Woman shot dead by two year old in America

Exactly! If the labeled outliers on the left (Brazil and above) were thrown out, there would be an even stronger linear relationship between the number of guns and gun-related deaths in any given country. We could conclude the US is no different than any of the other countries shown in this model, and certainly not an outlier. Granted, there are a staggering number of guns in the US.

A Swiss friend told me that up to the age of 30, all Swiss men (how sexist) are required to keep a gun at home for the reasons you indicate (I think they can also choose when, between the ages of 16 - 30, they do their National Service.)

As in other countries (apparently) most Swiss gun-related deaths are suicide. Which makes sense:

Feeling suicidal? - chance of suicide.

Feeling suicidal and have a loaded gun in the house? - far greater chance of suicide.

(If you substitute 'angry beyond rage', and 'murder', for 'suicide' in the above, it explains how most of the rest of the Swiss gun crime is domestic and involves family members.)

I'm with George on this regarding gun ownership.

I don't understand the 'John Wayne syndrome' that seems to afflict the US when it comes to guns. And hunting just seems barbaric to me.

steve

I with both of you. The US continues to baffle. Even this accident has brought out the pro-gun nuts with their "guns are safe if the precautions are followed". Guns are designed to be unsafe. It's their natural function. Owning guns for "protection" is so thoroughly debunked as an effective strategy that those to that cling to the notion must suffer from some of the most extreme cognitive dissonance imaginable as the seemingly endless tales like this tragedy continue to make the press.

If you've read Wolfe's "The Right Stuff", you'l recall how the test pilots always sought to blame "pilot error" for their colleagues' regular deaths in firey crashes. Believing that they personally controlled the risks was the only way that they could rationalise the risks they were taking.

(In terms of cognitive dissonance, gun nuts are right up there with motorists who insist that they are seriously inconvenienced by cyclists, when the overwhelming evidence, perpetually front of their eyes (when they look up from their phone, that is), is that it is other motorists who are holding them up.)

On hunting....someone who chooses to kill animals for pleasure has little in common with me at a fundamental level.

As a vegetarian you are entitled to feel that and not be a hypocrite.

Others, who do eat meat, delegate the killing to others and seem fairly untroubled by the slaughterers' mental states as they carry out their work - reserving the pleasure they gain for eating.

I'm not so much troubled by the killing of animals for food whether by people or lions or sharks (for example). It has nothing to do with whether I eat meat. Animals are killed for food all the time. It's just the way things are.

What I am just saying is that I find taking pleasure from doing this to animals unfathomable (or at least totally foreign to me). I just can't get my head around the idea of stalking a beautiful big stag through the early morning mist, for example, and then once you have it in your view, instead of admiring it, or perhaps photographing it, you choose to kill it. And that the act of killing it in a completely one-sided contest gives you pleasure. WTF? You couldn't pay me to kill something like that. I'm not actually saying that people shouldn't hunt for food or even for "sport" (although I would probably prefer if they didn't), but just that I don't understand how they find it a pleasurable thing to do. I just don't get it.

I terms of professional slaughterhouse employees? Yeah, I see how that job sucks. Hopefully, they do it for the money.

(Disclaimer, I have been fishing perhaps 3-4 times in the past 40 years. Although I eat what I catch, I certainly don't enjoy seeing the fish die, and feel hypocritical regarding my general views on hunting as sport)

Does this mean I can refer to "bicycle riding punks" without fear of retribution?  (Disclaimer: I don't think you are a punk, just making a point about how if a position is different than yours, you can't seem to respect a different view, and call the other position a disparaging name just because it fits your milieu to do so.) 

And I do acknowledge there are gun "nuts", but not every gun owner is one, and despite what you believe, there is a responsible way to own and possess a gun.  I have been to a couple of gun shows, and the a-holes in military fatigues are, well, a-holes.

Espousing safe handling of firearms, which this woman clearly did NOT, does not make you a "nut"...and I resent the inference.  I was taught at an early age proper respect for them, proper handling, and am far from being a "nut" (inasmuch as I currently don't even own one.)

I'd like a few references on your debunking of self protection.  I have lived in some pretty seedy areas in my life (in fact just 3 years ago), and sometimes I had a gun, and sometimes I haven't.  As I said, at present I don't.

Most hunters (by a VAST majority) are not "taking pleasure" in killing animals; they eat the meat, sell or use the hide, and enjoy the sport of it inasmuch as it is a challenge when done properly, & was a means to obtain food for centuries.  Many come home empty handed, because the animal has a chance to get away or is never even seen.  In years of hunting my grandpa got none, and my uncle only got one deer.  We ate it.

People who only kill for trophies irritate me, and those who use bait stations are not even hunters; that is why it is illegal to do so in many places.

Is hunting with a bow better?  How about trapping?

Subsistence hunting is in the same category as professional slaughterhouse employees. Something people do to survive. You're right that I used the general term "hunter" to mean something quite different. I mean the so-called "sporting shooters" who have no need to hunt, nor derive much from it other than the challenge and pleasure of killing. That people derive pleasure from the challenge, well, I get that, but there are plenty of other challenging outdoor pursuits that don't require killing animals. Hunting with bows, or knives, or trapping aren't any different in my view.

By using the term "gun-nut" I am indeed being disparaging. Not by accident. I agree that not everyone who owns a firearm is a "nut". Some people have a legitimate reason. But personal protection is hardly ever a legitimate reason, in my view. The statistics bear this out. The gun you are most likely to be shot with is your own gun. Next most likely is the gun of a family member or friend.

I'm afraid that those statistics mainly show that people who don't know how to handle guns should neither own nor handle them.  On that we can both agree.  The sad story that prompted this thread is proof of that.

I can't say I have any evidence but looking in from outside, it seems to me that the gun nuts and hunters are different, I mean you don't need a semi auto carbine or grenade launcher  to hunt animals. Seeing these survivalist types with arsenals a small country would be proud of, are taken as spokes persons for gun law maintenance.

I am fascinated by the mechanical genius that has been employed in gun manufacture and design.

I remember on our first trip to the US we ended up in Florida and saw a gun store on the side of the road, I thought it was a general store, we went in and they had everything from a little Saturday night special type of revolver to at least semi auto rifles and shot guns, also available was heavier armour including a small armoured vehicle.

The guy was willing to sell to us, so I pointed out I would probably have trouble getting any purchase  though customs.

This is wittily observed, funny, and quite pertinent.

(15 min video, gun control routine, swearing)

http://www.liveleak.com/view?i=89d_1411198955

We absolutely agree on that. The utterly irresponsible woman who was killed is arguably the appropriate victim of this very sad incident. Any other fatality would have been a true tragedy. I feel very bad for the kid who will (incorrectly) blame themselves for the death of their mother.

If that two years old had to shoot someone at least he picked the gun owner and not a totally innocent bystander who has nothing to do with firearms. 

I feel very sorry for the 2 year old boy, and wonder how much of it he knows.

Possibly not much, ...i assume.

But what will they say to him when he's old enough to understand?

He will live with it for the rest of his life : (

Probably put him off owning a gun.

Debs

Thanks for posting these links.  Unfortunately it makes me wonder even more about how the woman approached gun safety.  A zipper does not make something inaccessible.  I also don't agree with the accounts she left the purse alone for 'a moment'. 

She should have been carrying the gun on her person in an appropriate holster, or the purse should have remained on her arm. 

I'm wondering how she carried it before this present. 

As much as she liked guns and used them, it gives the appearance that gun safety was not high on her list. 

As others have said, I feel terribly for the boy.  He has a challenging road ahead in life.