It is purely and simply a gun control issue - if guns are available then people will be shot ... including kids.
No, actually it's a people control issue. That woman should have had that firearm secured and she should have been educated about the need for and importance of that. It's a very tragic situation but the gun is not to blame, the moron who owned the gun is. When I was the same age that little boy was, we lived in a pretty bad area of Chicago. There was a loaded shotgun in my parent's room propped up in the corner. None of us would have dared touch it.
Growing up there were guns in most of the homes of my relatives. They were hunters and avid sportsmen. All of the children were educated about the dangers of firearms and when we were old enough my Grandfather taught us how to shoot one and we'd shoot at beer cans lined up on a fence. When the boys were old enough to go deer hunting and expressed a desire to do so, they went through a gun safety course. Most of the kids I grew up with had the same type of experience with guns in their homes. We were taught respect for guns and they were therefore not a danger to us as kids.
The fact is that gun control in the U.S. as it has come about through legislation has done little to control the criminal's ability to obtain one.
Instead of taking away my right to own a gun when I've been trained and know how to use one, why not require gun safety training in order to get one? There is a waiting period for gun ownership anyway- why not add one more step? Either provide certification that you have already completed a gun safety course or enroll in a class before you can pick it up.
Correct me if I'm wrong but you don't have to pass any sort of intelligence or "sense" test to get a gun?
No, and they don't require it for buying a car or even a Bowie knife either.
We don't have guns generally avaulable and so tend to have far far fewer gun related accidents.Oh really? http://www.gunowners.org/sk0703.htm
* England: According to the BBC News, handgun crime in the United Kingdom rose by 40% in the two years after it passed its draconian gun ban in 1997. 4
4 "Handgun crime 'up' despite ban," BBC News Online (July 16, 2001) at http://news.bbc.co.uk/low/english/uk/newsid_1440000/1440764.stm . England is a prime example of how crime has increased after implementing gun control. For example, the original Pistols Act of 1903 did not stop murders from increasing on the island. The number of murders in England was 68 percent higher the year after the ban's enactment (1904) as opposed to the year before (1902). (Greenwood, supra note 1.) This was not an aberration, as almost seven decades later, firearms crimes in the U.K. were still on the rise: the number of cases where firearms were used or carried in a crime skyrocketed almost 1,000 percent from 1946 through 1969. (Greenwood, supra note 1 at 158.) And by 1996, the murder rate in England was 132 percent higher than it had been before the original gun ban of 1903 was enacted. (Compare Greenwood, supra note 1, with Bureau of Justice Statistics, Crime and Justice in the United States and in England and Wales, 1981-96, Bureau of Justice Statistics, October 1998).
BBC News Online: UK
Monday, 16 July, 2001, 04:50 GMT 05:50 UK
Handgun crime 'up' despite ban
A new study suggests the use of handguns in crime rose by 40% in the two years after the weapons were banned.
The research, commissioned by the Countryside Alliance's Campaign for Shooting, has concluded that existing laws are targeting legitimate users of firearms rather than criminals.
The ban on ownership of handguns was introduced in 1997 as a result of the Dunblane massacre, when Thomas Hamilton opened fire at a primary school leaving 16 children and their teacher dead.
Existing gun laws do not lead to crime reduction and a safer place
David Bredin
Campaign for Shooting
But the report suggests that despite the restrictions on ownership the use of handguns in crime is rising.
The Centre for Defence Studies at Kings College in London, which carried out the research, said the number of crimes in which a handgun was reported increased from 2,648 in 1997/98 to 3,685 in 1999/2000.
rest of the article is here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/low/uk/1440764.stm
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* Canada: After enacting stringent gun control laws in 1991 and 1995, Canada has not made its citizens any safer. "The contrast between the criminal violence rates in the United States and in Canada is dramatic," says Canadian criminologist Gary Mauser in 2003. "Over the past decade, the rate of violent crime in Canada has increased while in the United States the violent crime rate has plummeted." 3
3 Gary A. Mauser, "The Failed Experiment: Gun Control and Public Safety in Canada, Australia, England and Wales," Public Policy Sources (The Fraser Institute, November 2003), no. 71:4. This study can be accessed at http://www.fraserinstitute.org/shared/readmore.asp?sNav=pb&id=604.
The Failed Experiment: Gun Control and Public Safety in Canada, Australia, England and Wales
Publication Dat, Professor, Simon Fraser University
Email: [email protected]
Telephone: (604) 291-3652Executive Summary: Widely televised firearm murders in many countries during the 20th Century have spurred politicians to introduce restrictive gun laws. The politicians then promise that the new restrictions will reduce criminal violence and "create a safer society." It is time to pause and ask if gun laws actually do reduce criminal violence.
Gun laws must be demonstrated to cut violent crime or gun control is no more than a hollow promise. What makes gun control so compelling for many is the belief that violent crime is driven by the availability of guns and, more importantly, that criminal violence in general may be reduced by limiting access to firearms.rest of the study here:
http://www.fraserinstitute.org/shared/readmore.asp?sNav=pb&id=604
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Seems you have some cleaning up to do in your own backyard.
darned formatting !!