this post was submitted on 28 Jan 2024
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Handle doesn't check out lol. Your points are very well-reasoned. The saddest part for me is that education goes a LONG way with these things, but the issue is now so heavily politicized it's hard to make any headway with anyone.
In school districts you're often up against zero-tolerance hoplophobes and panic parents who are just plain terrified that guns exist (understandably), and would rather just pretend they didn't instead of educating themselves and their kids. (Irrationally)
Then sometimes you have the ones wanting to teach these classes having some ulterior gun-worship political motive...
But for real:
We teach kids not to play around moving cars or trains or downed power lines, but having "If you find a gun..." safety talks with children doesn't happen as often as it should, and they're way smarter than we give them credit for.
I stash mine securely, and if my nephews saw me cleaning one they'd be curious and staring. I'd always kindly tell them like it was:
"This is a dangerous tool. This is a tool to defend from someone attempting to kill you. It can seriously hurt or kill people. This is not to be played with. What do you do if you EVER find something that looks like this?"
"Don't touch it. Go tell an adult."
"Good boys."
They need to know they can trust the grownups in their lives to teach them instead of punish them for curiosity. Then these things stop being taboo and fascinating.
Finally you have owners who, as the tragic story said, just keep it in a nightstand. No lock or anything. Wow. Proper home security and an emergency preparedness plan with your family should buy you more than enough time to safely retrieve a securely stowed weapon to protect yourself from a very determined attacker.
The people who think they'll just wake up one night and suddenly find themselves having to mag dump into a ninja make me sad.
Lol sorry for the rant.
Kids are way smarter than we give them credit for, absolutely! I’m the kind of guy who would rather not live in a world with guns, or violence for that matter. I’d be willing to ban lots of weapons for this purpose. I’m that guy who gun advocates hate to deal with in that respect. The only reason I’ve carved a small niche for “responsible gun ownership” is because my dad was very open about getting one. He told us he got it, he explained why, he took a firearms class, got a concealed carry permit, would clean maintain it regularly even though I’ve never seen him fire it. He told me stories about how gun owners would be too quick to react when hearing a home intruder and accedently shot a family member who was coming home late. He showed me how to hold the weapon, but that was about it. That small bit went a long way.