimming, so I’ll assume they’re at least similar, if not equal. Let’s address the first part, the odds of accidental death.
According to CDC data, there were 7,733 accidental firearm deaths from 1999-2009. (http://webappa.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/mortrate10_us.html but it looks like you have to do the search yourself). In the same period, there were 38,022 accidental drownings. Now, obviously not all of these were in swimming pools. But the data is pretty clear: pools are a lot more dangerous than guns. If you want to start saving lives, without concerning yourself with the fact that you’re taking away items that people find pleasurable, you should start with pools, not guns. Your claim that owning a pool is “normal” while owning a gun is “stupid and dangerous” is belied by the actual data.
Yes, in fact, I am for swimming pool control.
In fact, in my community private swimming pools are required to have a fence of a certain height with gates that only adults can open to prevent toddlers from accidentally drowning.
Our municipal pool is only open when Red Cross qualified lifeguards are on duty, because of regulations in place. There is a fence with barbed wire at the top to enforce this regulation.
At my local Y, the pool regularly gets closed when thunderstorms pass by, even though the pool is indoors in a well-grounded building. It sucks — I’ve had my own swim session cut short or canceled on several occasions.
Would you oppose sensible regulations like this? And why would you oppose regulation of something that is even more inherently dangerous, and the only product which is manufactured with the intent to cause harm to humans?
(Oh yes, say anything you want about paper targets — those are mere surrogates because society frowns upon you using real people for practice. If guns weren’t meant to harm people, they would only have enough “stopping power” to put a hole in a paper target. And the entire category of “stopping power” wouldn’t exist.)
I don’t know how you arrived at your figures, but the CDC says this:
So, you’re off by a factor of 10. Nice try.
Kevin–The original post (and previous posts by the same author) seems to be making the argument for very stringent gun control, close to an outright ban, not minor regulations. It is in that context that I ask the question. If I have misinterpreted this, I apologize.
And despite all of the common sense controls on swimming pools that you list, several thousand people die from accidental drownings each year. We could reduce this number to nearly zero if we wanted to. Ban swimming pools, close public beaches, forbid water-based activities like kayaking, canoeing, sailing, etc. Presumably, you do not support such regulation. The question I’m getting at is why. The only answer that makes sense to me is that you recognize that millions of people get considerable pleasure from doing such things, and that such pleasure outweighs the loss of life, no matter how tragic. I contend that gun owners derive significant pleasure from hunting, target shooting, collecting, etc., all of which are legal and nonobjectionable, and that we should at least take this into account when analyzing the accidental loss of life that can occur. If the loss of life were extremely high, an argument can be made for banning ownership. As I have indicated however, the current statistics seem to suggest that banning swimming pools, rather than guns, would be the logical first step. Do you think I have gone wrong somewhere in my logic?
As to several of your other comments, they are simply wrong. Guns are simply not the only product “manufactured with the intent to cause harm to humans.” (Pepper spray, anyone?) The idea that people only use paper targets because they really want to shoot humans but society frowns upon it is so bizarre that I don’t even know what to say. Is it your opinion that every Olympic sharpshooter is a serial-killer wannabe? What about people who do archery as a hobby–same thing? Want to shoot that crossbow at a person but society won’t allow it so you have to use a target?
Kevin–I clearly specified “accidental” deaths, not intentional ones, and provided you with the link.
All these stories reminds me of a “stupid criminal” story I heard on the radio a few years ago.
A guy goes into a bank with a handgun intending to rob the place.
He fires two warning shots in the air to get everyone’s attention, but the only thing that happens is “click”-“click”.
He peers down the barrel of the gun to see what the problem is, and pulls the trigger.
BANG.
End of robbery.
The original post … seems to be making the argument for very stringent gun control, close to an outright ban
It does? Do you take meds, because I think you skipped a dose. This OP does not make an argument of any kind. Nada. Voices in your head, man.
Kevin at #14-
I got my info from a quick google search and some averaging. You quote a CDC report that means… what exactly? The only hard number you give is the 38,505 deaths in 1994 is up 130% from 1962. But that’s ALL gun deaths, including murder, justifiable homicide and accidents. And it included both children and adults. And the numbers have gone down some 14% from 1994 to 2009, where the death number is about 33,000. And the big scary ‘trend’ didn’t continue. It not only slowed but it went into decline.
So what’s the big scary number you’d like to put out? That there was even one child’s death is tragic but there are many more dangerous things in this world than guns. Perspective is all I’m asking for.
And Miss Snowflake-
Horrible and callous? Maybe. But circular? Really? Were you just looking for a third word to plug in there so it would fit with some imaginary idea you have about writing style?
Callous? Yes. I’m a realist. Children are going to die, many in horrible ways and needlessly so. If my child were to die, I would be very sad. But I would try to look for the actual cause rather than blaming some well-worn bogeyman. Our lives are filled with danger and a lot of that danger comes from stupid people. Stupid because they don’t know or stupid because they willfully ignore consequences. Either one is dangerous. I read a story about a child who shot himself in the head with a gun he found while sitting in the car at a gas station, while his parent(s) went in to pay the tab. Absolutely tragic. A waste of life. Stupid people left a loaded gun where a child could find it. (and they weren’t even charged with a crime-unbelieveable!) But I think that child would have come to harm sooner or later. Maybe not death but harm nonetheless. His parents would have left the gate open to the swimming pool or taken him on a riding mower or allowed him to play with knives. They would have done something to endanger him whether it was an overt act or negligence. Because they were the kind of people who couldn’t properly assess risk.
If that makes me horrible, then so be it. It would be nice if no child ever died from a gun accident. I think a place to start is by charging the parents of that boy with at least manslaughter and seeing to it that they can never legally possess a firearm again. We won’t do that, though, because that would be too horrible.
People who cannot assess risk are doomed. People who cannot learn are doomed. Sooner or later they will take themselves out. My hope is that they will avoid taking any of us with them.
With luck, some of us will avoid them and without it, some will be hurt by them. That’s the evolution of a species.
We could wrap ourselves in bubble wrap and never go outside or do anything until we were 40. And then what?
If you have a gun, secure it. Lock it up until you have occasion to use it for whatever it is that you do. Hunting, target shooting, etc. I think anyone who keeps a loaded gun in the house for ‘defense’ is a loon. Unless you are a trained law officer. And even then I have my suspicions. Make it so that getting to that gun is an act that can only be performed by the gun owner. Otherwise, get rid of them.
http://www.kcrg.com/news/local/Police-Arrest-Des-Moines-Man-After-Stray-Bullet-Goes-Through-Floor-138292174.html
Idiot teen playing his a gun accidentally shoots his upstairs neighbor. Luckily, the floor slowed the bullet down.
Kevin:
And how many “intentional” swimming pool deaths were there? Makes guns look even worse, doesn’t it?
Well, this is some stunningly egregious ignorance of statistics.
To figure out how dangerous pools are in comparison to guns, you would have to divide the casualties by the amount of exposure.
I.e., you would have to calculate the probability of death for one person spending one hour in a pool vs. one person spending one hour handling a gun. Otherwise you end up like one of the morons who think that since most accidents happen at home, the home is the most dangerous place to be.
If my username is too long for you to remember and accurately reproduce, just copy & paste it. Simple manners.
WTF does writing style has to do with anything? All of my grievances were with your substance, not style, and anyway, circular logic is a logical fallacy, not a stylistic error.
Your judgment of people who are killed in shooting accidents is circular. “They died because they were stupid and deserved to die, and I can tell that they were stupid and deserved to die from the fact that they died”. Though it is a moral argument and not a factual one, its circular structure is quite apparent.
I can’t quite see what you are getting at with the rest of your comment, but it appears to be something about how the problem is stupid people, which for some reason means that not giving guns to stupid people won’t make the world a safer place because even if they don’t shoot someone, they would maybe probably do some other stupid thing eventually, and more attempts to categorize “those people” as some separate kind of people and not regular ones who have lapses of judgment.
For those people using guns for pleasure: just make it a legal requirement that all firearms are kept in a locked safe at the target range, except when used by licensed people at that range.
When I was 9 I visited the US for a year, in school I learned about the bill of rights.
1st amendment: well, thats reasonable.
2nd amendment: thats just ridiculous!
I said that last bit out loud, which is the first time I ever got sent to the principals office. I still stand by it though.
Over the weekend eleven people were crushed, mangled, and burned to death in a pile up on Florida’s I-75 due to low visibility caused by a brush fire that was possibly started intentionally. A kid wearing headphones walked in front of a moving freight train and was killed in Hurricane, W. VA. And, so far in 2012, a little over 50000 Americans have died from heart disease. Maybe we need more stringent regulations on cars, fires, headphones, and cheeseburgers too. Somehow I don’t think that will stop stupid people from doing stupid things that get themselves and others killed.
Forbidden Snowflake-
There you go. Pasted. You’re welcome.
Greg has a thing about guns. He posted this story for a reason and that was to point up how bad guns are. But are they that bad? He ends with “…in case you were wondering, that’s what’s been going on in the world of personal firearms antics over the last ten days in the US.”
First of all, I’m sure that’s not ALL that went on in the world of personal firearms antics. All the stories were horrible and tragic. But the central theme wasn’t a gun, it was stupidity. If you possess an item, it behooves you to learn its operation and its lethality. Or get rid of it. All of the people mentioned disregarded the lethality of the gun that they possessed. In most of the cases, that lethality bit them in the ass but unfortunately the first couple’s mistake tragically impacted their son.
My reasoning was that people who don’t bother to educate themselves about the things they own will get hurt. When those things are guns, the hurt can be deadly. And the death of innocent bystanders is tragic. And most of the time that can be avoided by taking proper precautions.
I don’t believe that banning a particular item solves any problem related to the misuse of that item. Prohibition has never worked, as evidenced by our War on Drugs and the years spent under the Volstead Act. And my point was that we, as a society, need to address problems with intelligent solutions (Registration, testing, training), not hysteria (oh those evul guns!!). My other point was that there are people out there that are prone to disaster. Cars, guns, alcohol, butter knives, gasoline, lawn darts, whatever. A careless, ignorant person will find a way to injure himself or others. And I never intimated that they deserved to die. The reported outcome was they DID die. I wish they hadn’t.
Do you consider the shooting of the boy by his brothers to be lapse in judgment? Or the boy that shot himself with his parents gun in the car a lapse in judgment? A lapse in judgment is when I hit the snooze button one too many times but think I can still make it to work on time. If that’s what you consider a lapse in judgment, then Mt. St. Helens was just a mud slide.
Cheezburgers, yes.
But I don’t know why you are making this comparison. Suppose you wanted to consider regulating something. Smoke detectors, say. Landowners who rent apartments must have smoke detectors i the hallways and other key locations. This is actually a regulation that happens in many states.
So, go to Florida, count the number of people that would be saved by smoke detectors, and count the number who die in car accidents. The latter will be larger.
Therefore don’t bother with smoke detectors.
That makes no sense.
Forbidden: Actually, not really. It depends on what question one is asking.
Let’s say I’m asking “do I walk into a house with a gun and hang around” vs. “Do I go and sit by the pool” then exposure would be relevant. But if I ask “Do we pass a regulation banning all pools” vrs “do we pass a regulation banning all guns” and you want to know which one will save more lives, then exposure is not important; The only stat that counts then (assuming the same exact population … the regulation is state wide, so all people in the state, for example) is the number of deaths per unit time overall.
Oh, come on, he could have just as easily have done that with a knife or a piece of string!
Nathan: A serious question: do you support swimming pool control? I fail to see any difference between the two issues.
Is it that you can’t tell the difference between a swimming pool and a gun?
Please re-read my blog post and then quote for me the part where I suggested banning either guns or swimming pools. I’ll wait here.
…
OK, now that we’ve got that settled: Did you know that swimming pools are in fact regulated? No? They are, in most communities. They are unsafe because they are full of water and we are not fish. Children die in them all the time. You can’t have a swimming pool in your back yard without a fence around it, and the fence needs to meet certain specs, in most places.
The truth is that both guns and swimming pools are dangerous, both are regulated. Let me tell you the difference between the two:
If someone wrote a blog post about swimming pools deaths, there would be a discussion about how to make swimming pools safer.
If someone wrote a blog post about gun deaths, people would show up demanding to know why you want to ban guns (even though that was mentioned) guns would be compared to swimming pools, auto accidents, and string. Yes, string.
Why is that, do you suppose, Nathan? Or did you use up all your brain cells drawing that comparison between pools and guns and getting the part about how I want to ban all guns totally wrong?
Nathan [12] The vast majority of those drownings were not in swimming pools. Increased safety awareness and increased regulation of activities associated with drowning, over the last 50 years, has reduced the drowning rate in recreational and residential setting by a full order of magnitude. Many drowings are associated with flooding; Including that with the same statistic would be like mixing up accidental firearm deaths with some other random think like lightning strikes. And, of course, the comparison of different ways to die is not even a tiny bit relevant to the questions surrounding safety or danger of a particular activity.
Kevin [13] you have it all wrong. More people die in car accidents than in pools, therefore, it makes no sense to try to make pools safer!!!11!!
Nathan [15] Kevin–The original post (and previous posts by the same author) seems to be making the argument for very stringent gun control, close to an outright ban, not minor regulations.
I would be happy if there was an overall “ban” on guns, or if people have to keep their guns in lockers outside of town, etc. etc. But I know that people like their guns, have fun with them, use them for hunting, etc. So I’m perfectly willing to put my own personal desires aside and strive for a situation in which people have what is reasonable.
But, then there are people like you: You see a mention of gun violence, accidental death, or safety and take it as a call for an all out ban. You make absurd and meticulousness arguments against any kind of safety improvements.
Nathan, you can have your fucking guns. All I want is the following:
1) Repeal the second amendment. We need to make gun ownership a normal thing that we negotiate as a society (much like swimming pools!) and not some kind of protected activity.
2) Hold people who are responsible for gun deaths responsible for gun deaths! (And injuries).
3) Do a better job of keeping track of guns.
4) Do a better job of limiting ownership to people who should not have them.
I’m not sure why you would object to any of these compromises I’m offering you.
And despite all of the common sense controls on swimming pools that you list, several thousand people die from accidental drownings each year. We could reduce this number to nearly zero if we wanted to. Ban swimming pools, close public beaches, forbid water-based activities like kayaking,
You really should learn about stuff before you start yammering about it. In recreational settings, on lakes, etc. , the number of deaths due to drowning has in fact been significantly reduced due to both safety awareness and regulation. Oh, and some technology as well. A much higher percentage of peple now who drown in recreational settings do so because they are either a) stupid/drunk/badly behaved or b) extraordinarily unlucky (like the guy a couple of years ago that got his clothing caught on an outboard he was trying to un-weed, the motor shifted, plunging his head underwater, pinned him there. He was found later with his feet sticking up off the stern)
You say we could reduce drownings significantly. Guess what. WE DID. without draconian rules. Not to zero, but to very very low.
I want that with guns. I don’t know why you don’t. Are you planning something? Is there some reason you don’t want people looking into your gun ownership, Nathan?
I read a story about a child who shot himself in the head with a gun he found while sitting in the car at a gas station, while his parent(s) went in to pay the tab. Absolutely tragic. A waste of life. Stupid people left a loaded gun where a child could find it. (and they weren’t even charged with a crime-unbelieveable!) But I think that child would have come to harm sooner or later.
Seroiusly? Did you just say that? Really? Holy crap. You are one very very fucked up dude. Wow.
If that makes me horrible, then so be it.
Oh, it does, motherfucker. Do you actually have a child? Your children should be in a foster home. Do you own any guns? They should be taken away from you.
Wow. That’s the most fucked up thing I’ve EVER read in a comment on any of my blogs.
T Hunt: [26]All the stories were horrible and tragic. But the central theme wasn’t a gun, it was stupidity. If you possess an item, it behooves you to learn its operation and its lethality. Or get rid of it.
Exactly. But as you point out, you really can’t fix stupid people, can you. It would be fine if they just shot themselves and their own children, but those stray bullets are a real problem.
I say, when any gun owner shows the first sign of being stupid, there is a very simple and inexpensive way to make sure they don’t do any damage.
After all, a bullet only costs about nine cents.
Greg at # 33-
Seriously? The parents left their child in a vehicle along with a loaded gun. Somehow the child found that gun and managed to shoot himself in the head. And you DON’T think the parents should be charged? Maybe with negligent homicide? Manslaughter? Please say you’ll at least go for child endangerment. No? Then I guess it’s OK to leave lethal weapons around where children can get at and play with them.
How ’bout this; They leave their son in the garage with a 12″ table saw, plugged in and ready to go. He turns it on, gets caught in the blade and bleeds to death. What then? They should still go free, no charges at all?
Or how ’bout… Well, never mind. I get it. The kid should have known better and it’s no one’s fault but his own that he got shot in the head. The parents really didn’t have anything to do with it.
When, exactly, do the parents of this dead child begin to have to take some responsibility?
Or is it the last line that gives you pause?
“But I think that child would have come to harm sooner or later.”
I’m amazed that you don’t see this. If they are dim witted enough to leave the child alone with a loaded gun, are they going to vigilant around water? Do you think they will recognize the danger of a wild animal or a stray dog? Do you think that somehow, as if by magic, they will discern the danger in refilling a hot lawn mower with gas or working with chemicals in an enclosed space? Or running that space heater on a cold night?
This child lived with parents that didn’t or couldn’t recognize danger. That means he would be exposed to many more dangerous situations. Simple law of averages says that sooner or later, he will get hurt.
In all of this I don’t wish harm on anyone. I wish we all could avoid all the danger and trauma of life. But I don’t think that that would do us any good.
Greg, you are generally more civil in your discourse. I haven’t been called a motherfucker in print in a long time but I’m proud to wear the badge. Or is this a Rosanna Rosannadanna moment for you?
Is he?
T. yes, of course I think the parents should be charged. That is not what I was objecting to in your comments.
Greg, you are generally more civil in your discourse. I haven’t been called a motherfucker in print in a long time but I’m proud to wear the badge. Or is this a Rosanna Rosannadanna moment for you?
Hahahahaha. Fuck you.
At this point, you’ve totally missed why I think you are a motherfucker. I did quote you and respond to the quote. Let me whittle the quote down a bit more and see if I can be more clear:
… a child .. shot himself in the head … tragic …. But I think that child would have come to harm sooner or later.
@T. Hunt
Come to think of it, it might be kinder to, as a society, identify the stupid people whose children are going to come to a bad end anyway and euthanize the poor things before Mum leaves them in the garage with a chain saw running. What do you think?
The swimming pool analogy is ridiculous. I reiterate: when was the last time you nervously scanned a crowd to see if anyone might be hiding a swimming pool?
Of course pools should be regulated to ensure safety. So should roller coaster rides. But even if they were completely unregulated, anyone who wanted to avoid dying on a roller coaster could easily do so. I can choose to stay away from roller coasters, and swimming pools, and chain saws. How do I make sure that guns stay away from me and mine?
Wow, things are getting really heated here. And I have nothing truly incendiary to add.
But, I’ll toss this into the pool: teaching gun safety and regulating guns are good ideas. We don’t let people own cars without proving they can operate one; why are we making an exception for guns? Because our founding fathers wanted to be sure the populace could protect itself from tyranny?
OK, protection from tyranny. Got it. But nowhere in there does it say that we shouldn’t require some education and licensing of gun owners, does it? If so, I missed it and would love to be further educated on it. If not, then why can’t we TEACH PEOPLE HOW TO USE GUNS RESPONSIBLY?
Seriously, I’ve been a gun owner all my life. I’ve never accidentally shot anyone, I’ve never shot by accident at all. It’s called “being responsible” for my weapon. And I never forget that a gun is present, that I need to be sure it’s secure from others, that I cannot for a minute take for granted anyone else’s safety. That’s what I was taught.
Why can’t we require that everyone learn these lessons? We don’t let people cut someone’s hair without training; why are we pretending it should be different for guns?
And now I’ll put on some less flammable clothing…
I really don’t have any problem with the idea of sensible licensing requirements, but history has shown us that this is not a likely consequence of repealing the 2nd amendment.
You’ll end up with outright bans in some parts of the country, with lax requirements in neighboring parts (California/Arizona springs readily to mind).
DC, for example, has some spectacularly inane laws (for example, you can’t buy a gun in DC, you have to buy it out of state and have it transferred in through a licenses FFL transfer dealer of which there is exactly ONE in the district) and San Francisco has attempted to downright outlaw all firearms for anyone who isn’t law enforcement, security or active military on not one, but two occasions – repealing the second amendment would likely result in an outright ban on all firearms ownership certainly in LA and SF counties, if not throughout the entire state (and you can probably add DC, Illinois and New York to the outright ban list).
Are people who like to hunt or otherwise shoot recreationally just supposed to surrender thousands of dollars worth of legally owned firearms because one year someone managed to get the 51% of votes necessary to completely outlaw the things? Or better yet, just because the legislature decided to bow to the political pressure to outlaw the things?
Until people can have a rational debate about firearms without getting overly emotional either way (something this thread proves is not the case), we need the protections that the Constitution provides.
“No charges will be fired.”
Seems like a strange context for a pun, so I’m guessing you meant “filed”.
There’re the accidents, then there is also this:
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM199208133270705
Greg at #37-
I don’t think the child would have come to harm because of his actions, I think the child would have come to harm because his parents would place him in more dangerous situations more often. One of the really tragic things about all of this is that gun safety is not rocket science. It is fairly easy to master the basics: Always assume the gun is loaded. Never point at anything you don’t intend to shoot. Always control the muzzle so that IF the gun goes off, no one will be injured.
Put a child and a loaded gun together and eventually something bad will happen. Not because the child is stupid but because the child is ignorant. He doesn’t know and cannot appreciate the danger of the thing he holds.
All of the events I was referring to involved parents (you know, those who are supposed to be responsible) leaving kids in dangerous situations or allowing a dangerous situation to exist. Kids aren’t allowed to buy guns for a good reason, we deem them unable to take the basic responsibilities necessary to safely possess and use a firearm. But we assume, since they’re of legal age, that adults can and will act responsibly when owning guns.
If you took this any other way, I’d seriously consider giving back any advanced degrees you hold as something obtained under false pretenses. If you didn’t understand that the children mentioned in all of this were essentially innocent bystanders, then, yeah… Hello, Rosanna Rosannadanna.
So, T. Hunt, you are proposing is making it harder for people to get guns(to weed out as many of the irresponsible ones as possible)?
How many people have been shot dead deliberately or accidentally without a gun. Zero!