Children...........and Guns

[bigus_D]

Along the same lines of thought as your argument...

I'll pick 3 random items... Uhhh...
How about a chainsaw, tool sets, and kitchen knives...

There are people and children injured and killed every year with any one of these three groups than the whole of firearms.
Yet how many here lock there kitchen knives up in a safe?
Or how about your chainsaws?
Or screwdrivers?
Why not they do more harm than firearms do...

Or goodness I forgot about automobiles. Do you lock your car in a safe also? Why not it is for the safety of the children...

Makes no sense does it...

Nope, your analogies make no sense.

First, the car keys should be kept unavailable to children.

Second, I'd love to see some verifiable statistics that support your claim that screwdrivers kill more children each year than firearms... I mean, seriously.

 

[jeremy]

Nope, your analogies make no sense.

First, the car keys should be kept unavailable to children.

Second, I'd love to see some verifiable statistics that support your claim that screwdrivers kill more children each year than firearms... I mean, seriously.

Makes about as much sense as the other sides doesn't it?!

What you lock your car keys in a safe to make them unavailable to the children!?

Go to the DOJ site and look up their own stats for violent crimes and homicides and suicides...
I think the last year that have compiled is 2005 though.

 

[MBG]

Fear mongering, tin-foil hatters and Judgmental zealots = 90% of the posters in this thread.

Seriously, car keys kept from children? Really?

Where is your drill? You Steak knives? Your garbage disposal? your electrical outlets?

Are you a person that makes their kid wear a helmet to ride a bicycle? Rush over ever time the skin their knee or have some other minor injury?

My brothers and I all survived in a house with loaded firearms present, none of us EVER touched them as we knew the consequences. I know today people let their kids do and talk pretty much how they want. Kids come home from school and tell parents if they get a spanking, the teacher told them to call the cops. I promptly told my son to give that a try, then told the school to stfu and stay out of my home life. My kids don't get 'beaten' but there sure as hell is corporal punishment as there should be. Time-outs are for taking breaks in sports not behavior modification.

I think the Op is very judgemental, but, I could care less what a bunch of people on the internet think of my gun safety also.....

 

[HDSilvrStreak]

What do the Dept of Justice statistics on homocides involving screwdrivers have to do with keeping children safe in your own home?

All the OP is trying to say is that children, as a matter of nature, are curious and snoopy. It is best to try to protect them as best we can. They will, whether we want them to or not, get into something in during their childhood that they shouldn't. If they don't do it at home, they will do it at a friend's (or cousin's). If you think your kids will never get into anything they shouldn't, you're kidding yourself.

 

[bigus_D]

Fear mongering, tin-foil hatters and Judgmental zealots = 90% of the posters in this thread. .
.
.
.
I think the Op is very judgemental, but, I could care less what a bunch of people on the internet think of my gun safety also.....

Nope... this post isn't judgemental.

.... where did that purple button go?

 

[zebov]

Ok, so I hear the folks saying that proper gun safety begins with teaching your children gun safety and not with locking the guns up out of sight. I agree with that. At some point, our children will likely find themselves around an unlocked gun without any adults around and they need to know what (not) to do in such a situation.

However, as far as the analogies to locking up cars and knives goes, I think there is a little misunderstanding. We don't usually lock up our knives when they're not in use, true, but we do use some sort of precautions. For example, I wouldn't leave my child in the car with the keys in the ignition (at his current age). Nor would I store my kitchen knives in his toy chest.

The point is, we all use some sort of graduated scale for risk versus safety. I don't lock my keys up because there is absolutely no way my child could hurt himself simply by touching my keys. He's more likely to get struck by lightning 10 times in a row than to accidentally drive the car into the street by simply playing with the keys. For the knives, there is more risk of injury so more precaution is taken. They are kept out of his reach and we keep a constant eye on him whenever he is in the kitchen (where the knives are). Should he somehow manage to gain access to the knives, he could easily cut himself, but it would be difficult for him to cause extreme bodily harm or death on accident. And I can tell you this, should there be real potential that my child would/could cause death on accident with the kitchen knives (say if he had violent mental issues), you bet your butt they'd go under lock and key.

For firearms, we use the most precaution. With a firearm, he would easily accidentally kill himself or someone else in a split second by simply touching it--that's the whole reason we have firearms around anyway, right? As such, they're locked away.

You see, there's no global solution to all "potentially dangerous" items. The precautions we take will depend on the relative level of danger they pose. Let's not pretend firearms are the same as knives or knives are the same as cars. If you'd like to argue that point then I'll show you a video of my son play with a bucket of car keys and you show me a video of your child playing with a bucket of sharp knives. Safety rules should apply the same to them right?

I should say that I have a very young child and as he gets older these rules will likely evolve because the risks will change. However, for young children, I see no benefit and plenty of risk when leaving firearms out and our safety precautions should be appropriately adjusted for these factors.

 

[Prometheus]

Nope, your analogies make no sense.

First, the car keys should be kept unavailable to children.

Second, I'd love to see some verifiable statistics that support your claim that screwdrivers kill more children each year than firearms... I mean, seriously.

Jeremy is right on. Guns rank in the hundredth percentile when it comes to children killed under the age of 13.

I don't have the link handy (use the google) but in the top 20 are 5 gallon buckets, swimming pools, knives, cleaning products ect. ect.

Fear mongering has gotten the better of most people, most ashamedly gun owners themselves. While there is no reason to "tempt fate", to place a firearm in some sort of evil pedestal and focus on it, when there are OVER a hundred other items killing litterally tens of thousands of children every year is sheer stupidity.

In 2007 and 2008 guns killed less than 30 children under the age of 12. Take out the gang related ones of 10-12 y/o's and it went down to under a dozen. Thats NATION WIDE.

Again you shouldn't tempt fate, but the irrational fear of firearms simply cannot be justified by any stretch of the immagination. Some of you take the brady bunch way to seriously.

For my full thoughts, refer to my earlier post about both my wife and I having access to firearms growing up.

 

[zebov]

Incidents of gun-related deaths of children may be low, but it is basically NON-EXISTANT for cases where the gun was locked up.

Targeting guns: firearms and their ... - Google Books

"Although a few such incidents may have occurred, none of the sources reviewed in this chapter have cited even one case of a child who found a locked gun, unlocked it, and shot himself or another person. In practice, keeping a gun locked, whether loaded or not, whether stored away or not, appears to be a near-absolute protection against a child gun accident, if conscientiously used. But since it requires affirmative action to lock the gun each time after it is used or cleaned, accidents can still occur if an owner fails to resecure the gun."

And that from an ANTI firearm control book.

 

[chachi73]

+1 ^

 

[smitty12b]

Incidents of gun-related deaths of children may be low, but it is basically NON-EXISTANT for cases where the gun was locked up.

Targeting guns: firearms and their ... - Google Books

"Although a few such incidents may have occurred, none of the sources reviewed in this chapter have cited even one case of a child who found a locked gun, unlocked it, and shot himself or another person. In practice, keeping a gun locked, whether loaded or not, whether stored away or not, appears to be a near-absolute protection against a child gun accident, if conscientiously used. But since it requires affirmative action to lock the gun each time after it is used or cleaned, accidents can still occur if an owner fails to resecure the gun."


And that from an ANTI firearm control book.

Great post

 

[longbow]

Each of my children have guns and ammo in thier rooms....Everyone needs backup!

 

[bigus_D]

Ok, so I hear the folks saying that proper gun safety begins with teaching your children gun safety and not with locking the guns up out of sight. I agree with that. At some point, our children will likely find themselves around an unlocked gun without any adults around and they need to know what (not) to do in such a situation.

However, as far as the analogies to locking up cars and knives goes, I think there is a little misunderstanding. We don't usually lock up our knives when they're not in use, true, but we do use some sort of precautions. For example, I wouldn't leave my child in the car with the keys in the ignition (at his current age). Nor would I store my kitchen knives in his toy chest.

The point is, we all use some sort of graduated scale for risk versus safety. I don't lock my keys up because there is absolutely no way my child could hurt himself simply by touching my keys. He's more likely to get struck by lightning 10 times in a row than to accidentally drive the car into the street by simply playing with the keys. For the knives, there is more risk of injury so more precaution is taken. They are kept out of his reach and we keep a constant eye on him whenever he is in the kitchen (where the knives are). Should he somehow manage to gain access to the knives, he could easily cut himself, but it would be difficult for him to cause extreme bodily harm or death on accident. And I can tell you this, should there be real potential that my child would/could cause death on accident with the kitchen knives (say if he had violent mental issues), you bet your butt they'd go under lock and key.

For firearms, we use the most precaution. With a firearm, he would easily accidentally kill himself or someone else in a split second by simply touching it--that's the whole reason we have firearms around anyway, right? As such, they're locked away.

You see, there's no global solution to all "potentially dangerous" items. The precautions we take will depend on the relative level of danger they pose. Let's not pretend firearms are the same as knives or knives are the same as cars. If you'd like to argue that point then I'll show you a video of my son play with a bucket of car keys and you show me a video of your child playing with a bucket of sharp knives. Safety rules should apply the same to them right?

I should say that I have a very young child and as he gets older these rules will likely evolve because the risks will change. However, for young children, I see no benefit and plenty of risk when leaving firearms out and our safety precautions should be appropriately adjusted for these factors.

THIS IS AN EXCELLENT POST, IMHO.

Reps to you.

Jeremy is right on. Guns rank in the hundredth percentile when it comes to children killed under the age of 13.

I don't have the link handy (use the google) but in the top 20 are 5 gallon buckets, swimming pools, knives, cleaning products ect. ect.

Fear mongering has gotten the better of most people, most ashamedly gun owners themselves. While there is no reason to "tempt fate", to place a firearm in some sort of evil pedestal and focus on it, when there are OVER a hundred other items killing litterally tens of thousands of children every year is sheer stupidity.

In 2007 and 2008 guns killed less than 30 children under the age of 12. Take out the gang related ones of 10-12 y/o's and it went down to under a dozen. Thats NATION WIDE.

Again you shouldn't tempt fate, but the irrational fear of firearms simply cannot be justified by any stretch of the immagination. Some of you take the brady bunch way to seriously.

For my full thoughts, refer to my earlier post about both my wife and I having access to firearms growing up.

Prometheus,

I think this is also a great post.

I'll admit it. I don't keep my car keys in a safe. Unless my kid has a serious mental defect, the kitchen knives will remain where they belong... available for use, in the kitchen.

I respect the point about other otherwise seemingly innocuous items being the most common killers of children under 13... I won't use google, if you'd like, post the link you find as most reputable. I'll read it. Anyhow, I believe the general point is probably true. That's why I won't waste my time looking it up.

I'd really like to read a reputable citation of the following quote: "In 2007 and 2008 guns killed less than 30 children under the age of 12. Take out the gang related ones of 10-12 y/o's and it went down to under a dozen. Thats NATION WIDE.". I don't believe this off-hand. Please share a source. If this is true, I'll gladly redact every post I've made in this thread, and thoroughly reprimand myself for purchasing a nightstand safe for my EDC.