Guns, Guns Guns

Invictus wrote:Oh, and going back to the fun times in Ferguson, I found this article fairly interesting.

http://www.cracked.com/blog/4-weird-dec ... errifying/

This article makes very cogent points.

I would add that many of these problems have been exasperated by the gun control lobby's propaganda campaigns to alienate police from citizen gun owners and to justify gun control laws by fear mongering over police allegedly being outgunned by criminals armed with AK-47s and Uzis.

The full auto mini Uzi pistol can be a handful but the carbine is no big deal even on a full auto.

I think the accident was far more a result of the girl reacting to the sound rather than the result of full auto recoil.

Some years back I really pissed off the editors of the Wall Street Urinal by responding to a big article on gun range accidents by citing the actual numbers from Vital Statistics of The United States. It turns out that there is on average about a dozen deaths from accidental gun shots at places for sport and recreation each year. Every accidental shooting death is a tragedy, but when you put the real numbers in perspective accidental shootings are not a significant problem in the US. Most gun related deaths in the US are suicides. In spite of the proliferation of guns in the US, the suicide rate is far lower than most other industrialized countries. We do have a problem with guns being used in homicides. However; 2/3s of the gun homicides are committed by African Americans who are only 1/8 of the population and less likely to own guns than Whites.

pokermind wrote:Especially considering this was also on FB http://www.easybakegunclub.com/news/5337/Rent-a-Machine-Gun-Accident%3A-Safety-Officer-Killed.html a nine year old girl with an UZI WTF! well it wasn't crew served weapon

Poker


LMAO!

Poker

Hah... Evil, but funny. [/quote][/quote]

Some years back I really pissed off the editors of the Wall Street Urinal by responding to a big article on gun range accidents by citing the actual numbers from Vital Statistics of The United States. It turns out that there is on average about a dozen deaths from accidental gun shots at places for sport and recreation each year. Every accidental shooting death is a tragedy, but when you put the real numbers in perspective accidental shootings are not a significant problem in the US.

A dozen per year isn´t a problem?

Lets see, based on population, there should be a bit more than 1 death per 3 years here by the same standard.
Taking into account the lack of obsession with guns, let´s say about half that...

Hmm, when was the last time i heard of anyone dead in a gun accident on a shooting range or similar...

Actually, problem here is that i can´t recall it happening and i can also not find any information about it happening.

Even any kind of injuries bad enough to need any kind of treatment(and get reported) are so rare that i´m unable to find any real statistics. Just a few mentions of it occasionally happening.

Every accidental shooting death is a tragedy, but when you put the real numbers in perspective accidental shootings are not a significant problem in the US.

I believe i read there is about 400-600 accidental deaths by gun per year in USA.
Over a hundred children dead per year.

Accidental deaths only. That´s not a small number.

My own country, the total number of accidental deaths varies between 0 and 6 in the last couple of decades, with year 2000 standing out from the rest with 8.

An average per year well below 3. So, USA has more than 8 times more accidental deaths compared to population.
Even adjusted for guns/population, USA is still 2.5 times as high. And the number of guns doesn´t(or at least shouldn´t) really matter anyway.

That says you do have a problem.

A family of four recently drowned in a lake a few miles from my home. Deaths by drowning is far, far more prevalent in the US than accidental shooting deaths. May be we should ban access to swimming pools, lakes and rivers?

Tenshinai wrote:

Some years back I really pissed off the editors of the Wall Street Urinal by responding to a big article on gun range accidents by citing the actual numbers from Vital Statistics of The United States. It turns out that there is on average about a dozen deaths from accidental gun shots at places for sport and recreation each year. Every accidental shooting death is a tragedy, but when you put the real numbers in perspective accidental shootings are not a significant problem in the US.

A dozen per year isn´t a problem?

Lets see, based on population, there should be a bit more than 1 death per 3 years here by the same standard.
Taking into account the lack of obsession with guns, let´s say about half that...

Hmm, when was the last time i heard of anyone dead in a gun accident on a shooting range or similar...

Actually, problem here is that i can´t recall it happening and i can also not find any information about it happening.

Even any kind of injuries bad enough to need any kind of treatment(and get reported) are so rare that i´m unable to find any real statistics. Just a few mentions of it occasionally happening.

Every accidental shooting death is a tragedy, but when you put the real numbers in perspective accidental shootings are not a significant problem in the US.

I believe i read there is about 400-600 accidental deaths by gun per year in USA.
Over a hundred children dead per year.

Accidental deaths only. That´s not a small number.

My own country, the total number of accidental deaths varies between 0 and 6 in the last couple of decades, with year 2000 standing out from the rest with 8.

An average per year well below 3. So, USA has more than 8 times more accidental deaths compared to population.
Even adjusted for guns/population, USA is still 2.5 times as high. And the number of guns doesn´t(or at least shouldn´t) really matter anyway.

That says you do have a problem.

namelessfly wrote:A family of four recently drowned in a lake a few miles from my home. Deaths by drowning is far, far more prevalent in the US than accidental shooting deaths. May be we should ban access to swimming pools, lakes and rivers?

So, you´re saying that you need guns as much as water then... Yes, very sane...


What DO we do? We make sure people are taught how to swim at an early age and try to get people to NOT drink while on/in water, as that is the single largest cause of drowning accidents.

Surprise, it works even if it can´t completely get rid of accidents.

With guns, states with CAP laws have 25-40% less accidental firearms deaths, and IIRC about half that many less gun suicides.
Surprise, something CAN be done here as well.

Tenshinai wrote:

Thing is, I work at a public shooting range. And what I can't fathom is how the hell a range that allows children to fire automatic weapons untethered was able to get insurance?

Different gunculture. Would you ever expect Australians to protest against a restaurant not wanting guns inside, by openly carrying assault rifles and going there?

Yeah, not going to happen here either.

We have a set age limit of a minimum of 13 years old to fire rifles, and being Australia, no chance of automatic weapons. Handguns are a minimum of 16 years old. And all of our weapons are tethered to the bench so that they only point down range! It's not perfect, (far from it), but that was about the minimum an insurance company would expect from us if we wanted cover.

Not quite so strict here, but OTOH, shooting ranges are either military or belongs to local clubs, and the clubs always has at least one person at hand to provide safety lecture and assistance(without doing idiot stuff).
And you just don´t get to handle a weapon on a club range until you show that you can deal safely with the.

Sorry Tenshinai, I wasn't clear. That age limit is a club age limit, not a government requirement. And so far as I know, it was chosen in consultation with our Insurance cover simply because of the Risk.

So far as I can tell, the gun culture part is irrelevant, no offense. Any insurance company that wants to make a profit has to judge risk before offering a policy.

Invictus wrote:
Sorry Tenshinai, I wasn't clear. That age limit is a club age limit, not a government requirement. And so far as I know, it was chosen in consultation with our Insurance cover simply because of the Risk.

So far as I can tell, the gun culture part is irrelevant, no offense. Any insurance company that wants to make a profit has to judge risk before offering a policy.

That was one of my points, that your insurance company went way further than even here.

At the Tri County Gun club that I belonged to for many years, there has been only one accidental shooting which was non fatal.

The person involved was practicing their quick draw pulled the trigger as the pistol was clearing the holster.

The unqualified idiot was a police officer.

The club has strict rules against having firearms inside the club house. The only exemption is for police officers who use the club for training.

The tables are riddled with bullet holes.

All I can say on the accident involving the UZI at least no bystanders were killed. As for the guy that let a nine year old girl handle an UZI on full automatic, well he earned the Darwin Award!

Poker

Look! She has concealed handgun license. Thank God for her having weapon when she needed it.

http://news.yahoo.com/woman-uses-her-gun-ward-off-abduction-190207403.html