Experiment Shows Differences Between Children With Guns in the Home and Those Without

In the next episode...we show a child what a nuke can do and then we let it decide whether or not it will push the big red button and nuke a country of it's choice !!! Stay tuned..

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus

originally posted by: seagull
There were, at any one time when I was a child, six of us in the house. The guns were not locked up. They were in my parents closet, on a shelf...rifles, and shotguns. Two revolvers, in each of my parents nightstands, were loaded where my parents could get to them, if necessary.

Same here. My brother and I knew where my father's firearms were located and we never played with them, the thought never even crossed our minds to treat them like toys.

That. At eight my little .22LR was on my two rifle rack on the wall of my bedroom with my CO2 pellet gun. I wouldn't have considered playing with them like a toy. I did clean the blue off both of them though.

a reply to: jaynkeel

You imply you're packing when kids come over and in the next breath, say you should store them safely?

Of course the kids with guns in the house avoid them, they've seen daddy redneck shoot himself in the foot time and time again.

So, education is good? Who'd have guessed that one!?
This just shows that we need tuition-free college.

This experiment feels disingenuous. Like it's meant to be there so you can point at it and say "look, having guns lying around is great for the kids!"
It would have been more interesting had there been three groups.

Uneducated. (Expected to play with gun.)
Educated w/ no gun in house. (???)
Educated w/ gun in house (Expected to not play with gun.)

While I know the gun issue is a contentious one, and while you'd need a larger sample and more rigorous study to really draw any major implications, I'm not surprised.

While my mother (and I guess I by extension lol) are the "black sheep" of the family because she migrated to California and became a hippy, and through inheritance of those ideals or something like them I'm not personally a fan of guns, my extended family (her family) are all from Texas. They grow up around and among guns, and all of their kids from an early age have a healthy respect for the power and danger of them. They've never had any incidents.

They're all also intelligent, kind people.

This all feeds into my seemingly contradictory but to me perfectly natural mindset that even though I don't like guns personally and don't wish to own them, I have to defend people's second amendment rights. Because my own discomfort shouldn't be cause for the curtailing of their rights.

I know that makes me an outlier from the perspective of both sides but... in a word... whatever.

Peace.

there is no reason for kids to be around guns, thats just asking for trouble.

a reply to: JourneymanWelder

there is no reason for kids to be around guns, thats just asking for trouble.

Define kids.
Then define guns.

As a "kid", there were hunting rifles (and one pistol) in my home. I was around "guns" quite a lot, in various aspects. Learned how to handle them (including stripping and cleaning), what they are for.
I survived, as did my sibs and parents. I also no longer own a gun, by choice.

Now what?

a reply to: AceWombat04
Your stand doesn't make you an outlier in my world at all, but a person who is respectful of others' rights. That's what liberty is all about.
I'm not a fan of football. I think it is violent and silly and a lot of people get injured playing but I would never call for banning the sport because if that's what someone wants to do---who am I to tell them how to live their lives?

So you mean to tell me that if you teach your kids about firearms safety, they'll be safer around firearms than those with no instruction at all? Imagine that.

Growing up, I was taught safe firearms usage from a very young age, and I always knew where they were stored in the house (we had a closet, not a safe). I never touched them unsupervised. For one, there wasn't any reason for me to. All I had to do was ask and we'd set up a supervised impromptu 'firing range' in the backyard (for those who can't figure this out, we lived in the middle of nowhere). But more importantly, my sister and I knew what our parents would do to us if we so much as breathed on any of the guns in the house without permission and so we didn't. It worked, safely and effectively, just as it did for the many tens of millions of others in this country who grew up with similar experiences.

Now, don't misunderstand me. As an adult, I'm a firm believer in having a gun safe, especially with kids in the house, but I also don't think a gun safe is a replacement for responsible parenting and teaching your child about firearms safety or safety in general regarding any potentially dangerous items that you might bring into the home.

There is no way to avoid the fact that what follows is a grumpy-old-man-rant:

So many parents today expect things like table manners, etiquette, driving skills, riding skills and basic gun safety to somehow gently settle on their children like a calm snow storm or dandruff.

How to handle, be around, understand firearms of all kinds is NOT an innate skill. How to be around OTHER people who have firearms... It has to be taught. Too many Americans seem to think that gun ownership begins and ends with "the right to bear arms."

Unless you teach, teach, teach, and drill, drill, drill your kids on what to do and what not to do and how to recognize a moron who THINKS they know what they are doing when they really dont...how do you expect them to understand?

You wouldn't throw some lumber and a toolbox at a kid and expect a bookshelf, don't expect that the 2nd Amendment is all your kid needs to know about firearms.

a reply to: Leonidas

Learning to use any tool, regardless of what kind, requires training.

There is no way around that fact.

Old man rant? Nope. Simple fact.

a reply to: infolurker

Why worry?

I keep reading on ATS and the rest of the US media that you guys don't have a serious gun problem.

a reply to: Whodathunkdatcheese

There is a serious gun problem, but the gun problem is that not enough people own guns. There aren't enough guns in the world.

a reply to: infolurker

Ah, more mental manipulation. Maybe they can force everyone to carry guns. Only in Texas.

a reply to: ketsuko

That avatar is "hilar"-ious



Yes we had guns and ammo in the house that weren't locked up, but we knew if we ever touched them, we would be in big trouble, so we didn't. Eventually they were sold off, but we were older then.

originally posted by: infolurker
Please, for the lives of your children, teach them about firearms safety!

The life of your child and mine depend on it!

Especially since your untrained kid will probably shoot my kid because you neglected to teach them responsible gun safety.

Video at the link:
fox17.com...

Experiment Shows Differences Between Children With Guns in the Home and Those Without
By Adrian Mojica Friday, February 26th 2016

An experiment held in Texas by police officers and parents had some interesting findings.

Police put a fake gun which could not be fired in a room and then let eight children into the room. It took a child just 15 seconds to find the gun. With parents and law enforcement watching, the children were passing the fake weapon around, aiming it and attempting to shoot it.

While the result might not be surprising to most, the children who didn't touch the weapon were children whose families have guns inside the home and have explained the dangers and responsibilities of guns.

"Police put a fake gun which could not be fired in a room and then let eight children into the room."

Isn't that called entrapment?

No wonder people get shot in their home by kids leaving weapons sitting around.

a reply to: mazzroth
Before my kids even had toy guns they were building them out of Duplos and Tinker Toys. You can make some really nice looking guns out of Tinker Toys Boys are boys.

Good article and finding. They key point here is: parents are actually parenting, and teaching their kids something useful.

Even my own mom, not always the sharpest knife in the drawer, bless her heart, showed me her pistol when I was very young (about age 7). And she made sure to tell me it's not a toy, and it could kill people. And guess what? I didn't kill anyone.

But some people seem to be allergic to common sense.

This is a bogus experiment. The kids were interested in the gun because it was new to them and was a "toy" to them.

I grew up in a house with guns because my Dad was a Police Officer for many years. And even though I saw TV shows where the good and bad guys fired what seemingly was thousands of bullets (like the A-Team, lol) and nobody died, I still knew the difference between TV show guns, toy guns and real guns.

Experiments like the one in this article is so false. They're deigned for only one purpose and one purpose only. It's to demonize guns, their owners, the makers, the people who support owning them, etc. They're coming from all angles to this and the next generation so sooner or later, people will be falsely lead to believe that guns in our hands is bad and guns in the hands of "trained professionals" is good.

Ok, it's the day after they outlaw guns. You can't buy them, own them, look at them, dream of them, think of them, wish you had them and if you did, the Dream Police, Thought Police, etc. will come and arrest you. They will NEVER be able to take the guns out of the people who want them to commit crimes. Those people will ALWAYS be able to get them.

Meanwhile, good citizens like myself, who properly know all about guns, won't be able to purchase any to defend myself against the very people who don't care about others and wish to do them harm for their own selfish gain.

I don't own a gun. But I want the right to be able to go out and buy one if I need to.

The less guns out there the more crimes with guns will be committed against those who don't have one. If a criminal knows that chances are you don't have a gun in your house guess what? They're gonna come in. But if they feel that it's likely you do own a gun, they won't come into your house for fear of you hurting THEM.

Don't let them trick you into believing that legally owning a gun is bad for you, your wife, kids and the neighborhood. It's only bad for those who want to do you and your family harm.