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This type of story happens with such depressing frequency it barely rates the front page anymore. Kid finds unsecured and loaded gun. Kid shoots someone with unsecured and loaded gun. Pro-gun and anti-gun forces wring their hands and regurgitate the usual rhetoric about gun locks, parental responsibility and teaching kids to stay away from guns.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

I can hear it now. "Trigger locks could have prevented this senseless tragedy," the folks from Handgun Control will say in righteous indignation. "Trigger locks are useless in a situation when you need a gun, but don't have the key for the lock," the NRA will retort. Both sides will blame the absentee parent(s) for not securing the gun or watching the kids. Everybody will pass the buck and nothing will change.

Wash. Rinse. Repeat.

Something's got to change or we will continue to see stories like this.

How can we prevent these killings? Is it time to mandate everyone with a gun where children are present keep them locked and secured? Is the NRA doing enough to promote firearm safety? Is this the kind of "common ground" issue where pro and anti-gun forces can come together to find solutions?

Education and tough prison sentences are the only feasible way to make inroads here.

We could certainly pass a law mandating this, but is it enforcable? I guess it could be integrated with my above comment.

My opinion is that the NRA has one of the better gun safety programs around.
NRA Link
Eddie Eagle Program

I can only hope that we will.

we can prevent these killings by teach children that guns are dangerous tools, and not to mess with them when they find them. kids should, when they find a gun, loaded or not, know not to even touch it. barring actually educating your kids in proper handling of firearms, people could keep their guns unloaded when they aren't near them. you should do so anyway. (keep guns not on you unloaded) people could keep the bullets locked up, a clip (or speedloader for revolvers) on them incase they need to use the weapon, and store the weapon where kids would have trouble finding anyway. should they find it, it will have no bullets, thus be incapable of killing.


how would you propose such a mandate be enforced? teaching children to (a) properly handle firearms, (b)teaching children to at least not play with firearms when found and ©keeping the firarms unloaded, would do a lot to prevent shootings like this. children should know guns are not toys, and should not be treated as such.



I don't know if the NRA is doing enough to promote safety or not, but from what I understand, they would rather teach kids proper handling of firearms. they have a mascot for their program called eddie eagle. from their page on eddie and firearm safety: so it does appear they're trying.



you would think so. the pro-crime people would rather that all guns be destroyed and banned then teach kids to what to do should they encounter weapons. the pro-gun groups would rather that kids learn not to touch guns when they find them. I propose we take it a step further, and teach kids (5 and older) how to properly handle guns, so if they do find one, and decide to pick it up, they don't play around wioth it like a toy, but treat it like a tool and weapon.

(*anti-gun changed by me.)

I don't know that there is much we can do before the fact. There are a lot of really stupid parents out there, and people who have no right breeding in the first place, who simply don't bother teaching their kids how to behave or about the simple dangers in their homes.

Personally, I think that any kid who finds an unprotected gun in the home and kills someone with it, their parents should be liable for manslaughter.

I remember a conversation at work.

Co-Worker: "The neighbor's four year old picked up the gun off my kitchen table and shot a hole in my refrigerator. Their parents aren't willing to pay for a new refrigerator."

Me: "Why should they?"

CW: "Because his parents didn't teach him how to properly handle and shoot a gun."

Me: "My four year old wouldn't recognize a gun. Why is it my responsibility to teach my four year old to use something that I don't think I could safely handle."

That would have been circa 1970. If someone has a four year old in the house, I think it is the gun owner's responsibility to keep the gun unloaded, locked up, out of reach; or whatever it takes to protect everyone from a four year old making contact with a loaded gun.

When a child is old enough to get a hunting license, take some training by someone outside the home, and understand that a gun is only designed to kill; then it is time for a child to get training. Training a four year old to handle a gun safely makes less sense than training a four year old to drive a tractor.

I've had only a couple of "lessons" in safe gun handling. My first went down something like this.:

My older brother and I shared a bedroom. Mother woke my older brother up to ask:

Mom: "Who did you bring home with you last night?"

Brother:"No one."

Mom:"Then who is asleep on the couch?"

My brother grabbed the rifle my oldest brother used for deer hunting, went downstairs and aimed the rifle at the man asleep on the couch while mother called the police. The policeman who responded said, Apparently some guns have a safety device to prevent them from being fired.

I'm 57, I wouldn't be able to locate a safety and unlock it; let alone determine if the gun is loaded. As long as the NRA feels it is my job as a parent to teach children "gun safety," I will continue to extend them very little credibility. I am no more qualified to teach a 4 year old (or even a 9 year old) how to recognize an actual gun, than I am qualified to teach a course in "Useful Differential Calculus for Illiterates: Is the underpass you're sleeping under structurally sound?" Do I know enough to teach gun safety? Please reference my second "gun safety lesson."

This post approved by Spell Check

Really? That type of story happens with depressing frequency that it barely rates the front page? Do you know the frequency exactly? Wash, rinse, repeat.

In fact, I do have the statistics for accidental handgun deaths for children under the age of 13 from the CDC for 2000. Although the 74 victims of accidental gun death were unfortunate, that statistic certainly is only 12 percent of the number of unintentional burning deaths, and 8 percent of the number of (896) accidental drowning deaths (same site). An under 13 year old child is even more likely to die from a fall than a firearm, by accident.

If I own a gun and need it to stop an intruder, I might not have the time to use a key and unlock a mechanism on the trigger. It is easier for me to store the gun away from my children in a location which is virtually impossible for them to get to, but accessible to me if the need should arise.

How can we prevent these killings? I think I've shown that you've exaggerated the killings. It is demonstrably much more dangerous to own a pool or a stove than a firearm, statistically. Some parents are stupid. The stupidity of a small number of parents should not impede my ability to defend my home. Painting every firearm owner or NRA member as an advocate of child death does not help your cause. Obviously no parent wants their child to die from an accidental firearm shooting in their home. I believe very few NRA members have accidental shooting deaths in their home. I would bet money that virtually none of them do (much fewer, for instance, than childhood drowning deaths by swimming advocates who have pools in their back yards), and I would be curious if anyone (on the anti-gun side) has a statistic for that.

Stories like this break my heart. As the mother of two small children I am astounded at the level of irresponsibility and stupidity the owner of that gun has demostrated. There should be absolutely no way for an adult, much less a small child, to gain access to anyone's fire arms.

The gun owner should be tried for murder in the first degree and put behind bars indefinitely. Society does not need someone with such a low level of intelligence and responsibility roaming freely amongst us.

What a tragedy.

Here are two links to the story.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/artic...-2003Sep28.html

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?mpl=story...s/children_shot

Look Mrs. Pigpen, I don't want to take away your gun and I don't support those that wish to.

I DO believe that 74 children killed by guns carelessly unsecured is something more than "unfortunate." It still averages out to at least one dead kid a week and I think it's an appalling waste of young lives. Whether it's 12 percent or 2 percent it's still too high! I'm sorry, but 74 dead kids is not an acceptable number of losses to my way of thinking.

And please don't fall back on that agitprop that stoves or a swimming pool is much more dangerous than a gun. Most kids don't crawl into a hot oven or hold their kid sister's head in a wading pool until she drowns. Trying to deflect the very real issue of children being killed in gun accidents by comparing the statistics to that of car accidents, falls, poisonings, burnings or bungee jumping is disingenous to the extreme.

I did not paint firearm owners and/or NRA members as "advocates of child death." That kind of shrill hyperbole is a figment of your own imagination and not by any words of mine. What you may have read is something quite different from what I wrote.

Is it simply the nature of gun owners and NRA members to be overly sensitive in matters such as this as if somehow your right to own a firearm was more important of a principle to be protected than that of a child not to die senselessly due to a careless gun owner?

This is not a "pro-gun" vs. "anti-gun" debate. This is about a stupidly unnecessary killing that has ended a child's life and scarred the lives of everyone else involved.

I don't think you've shown that I've "exaggerated the killings." I think you've demonstrated that you have your NRA rhetoric down pat and care more about your right to a gun than you do about how irresponsible some gun owners are.

I have never been rabidly pro or anti gun. I have a large gun collection, all hunting pieces or pretection pieces from big furry animals that will eat you up here. I have none in my house, I lock them at my brothers house in his fire safe, as my gun cabinet is too easy to break into. I now have a very small fire safe for documents and one handgun, that I have a custom holster in my truck in case I come upon or hit a moose myself and have to put it down ( I have done this at least 20 times up here, yes, it happens all the time) and I am on the road kill salvage list, so it seems to happen even more now. The best protection for your house, the safest, is a good dog. I have seen so much tragedy up here with guns and children, it scares me silly to have one in the house with my small children, If my child used my gun to harm themselves, I would be the next gun victim, I swear to god.


Like I said, I am not rabid either way, too much rhetoric on either side really. I would be for licensing guns really, something along the lines of the drivers license, with testing etc. Heck, same with having babies for that matter!

Yours is exactly the argument heard time and time again. "We just care about the innocent children", as though anyone who owns a gun and wants access to it doesn't care about children. It's the classic loaded question: "Isn't one death too much"? Yes, 74 accidental deaths are unacceptable. 900 accidental drowning deaths are also 12 times more unacceptable.

There are anti-gun messages on sitcoms all of the time. The very same "wash, rinse, repeat" message of your opening post. Either an impossible situation is developed where a child finds the lock to the bullet case and gets the gun out of the attic, loads it, and "accidentally" kills his friend (the message...See, it can happen to anyone! Even if you're careful!), or the terminally stupid parent who actually leaves a gun where the child has easy access.

I am in fact, more afraid of pools around children than a gun with responsible ownership. I've never known a child who was shot accidentally, but I've known many who almost drowned. I don't have a pool for that reason, but I do keep a loaded gun in the attic (accessible inside the ceiling of my bedroom). I grew up around guns in the house, and my father forbid me to touch any. My husband did the same. There is no way to protect children from terminally stupid parents. What solution do you have, aside from requiring a locking mechanism on the trigger, which would yield the gun useless?

Yes, 74 children dead is a bad thing but when juxtaposed with almost 900 drowning deaths it is very small. I agree they are unacceptable losses, but so are all other accidental child deaths. To suggest that accidental gun deaths are "oh, so common they don't warrant front page headlines anymore" is sensationalizing the issue. They are indeed, extraordinarily uncommon for an invention designed specifically to kill. If the only solution is to yield the gun ineffective for protection, I believe such a policy would cause many more deaths than it would prevent.

I've never, incidentally, heard the NRA agitprop about pools and stoves. I've heard the one about automobiles.

Edited to add: I recommend Do we fear the right things?

Completely agree. The 'how' question is as yet undetermined, but for the other questions:

All guns should be kept locked and secured. They are dangerous weapons. Failure to treat them as such should be considered criminal in itself.

Yes and no for the NRA. I think, in their teachings, they promote firearm safety very well. But, I don't think they want it to become a centerpiece of their national media campaign.

If this can't be common ground, I don't know what can. Most firearm issues are very 'common sense' oriented. For example, who really needs Teflon bullets? I think the NRA needs to pay less attention to the 'slippery slope' and realize that if certain steps aren't taken, the whole dang hill will collapse. Although I do believe in the right to keep and bear arms, I also think that there will be a time in the not too distant future when people will look back in wonder that we ever had such weapons unsecured in the home.

As for the entire notion that guns can't serve their purpose if they are secured: Poppycock! Guns are terrible self-defense items, as almost all policeman and every single survey will show. In a situation where an intruder is in your house, said intruder has all the advantages. Gun owners are far, far, far more likely to kill their own loved ones than they are to affect an intruder. If intruders are your concern, get a dog!

REALLY? I've personally heard exactly the opposite from police officers I know. Do you have a reputable link for that?Link

It's nice you've never been in a situation where you needed armed protection. Many people (myself included) aren't so lucky as you.

Mrs. P.

Unfortunately, no, I don't have a link (I'll see what I can find). This information came on a Nightline type show on gun safety some years ago. As to your link, I will admit that the number cited were more than I would have suspected. However, it fails to differentiate two things: times guns were used in defense vs. times when these same guns couldn't have been used had they been properly secured, and also times when another mechanism (ie-dog) wouldn't also have been sufficient. I would also be interested in hearing what you've heard from policemen (and also what types of areas you/they are from--as I could see situations varying considerably between, for example, the ghetto and suburban areas). The show I was referring to seemed to focus exclusively on suburban areas, which might explain the differences of opinion.

I would like to clarify that I am not arguing for gun control, but rather merely trying to point out that many who have guns don't think through the ramifications. In any house with children, I think it is simply obvious that the chances of that gun (if not secured) endangering your child are greater than the chances it will ever be used to protect them (or you). Obviously, this could vary greatly among different areas, but logic indicates that you children could come across that gun every single day. How often would it be used for protection? I don't think this requires any statistics to show the validity of the issue.

Nothing can be really be done to prevent such things. And, in my opinion, not really worth it to try. There will always be dumb people out there. Should we force all pool owners to attend "pool safety classes" and require them to install water intrusion detectors? And the same could be said about practically any potentially fatal possession we own.

Some people are just plain irresponsible. And there's no way to change that. Yes, it's a tragedy when innocent children have to be victims of their parents irreponsibility. But, it's impossible to keep everyone safe from all harm.

Myself, I wouldn't mind a mandatory gun class for all new gun purchases. But, after that, people could still do dumb things. And there'd be no way to stop it.

I wish I had a recent article from the American Conservative. It had a great article on gun ownership. Basically, it said that private gun ownership is much more of a theft deterrent than having the police around. In the mind of an intruder, at least a policeman will give him a chance to raise his hands and give up. With an armed victim, the intruder is not going to be given much of a chance to give up and just be shot dead instead. And the thought of being shot dead without a chance to give up is a pretty big deterrent.

I've lived in many different places. Some areas were relatively safe, like the place I live in now, and others had very high rates of violent crime. The locations with the highest crime rates were Gainesville, FL; Miami, Fl; Las Vegas, NV (when I lived in the bad part of town); and Fayetteville, NC.
I lived in Gainesville when the serial killer was making rounds. One of the neighbors in our apartment complex was decapitated just a few doors down from me. I wanted to buy a gun immediately, but there was a two day waiting period. That was the first time I understood the problems associated with waiting for a gun or ammunition. If your life is in danger, you need a gun immediately. If you want to kill someone for your own reasons, it's easier to wait.
I then moved to another apartment which was broken in and my roomate raped while I was at class. Then, I moved into another apartment which was broken into with a master key, and they refused to let me change the lock on the door. I asked many policemen what to do during this time and every one of them said "get a gun". Luckily, I already had one (and a dog, and a large boyfriend I lived with).

Later, in Miami, the crime was worse. The hurricane came through and destroyed lots of houses and property. Gangs came through our neighborhood to loot and threatened to kill anyone who didn't let them take whatever they wanted. Fortunately, Miami is full of marksmen, to include my husband. A couple of neighborhoods over, a gang pulled over a truck to enter a man's home. He shot the lead guy between the eyes. They left, and there was much less looting after that. Actually, my father-in-law was a police officer in Miami (he did this part-time, as he was also a realtor, pilot for Eastern, insurance salesman, computer engineer, competative aerobatic pilot who also built the airplanes, electrician, and plumber). Anyway, he was also a police officer for a time, and a very big gun advocate. He told me there is absolutely no time for the police to get to your home in time to save you, even if you have the good fortune to get to a phone somehow.

Fayetteville was the worst, but I'll spare the details. Suffice it to say, I've lived in a number of bad areas which required armed protection. I've known a lot of victims of violent crime, and many who have lived in neighborhoods much worse than any I've ever seen. I don't believe any person shoud be placed in a position in which they have to break the law to defend themselves. This applies to gun locks. If the trigger of a gun has a mechanism which requires a key to remove it, that gun is inaccessible. First, any rational human being with a child would place it in a safe, virtually inaccessible place for the child whether it had a lock or not. Then, the gunowner would have to get the key (which obviously wouldn't be in the lock mechanism), place it in the lock, hope it wouldn't stick, in order to use the gun. By the end of all that, there might be no time to use the gun, and a baseball bat would offer better protection.

I don't like the idea of guns getting into the hands of children either. Fortunately, there isn't much of a chance of them shooting themselves or others if the parent is responsible. A vast majority of the statistical evidence that claims guns are used against the occupants of the house are suicide. The rest are almost always domestic abuse cases. The very rare child getting a hold of a gun and shooting someone is a red herring. It is a terrible event, absolutely, but no more so than any other in which the parent indirectly kills his/her child in another fashion.

Regarding the dog....Although this isn't really the place to discuss the merits of having a dog, I certainly am a dog advocate. Unfortunately, my (now departed) old dog would've slept through the moment of truth in a home invasion. He actually did sleep through a lot of banging and a few attempted breakins (my husband had to kick him awake to investigate the noise). I've also known dogs to be poisoned and/or stolen. I've also known several children to be mauled by their own dogs (a dog mistaking a baby's cry for the cry of a wounded animal, and attacking, is one of the first signs of senility). All-in-all, if I were to live in the same sort of dangerous environment I used to, I would have a dog and a gun, but would be more inclined to trust myself with the gun than my dog if I needed urgent protection.

Mrs. P,

I have one question (maybe more of a comment) about your statistics comparing accidental drownings to accidental shootings. Aren't there more homes that have a pool (let's include kiddie pools since there are drownings in those as well) than there are homes that have a gun? It would seem to me that there are many more places where a tub of water could be found than an improperly stored handgun. There may be more deaths from drowning, but it does not immediately follow that pools are more dangerous than handguns.

Still, I agree that we should have a right to own guns, especially handguns which are the least dangerous type (as long as they're not concealed) even when they do fall into the wrong hands. One suggestion though, if you have kids, why not nonlethal weapons? Unless the burglar is on PCP or something, a tazer should stop him pretty well and incapacitate him for long enough to call the police. Rubber ammo is pretty effective as well without being lethal. Pepper spray and a stun gun require that you get pretty close to the assailant, so those would be out in my opinion. All of these options, however, would lessen the chance that, if a child found a weapon, he/she could kill another child with it.

Very true. I'm inclined to believe that most of the drownings are related to parents leaving small children in bathtubs than pools. I have, however, personally known children who drowned in pools or hot tubs. I've never known a responsible parent to allow their young ones access to their guns (to include me). All in all, good, non-biased statistics are a rare commodity so it's hard to know for sure.

And, to answer your question about nonlethal weapons. No, I don't believe a can of pepper spray would deter a violent criminal (especially one who is probably high and carrying his OWN lethal weapon). I would rather kill an intruder than enrage him.

I'll have to admit that I'm undecided regarding gun control, kids or no kids. I am tired of the ranting on both sides. It impedes more than it persuades, and makes it extremely hard to make an intelligent, informed decision.

For:

I'd cheerfully terminate anyone who tried to harm myself or my family. As this would be easier and quicker with a gun than with most other weapons, I can see where a gun might come in handy for the purpose of exterminating those who intend me or my family harm.

I don't think the government should impose many (I'm not committed to "ANY") laws which restrict rights that I would have without government. Government exists for my benefit, not the other way around.

There are too many gun-nuts ever safely disarm, so that option is a waste of time to consider, as I'm not willing to resort to totalitarianism, a problem worse than the disease.

Against:

When I peruse the newspapers, I read far more articles about drunken, jealous husbands murdering their wives or shooting their children than I ever do about valiant old ladies repelling burglars.

I spent many years living in a country where most of the populace didn't carry guns - and that included the police - and I felt safer there than I did here. The statistics largely agree with my impressions, regardless of what you feel about Michael Moore.

A LOT of the scariest people I know are gun-nuts: the most red-neck, homophobic, racist, anti-semitic, Jesus-is-coming-in-a-black-helicopter loonies that I've ever had the displeasure of meeting. If owning a gun means that I have wear a tinfoil hat and foam at the mouth, no thank you.

I'm still undecided.

Unfortunately, I don't think there is a place in my house that my daughter can't find my favorite ball point pen!

Now consider some of the gun owners that I've known...

My brother-in-law keeps his guns locked away when we're visiting, as a general rule of thumb. Still, there have been a couple of times when he has had them out, encouraging me to learn how to use a gun.

A co-worker was proud of the fact that, "There is no place in my house that I am not within arm's reach of a loaded gun." I had no doubt he would use them to kill someone, and never accepted his invitation to visit his house.

A next door neighbor was told by the police, "We caught the thief that broke into your house and stole your gun collection. Unfortunately, all we know is that your son sold all of your guns on the black market. He didn't keep any records. It is likely that if they are recovered, it will be because they were used for criminal activity, and you won't get them back if that happens."

A co-worker once told me, "I left my husband after he tried to shoot me. He was so drunk that he held my hair with one hand, held the gun to my head with the other hand, fired, and missed at point blank range." It was just a typical domestic dispute according to the police who investigated, and while she had no hair on one side of her head for a couple months, no one got hurt. She was unable to get a judge to sign a protection order, so she left the kids behind when she left him. He got custody because she had deserted them.

I personally feel the risks from having a gun in the house exceeds the risks involved in not having one. I sleep as soundly as Mrs. PigPens dog. A thief could steal a gun from under my pillow without waking me up. If my ex-wife had owned a gun, and known how to use it; I seriously doubt that I would have survived my first marriage.

And now one more gun to worry about...

Our new next door neighbors had their house broken into a few days ago. "The only thing stolen," she tried to reassure us, "was a 9 mm handgun." It is somehow not very reassuring to know that we have an armed burglar in the neighborhood. (Two recent B & E's that we're aware of.) I'm certain the logic was that they had the gun in the house for self protection, but there was no one home when the house was broken into.

[QUOTE]


Perhaps your neighbor needs better locks or an alarm system! Oddly enough guns are one of the reasons most house breaks are in the day in the US. Burglars are afraid of meeting and armed homeowner.

In Britain where gun possession is prohibited the incidence of break-ins at night are 9 times the per capita rate of the US.

[QUOTE]

Well I read the papers and the stats as well and some researchers say that guns are used up to 2 million times a year (without shooting anyone) to protect a person or family.

I also lived (summers as a boy) in rural Maine and EVERYONE had a gun. And I mean every kid down to 8 had one or more guns. The only gun accidents I ever heard of were out of town hunters in the fall and the gun crime rate was 0.

Now lets compare this to Wash. DC where most folks cannot own a gun and where the gun crime rate is off the charts.

I agree that some tough talking folks do own guns but they are outnumbered by folks who are the opposite and who would not hurt a fly.

At the end of the day it’s a personal decision and I have a gun because I feel my families safety is more important than the trouble it takes to have a gun and keep it safely.