To think that this proves who stupid the Aremican gun laws are .

[sunshield]

www.msn.com/en-gb/news/world/tombstone-two-people-shot-at-ok-corral-as-reenactment-uses-live-bullets/ar-AAfBWa2?li=AA59G2&ocid=SL5MDHP

[MrsTerryPratchett]

I think this is a better indication of the stupidity.

[sunshield]

You have a staged reenactment of the Gun fight at the OK corral being watched by people using real bullets !

You cannot believe , that the authorities would allow real bullets to be fired at a large scale gathering of tourists.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

They didn't. They just didn't check his gun. TBF they are weird about guns, but not that weird.

[catfordbetty]

If the Sandy Hook shooting didn't change attitudes towards guns in America I'm not sure what would.

[MaidOfStars]

Is that more stupid than a 6 year old shooting his 3 year old brother through the head while playing cops and robbers? Or an 11 year old killing an 8 year old girl because she wouldn't let him play with her dog?

To us, it's not just stupid or shortsighted, it's fucking bewildering. For many Americans, the right to have a gun is basic, and they fight against regulation or removal as fervently as we might fight against the government curbing some of our basic rights.

[bumbleymummy]

I just can't get my head around it. There was an article last week about a little boy shooting his 2 yo sister dead and the parents were saying that it must just have been 'her time' and it was part of 'God's plan' :(

[Efferlunt]

I think the worst was an incident a couple of years ago 5 year old shot by 6 year old brother. They'd been left in a room with a loaded gun.

The local sheriff was interviewed and described it as 'a crazy accident' no charges were brought against the parents because apparently leaving small children unsupervised with loaded firearms is just one of those silly mistakes that could happen to anyone.

[PassiveAgressiveQueen]

this is good (and relevant)

[bumbleymummy]

Good link. Thanks for that.

I just don't think some Americans would be touched by it though. They think the answer is more guns

[Ricardian]

Although US gun laws are crazy, this isn't an example. It's a known hard problem to make sure that guns that are used both with live and blank ammunition are loaded with blanks, that stocks of blank and live ammunition are kept separate, etc. It requires very strong and careful checks, particularly as Cowboy-type revolvers don't require blank firing adapters and it's difficult to check without physically unloading the weapon.

There were several cases around the turn of the century, during a period when the British army were worried about terrorist attacks on soldiers. On exercise, one or two soldiers were issued with a magazine of live ammunition in case the unit was attacked. As was almost inevitable, during what should have been blank-firing exercises, I think largely at night, guns got accidentally loaded with live ammunition and people got shot. If it can happen in Devon and in the Brecon Beacons, it can happen in Tombstone Arizona.

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/1880124.stm

news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/1147867.stm

[beefthief]

You get ten Mumsnet points for incorrectly spelling the name of the country you were calling stupid.

[wasonthelist]

Ricardian-top ammo knowledge

[Titsywoo]

This is a funny but sensible view on the whole thing

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

[wasonthelist]

There isn't much point in making laws that everyone would break/ignore. My US friends are really baffled that we accept limitations on guns - horses for courses.

[MrsTerryPratchett]

They could make their laws less bloody stupid, though. In Canada anyone wanting a gun has to go to a safety course, get Police checks (although idiots are trying to reduce these), get a licence to transport if they want to go to the range, store ammo and guns separately and locked. Canadians aren't allowed large clips or stupid guns (AK47 or rocket launcher anyone?).

People who get bears and cougars in their gardens get to have guns, but sensibly legislated for.

[sunshield]

Sorry for spelling America (Aremican) and how as who....

Just goes to show that writing a post when doing something else is not advisable ......

[Crazypetlady]

The gun laws are very lax. The parents of the toddler on the news that was shot left the gun on the fridge, so tragic.

[wasonthelist]

They could make the gun laws less stupid; but they never will. The other thing they won't do is had over the gazillions of guns they already have.

[TheWildRumpyPumpus]

I always remember this story as a typically sad yet unsurprising result of the gun laws in the US.

[stopfaffing]

I've seen that clip before passive and it never fails to leave me feeling shivery and cold . When these customers are confronted by the actual killing weapon that has slaughtered, murdered or accidentally killed, they are repulsed.

[SuperT3d]

Sorry but if you keep your gun within reach of a child and that child shoots themselves or others. Your children should be taken from you and you should be charged with manslaughter in some cases, child endangerment and neglect as you're quite obviously not fit to have children.

Any country with such insanely lax gun laws is just asking for mass shootings and children killing themselves and their parents. Sick of hearing about it from relatives over in the USA

[Ricardian]

They could make the gun laws less stupid; but they never will.

I'm not sure who "they" in this context is. By Northern American standards MA has very tight gunlaws, including compulsory licensing and purchase approval, which puts it on a footing similar to Canada. Whereas the neighbouring NH is pretty much the wild west. Compare and contrast the tables in:

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_New_Hampshire

and

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_Massachusetts

So although (the people's republic of) Massachusetts' laws don't conflict with the second amendment (and can't, as such laws would be struck down) they take the constitutional language as far as it can, and regulate gun ownership pretty heavily. New "live free or die" Hampshire hasn't passed equivalent laws. On the other coast, California's laws sit midlaw between the two examples above.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gun_laws_in_California

So "they" can make the gun laws dramatically less "stupid", and have done, subject to the constitutional constraints.

[kungpopanda]

Darwin does his best and US gun laws do lend a useful hand.

I find it quite satisfying when there is news of a child shooting a parent or grandparent, but each to their own.

[Senpai]

Sorry but if you keep your gun within reach of a child and that child shoots themselves or others. Your children should be taken from you and you should be charged with manslaughter in some cases, child endangerment and neglect as you're quite obviously not fit to have children.

That's generally what happens.

There's two problems to this:

1. NRA is a huge corporation and won't be going away anytime soon.
   
2. There are so many guns in circulation right now that gun laws only keep honest people honest.
   

The horse is already out of the barn.

Even if we stopped sales, we have guns that we sold coming right back in the country from the cartels.

There's just not an easy solution for this right now.

[Want2bSupermum]

The more liberal leaning the state, generally speaking thhe more gun control exists. There is a huge problem here in the NY metro area of guns purchased in states with more liberal rules or taken from family members who are legally licensed. That's what is hard to regulate even when you have stricter rules in place.