Gun in nightstand

Status
Not open for further replies.

Al

Joined
Jun 8, 2002
Messages
20,177
Location
Elizabethtown, Pa
Last edited:
Originally Posted By: Al
Also..he confessed to putting people in danger. Shouldn't he be arrested for Reckless endangerment?


Each time I hear someone refer to a pistol's magazine as "a clip", I move on...
 
Originally Posted By: Hokiefyd
[Each time I hear someone refer to a pistol's magazine as "a clip", I move on...


Exactly.

And I run during the hunting season when hunters include, "by the way, what does one of those deer look like." Up here, and usually on an annual basis, some hunter sadly dies or some farmer's prized bull gets taken out.
 
Quote:
Each time I hear someone refer to a pistol's magazine as "a clip", I move on...


I grew up in the heart of the inner city. I didn't hear the term "magazine" til I was 16.
frown.gif
 
Originally Posted By: Recalculating
Originally Posted By: Hokiefyd
[Each time I hear someone refer to a pistol's magazine as "a clip", I move on...


Exactly.

And I run during the hunting season when hunters include, "by the way, what does one of those deer look like." Up here, and usually on an annual basis, some hunter sadly dies or some farmer's prized bull gets taken out.

I grew up near an alpaca farm. I think one of them would get shot every year.
 
Originally Posted By: Al

My real question: "Should NJ. ban nightstands?


Banning nightstands wouldn't have prevented any of this:

Quote:
In January alone, a 3-year-old Tallahassee boy died after shooting himself in the face with his uncle’s gun; in Missouri, a 5-year-old, with his grandfather’s gun, shot his 9-month-old brother to death; a North Carolina man was shot in the neck by his 3-year-old grandson; a Minnesota teen, playing “cops and robbers” with his father’s gun, killed his younger brother; a 2-year-old Florida boy shot himself in the chest with a gun he found in the glove compartment of his family’s car.


This is the ugly byproduct of being a part of a society that values gun ownership to the extent that we do.
 
I tend to put the blame not on America's value of gun ownership but on the apparently significant number of people who exhibit poor gun safety protocols and lack the capacity to be able to project ahead that this might be an issue with young people in their care or in their general environs.

My late dad slept with a gun on the nightstand but had a ritual that involved loading the gun at night and unloading the gun in the morning. Rounds were stored in a locked case. He also had a safety lock that was on the gun that was child-proof but he could remove it quickly if there were problems. IMO, a mother keeping a gun in her purse while with her toddler, an unloaded gun in a drawer with loose ammo next to it, etc. doesn't equate to much intelligence if children are around. It makes texting while driving seem like quantum physics....
 
It seems like simple logic to me. A higher rate of gun ownership means a higher rate of gun related deaths.

You can blame parenting or whatever intangibles all you want, but with so many weapons floating around it's hard to deny this basic point.
 
Originally Posted By: Mykl
A higher rate of gun ownership means a higher rate of gun related deaths.



That is not the fact though! Homicides, accidental gun deaths amongst both adults and children, have been on the DECLINE over the last 3 decades while gun ownership has increased.
 
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
That is not the fact though! Homicides, accidental gun deaths amongst both adults and children, have been on the DECLINE over the last 3 decades while gun ownership has increased.


"DECLINE" and "NON-EXISTENT" or "LOW" do not mean the same thing.

Despite being in decline, you are five times more likely to die a violent death in the United States than you are in almost any other first world western country. It's going to have to decline a lot more to close that gap.
 
Originally Posted By: Mykl
It seems like simple logic to me. A higher rate of gun ownership means a higher rate of gun related deaths.

You can blame parenting or whatever intangibles all you want, but with so many weapons floating around it's hard to deny this basic point.


I can't really disagree about the numbers of guns but if the statistics show a consistent decline in these types of incidents with increased number of firearms then there's a disconnect between the number of these types of deaths and the numbers of guns. I would say that the "intangibles" are more of the issue than the physical firearms where children are concerned. If there's more poor parenting gun owners combined with a lax attitude toward their children, it's likely that this attitude will be closer to causation than simply owning a gun.
 
Originally Posted By: Mykl
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
That is not the fact though! Homicides, accidental gun deaths amongst both adults and children, have been on the DECLINE over the last 3 decades while gun ownership has increased.


"DECLINE" and "NON-EXISTENT" or "LOW" do not mean the same thing.



I agree. Why did YOU mention those words??? I certainly didn't. I never even insinuated that gun deaths were non existent in the US, and they certainly aren't low since US citizens still have the constitutional right to own a firearm fairly unrestricted, which isn't true for most of the developed western world.

My point in the exercise here is to dispel all the myths and outright lies, mostly perpetuated by anti gun left wing media, that gun deaths are on the rise, a kid accidentally shooting another kid, or a cop shooting a suspect, or a mass shooting, is something contemporary and unknown to the past. Gun violence has been on the decline for decades despite all the media spin. It's hard to have a logical debate about firearms when basic facts are ignored or outright discarded.
 
Originally Posted By: Vuflanovsky
I can't really disagree about the numbers of guns but if the statistics show a consistent decline in these types of incidents with increased number of firearms then there's a disconnect between the number of these types of deaths and the numbers of guns. I would say that the "intangibles" are more of the issue than the physical firearms where children are concerned. If there's more poor parenting gun owners combined with a lax attitude toward their children, it's likely that this attitude will be closer to causation than simply owning a gun.


Yeah, that's all true.

I suppose the general issue I have with these conversations is that it seems that the majority of people arguing for guns seem to view them as objects that, when used, release rainbows and unicorn farts. Nobody ever wants to acknowledge that the largely unregulated, mass proliferation of tools which exist to make killing easy could possibly lead to a higher rate of death within a society.

I understand, appreciate, and support the positive virtues of gun ownership. But ignoring the negative impact a high rate of gun ownership can have on society means that we're not thinking about ways of having that high rate of gun ownership while keeping the death rate as low as possible.
 
Originally Posted By: Drew99GT
I agree. Why did YOU mention those words??? I certainly didn't. I never even insinuated that gun deaths were non existent in the US, and they certainly aren't low since US citizens still have the constitutional right to own a firearm fairly unrestricted, which isn't true for most of the developed western world.


Because the context with which you were using the word "DECLINE" suggested that you mean either of those other words. I don't care if it's going down or up, I care about where it's at, which is still quite high compared to our peers.
 
We COULD also be wiped out by a killer asteroid.

Frankly, I think those of us who are in favor of firearms are most familiar with the risks of ownership. Most responsible gun owners teach their children that the firearm is a deadly tool.

While I believe there are probably those who are as you described, I don't think you can accurately label the pro-firearm person as one who has this rainbow and unicorn view.

From my perspective, this view is held by those who claim that ridding our society of such tools would generate a utopia overrun with both unicorns and rainbows.

It just isn't true.

Originally Posted By: Mykl
Originally Posted By: Vuflanovsky
I can't really disagree about the numbers of guns but if the statistics show a consistent decline in these types of incidents with increased number of firearms then there's a disconnect between the number of these types of deaths and the numbers of guns. I would say that the "intangibles" are more of the issue than the physical firearms where children are concerned. If there's more poor parenting gun owners combined with a lax attitude toward their children, it's likely that this attitude will be closer to causation than simply owning a gun.


Yeah, that's all true.

I suppose the general issue I have with these conversations is that it seems that the majority of people arguing for guns seem to view them as objects that, when used, release rainbows and unicorn farts. Nobody ever wants to acknowledge that the largely unregulated, mass proliferation of tools which exist to make killing easy could possibly lead to a higher rate of death within a society.

I understand, appreciate, and support the positive virtues of gun ownership. But ignoring the negative impact a high rate of gun ownership can have on society means that we're not thinking about ways of having that high rate of gun ownership while keeping the death rate as low as possible.
 
Originally Posted By: Mykl



I suppose the general issue I have with these conversations is that it seems that the majority of people arguing for guns seem to view them as objects that, when used, release rainbows and unicorn farts. Nobody ever wants to acknowledge that the largely unregulated, mass proliferation of tools which exist to make killing easy could possibly lead to a higher rate of death within a society.


Reductio ad absurdum
 
There are many dangerous things in our society that are not taken seriously. Driving a car is one example. Ever see someone messing around on their cell phone, putting on makeup while driving a deadly weapon? Lack of personal responsibility is the problem. Not the car.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top