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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To wonder what kind of idiot teaches a 9-year-old to use an Uzi

397 replies

BadLad · 27/08/2014 11:33

m.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-28948946

A 9-year-old kills her shooting instructor when she loses control of the Uzi he is teaching her to use.

Apparently many (that's right, many) firing ranges have strict rules when teaching children.

Oh well, that's all right then, what was I worried about?

OP posts:
Figster · 27/08/2014 11:34

Only in America Angry

trikken · 27/08/2014 11:35

This is why guns should be made illegal.

BongCrisby · 27/08/2014 11:36

Wasn't there a story recently about a young boy accidentally shooting his baby sister?
Mixing guns and kids seems like a really good idea.

PausingFlatly · 27/08/2014 11:37

That merits a Darwin Award...

however · 27/08/2014 11:39

YABU.
Proficient use of an Uzi is an essential life skill. Like say, swimming or boiling an egg.

BongCrisby · 27/08/2014 11:39

A quick google shows that this isn't a rare occurrence.
A young boy shot his brother when they found a handgun in the apartment.
A 5 year old boy shot hi 2 year old sister with the rifle he was given for his birthday (a five year old given a gun? Jesus)
But it's the land of the free, so everyone who wants a gun can have one Hmm

AlpacaPicnic · 27/08/2014 11:41

A nine year old is obviously not going to have enough body strength to control a sub machine gun. Some grown adults would struggle. I just hope the little girl is not traumatised by the event.

While I feel that it is good to teach a healthy respect of weapons to children who live in a country where weapons are a part of life - this should never have happened.

I can't help but wonder if we are actually being told the whole story...

SpecialAgentFreyPie · 27/08/2014 11:43

I don't think (most) Americans feel safe unless they have a gun. Vicious cycle and really, really encourages paranoia. One of the only three reasons I refused my DH's promotion to live there. :(

TwllBach · 27/08/2014 11:45

I watched a programme recently about kids and guns in America. A father bought his three year old daughter a gun for Christmas and was upset when she wasn't excited and didn't want to play with it.

Blew.
My.
Mind.

PinkSquash · 27/08/2014 11:46

Land of the free and home to some of the terminally stupid.

That poor girl has to live with that, I hope her family think it was worth it

AnotherStitchInTime · 27/08/2014 11:46

I know bad, why do they need to know how to fire any gun?

squoosh · 27/08/2014 11:46

I'm pretty anti gun, and definitely opposed to children handling any guns whatsoever, but a fucking Uzi!?!

Uzi is to gun as Samurai sword is to knife.

Eauneau · 27/08/2014 11:47

That poor girl will have to live with knowing that she killed a man for the rest of her life, and all because the adults around her have totally fucked up ideas about guns.

What is wrong with people Sad

Original poster
BadLad · 27/08/2014 11:48

A quick google shows that this isn't a rare occurrence.

True. But a rifle is one thing, but when nine-year-olds are learning to use Uzi's, which wikipedia says can fire 600 rounds a minute, then the stupidity really has plunged to new depths.

OP posts:
zippey · 27/08/2014 11:48

This reply has been deleted

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NoArmaniNoPunani · 27/08/2014 11:49

Not just America. One of the selling points of the AK47 is that it's easy for child soldiers to operate :(

Eauneau · 27/08/2014 11:50

And it just shows that the attitude about guns is not about bullshit 'protecting yourself' - you don't need an Uzi for that. No, it's about a rather sick obsession with having the power to kill something, right there in your hands. And bringing up the next generation to be the same.

Grim.

Original poster
BadLad · 27/08/2014 11:59

The bbc has a video with an interview with range master.

They instruct kids from five years old.

He wasn't entirely clear about the criteria for handling an Uzi, but I think he says you have to be eight years old for that.

OP posts:
LatteLoverLovesLattes · 27/08/2014 12:00

I have just watched the video (it doesn't show him being shot, it stops right before). It seems like quite a controlled safe environment, it's hard to see how it actually happened?!

I don't agree with children being shown how to shoot, not for a minute, but having seen that video you wouldn't believe it would be possible for the instructor to have been killed.

Whilst I don't agree with what he was doing, it's legal, he sounded like a nice guy and it appeared to be a safe environment.

My heart goes out to the little girl and his family & friends.

alAswad · 27/08/2014 12:04

Safe conditions?! Would you want to be standing right next to a 9yo using a machine gun for the first time? Confused

Mrsjayy · 27/08/2014 12:05

My husband watches programme s about preppers you know those folks who live in bunkers anyway one loony lot teach their kids to shoot machine guns its madness

MrsWinnibago · 27/08/2014 12:07

What gets me is that the guy was a soldier...and a trained gun handler so WHY did he do this? What made him stand so close? Why did he let a small child handle a gun that many adults would struggle with??

AgaPanthers · 27/08/2014 12:08

She was not being 'trained' to use an AK47.

The place she was in is a tourist trap basically, on the border between Arizona and Nevada. Nevadans go there to buy lottery ticket, people visiting the Grand Canyon stop off to go to the toilet, and some people go and have a quick blast on the gun.

Here's a similar package:

bulletsandburgers.com/packages/the-bullets-and-burgers-experience

And here is the actual place where the instructor died:

arizonalaststop.com

When we went to Las Vegas, we did a Dune Buggy day, a quick Google search suggests plenty of people die in Dune Buggies, but that doesn't make international news.

The fact is you can go to Las Vegas/Arizona and blast off some machine gun rounds in what is statistically an extremely safe environment, literally millions of people do it every year, before going home to their everyday lives.

It is not psychopath training, it's just a fun thing people do on holiday.

Sadly here there was an accident and the instructor died. But it doesn't warrant pages of posts about how Americans are so stupid and 'OMG guns', along with international headline news.

MrsWinnibago · 27/08/2014 12:08

Latte how it happened was that the gun is so powerful that the first shots caused her to lose control and it went upwards...towards the man.

Mrsjayy · 27/08/2014 12:08

There is a whole culture of this kids with guns sexy women with guns injust dont get it to let a child loose with a machine gun in lunacy there is obviously nothing safe about it and ffs an uzi where the hell do they buy machine guns