Talk:Gun safety
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Obviously your incredible prejudice in favor of private citizens owning firearms for self protection has made you completely unable to present a balanced point of view.
The issue of firearms safety is not a political issue. It doesn't matter who is handling the firearm, be it a private citizen, a police officer, or a soldier. The fundamentals of safety apply equally to everyone.
Somewhere in the world, right this minute, there is a police firearms instructor teaching a group of new recruits the fundamentals of firearms safety. That instructor will teach these four rules.
Your claims that training makes no difference in safety are absurd
I have never claimed that training makes no difference. Training is extremely helpful, and I agree that the page should reflect that. I will not accept the biased and unfounded view, though, that the proper use of firearms is so complex or demanding that only highly trained professionals can do so correctly. I could teach you to enjoyable and safely target shoot with an hour of instruction.
You have deleted my reference to the fact that the initial set of rules in this article is representative of only those people who favor providing everyone with guns.
I deleted this because it is manifestly untrue. If you find any firearms expert, whether they are for or against private ownership of weapons is irrelevant, they will tell you that these are extremely widely accepted fundamental rules of gun safety, and that these rules are not in the least bit political or controversial.
Let's be specific:
1. My first change was to the introduction to qualify WHO was advocating this particular set of four rules:
[...]
How is this change inaccurate?
These rules are not opposed by even the most ardent anti-gunner. Do you imagine that the political lobbyists at Handgun Control, Inc., go around advocating that people who own guns ought to handle them in an unsafe manner?
Again, it must be emphasized that safe handling of weapons is not a political issue. It is a matter of simple common sense, and there is a strong consensus of the experts that the rules here are all extremely well-founded and important.
Why pretend it is a political issue, when it is not?
2. My second change is to make mention of the fact that children need to know the potential risks as opposed to just what to do:
Once again: How is this change inaccurate?
As I said, I have no particular objection to this change. I merely deleted everything that you wrote by restoring the previous version because it was easier than going through line by line to fix all the errors.
3. Finally I added a discussion of why training is an important element of gun safety. I made five points here, but obviously you deleted all of them:
A. This may be the most important element of gun safety since adequate training will cover all of the aforementioned cautions.
Training is important, and the page should be changed to reflect this. However, the information on training must not be false.
B. The risks of a fatality increases with each firearm introduced into a tense situation.
This is just false, and is additionally misleading.
C. Worse yet an insufficiently skilled wielder sometimes has a weapon taken away by an adversary.
This is just false. It could be converted to a truth if written as follows: "Even extremely unskilled wielders of firearms almost never never have weapons taken away by their adversary." I doubt if this suits your political agenda, but it does have the minimal benefit of at least being true.
D. This risk, however, can be lessened by extensive training along the lines of a police academy and state military training.
The aforementioned risk is hardly a risk at all. We might want to add some of the criminological statistics showing that women who use firearms in self-defense against criminal attack are significantly less likely to suffer serious injury than those who do not resist at all, or those who resist without a gun. This demonstrates that weapons are extremely useful even without training... while training can make one even more safe, of course.
E. This training also helps recognize the specific challenges of particular weapon models in a given situation. For example Vietnam era M16 rifles frequently jammed due to a combination of overheating and dirt in contrast to the less accurate, but less sensitive, AK47 rifles.
This is a rather odd specific point to make, but I have no objection to illustrating how training can help, with specific examples that are actually relevant to the kinds of situations that people will actually encounter.
I would love to here why you think that none of points A-E are true. Even more I would love to see research to back up your position on these denials from any source that could reasonably be trusted to be objective. (for example: Government or University public safety studies not sponsered by the NRA or like organizations ideally including both US and non-US research.)
I will be happy to provide you with specific references. Why don't we take this to email, so that we can discuss it without bothering the other wikipedians? You'll have to put in some effort, because real research demands close attention. If you aren't interested in putting in the time, I will understand. But please don't presume to write on this page until you have the facts.
Considering that all of the reading I have done on the subject is reflected in what I wrote and I find YOUR statements to be manifestly untrue pertaining about the lack of risk to oneself and bystanders in the use of firearms at home or when hunting. I never even said that these situations always have a bad outcome. I rather used the word "some". Your very disagreement is extremely politically by in its very nature by denying what a very large percentage of the population consider safety concerns about firearms. To quote you: "You'll have to put in some effort, because real research demands close attention. If you aren't interested in putting in the time, I will understand. But please don't presume to write on this page until you have the facts." ... because I don't believe that you do.
--Jonathan--
Even if I had no reason to believe one of you or the other, it is still best to remove specific assertions of fact if either of you thinks them wrong until the one positing them backs them up. You're the one positing specific facts here, so it's up to you to demonstrate that they're true. That you've done "lots of reading" is meaningless if you've read only propaganda. I know Jimbo, and I'm inclined to believe him simply because of his reputation for knowledge and honesty. At least he has offered to cite sources; you haven't even done that, and you don't have a reputation, so I have no reason to believe the "facts" you've offered here. --LDC
You have seen my work; I wrote the bulk of the current Unix and Vim articles, and I have contributed to the Abortion article among others. Feel free to check out my research on anything I have written, and I believe that you will have a hard time proving me outright wrong on any of it.
In this case I will do more than assert the obvious; here are some sources: Many safety risk statistics: http://www.bradycampaign.org/facts/research/firefacts.asp References to specific safety studies: http://www.hsph.harvard.edu/hicrc On safety risks to women: http://www.gate.net/~liz/liz/guest3.htm Note how the US compares: http://www.nisu.flinders.edu.au/data/phonebook/queries/guninjuries94.php
Your writings on other topics are useful to judge writing skill, memory, and to some extent, lack of bias. I have no major quibble with those. But the question here is whether or not the specific facts you claim--that proper firearm training greatly reduces one's risk of accident, and that unskilled users are likely to have their guns used against them--are true. These are questions of fact resolvable by reference to actual studies. I looked at all four of the pages above, and not one of them contains any fact of even remote relevance to those questions. It is difficult to even find the word "training" on most of them. The fact that you would list them here when they contain no relevant information further reduces your credibility here. --LDC
Well, let me defend Jonathan here. He says he has done reading, and so I believe him. I'm sure that he believes me, too. So now we need to take a look at each other's facts, and work together to rewrite the article by citing specific sources. It seems that he's accepting some of my objections to his article, and the primary remaining issues have to do with "risk to oneself and bystanders in the use of firearms at home or when hunting". That's a legitimate concern, although I don't think that the fact will leave us where he wants to be.
I hope that we'll take this to email so we can compare notes and start working towards a consensus. The main thing is that a page on gun safety should not be political. Based on that, we shouldn't have too much trouble coming to a consensus.
(Of course, if he wants to cite the Brady Campaign, I can surely cite the NRA. But I won't, because both are highly politicized sources of information.)
--Jimbo Wales (jwales@bomis.com, please email me, Jonathan)
Contents |
[edit] Complete rewrite
I have comepletely rewritten the page. I have tried to be faithful to the original page in that as much fact as possible has been preserved.
Spelling and grammar is undoubtedly wrong in some places. Also note that this is my first major Wikipedia edit so I am most probably off on formatting and style. Halp on that is apprechiated.
Possible additions to the page may include a picture shing an example of bad adherence to gun safety (people posing with guns commonly keep the finger on the trigger and/or pointed at others). Also a picture of a situation illustrating the dilemma caused by rule 4 (Be sure of your target) could be usefull.
Cheers --J-Star 17:04, 2004 Nov 12 (UTC)
[edit] The additions of 2005-07-13
24.126.74.236 has added alot but I'm not certain everything should be there. But before I start hacking and slashing I'd like to bring this up to discussion.
Safety always on. Is this really a generic part of gun safety training? I can think up lots of situations where a handler would disengage the safety to be prepared to fire, even if firing is not imminent. I vote to remove that section.
Inspecting chambers when receiving a firearm. Again, is this really a generic part of gun safety traning? I've never heard of it before. Perhaps this is a branch specific procedure? I vote to remove that section too.
Horseplay. I'll reword that and move it up to Treat firearms as if they are loaded.
- Reworded but kept it in that section. --J-Star 07:21, July 13, 2005 (UTC)
Passing firearms. Should be kept.
Weapon conditions. Never heard of. This seems like something USMC specific. I think this clashes pretty badly with the rest of the article and messes it up. I vote to remove this part, or to put it in a separate article, or to make a section that deals with branch specific gun handling and put this part in that section.--J-Star 07:10, July 13, 2005 (UTC)
- My two cents.. Chamber inspection is a great idea if you know how to do it. It's not generally one of the "main" safety rules, as the specifics of how to inspect the chamber varies for different firearms. The "conditions" are real, but I don't see that they really belong on this page. "Safety always on" is probably questionable as well, as the specifics vary on different guns. Many folks who shoot trap, for example, practice proper gun safety but never use their safeties, as they don't load the gun until they're ready to shoot, making the safety irrelevant. Friday 18:42, 13 July 2005 (UTC)
Response by (24.126.74.236):
First of all, the additions to this page that I added I did so on the understanding that this article was to be a basic "primer" on general gun safety. Rules specific, for example, to trap shooting, ought not be included in an article on general gun safety, or should be included as a qualified dependent clause or paragraph.
Regarding the issue of keeping the safety on, in my edit I feel that I qualified the issue properly by indicating that different firearms had different designs regarding safety, or had no manually actuated safety at all. If one wanted to cover the specific case of trap-shooting or some other activity in which keeping the safety off would be advised, then this could be added in a dependent clause or paragraph, without affecting the spirit of the "safety on" rule.
Regarding chamber inspection, I was taught that part of safety rule #1 (treat every firearm as if it were loaded) is to always visually confirm the state of the chamber when taking possession of or handing off a weapon. The specifics of how to do so may vary by weapon, but, again in the context of a general gun safety article, the fact remains that every weapon has a means of inspection to determine whether or not the weapon is locked and loaded.
Regarding "Weapons Conditions", fair enough, this probably is a branch-specific policy. Jeff Cooper, who was very influential in gun safety, was the one who popularized this procedure, but he was a Marine Colonel at one point. This could be moved to a specific article on branch-specific policies, and perhaps linked to this page.
- My two cents.. I approached this article with a sense of responsibility towards the reader, considering that the uninitiated may be receiving some of their first exposure to principles of gun safety here. Under the circumstances, I felt it best to err on the side of caution, and exposit a relatively broad and demanding set of general principles of safety. If this conflicts with the way anyone else might teach a shooter or run their range, then they of couse would be free to teach any appropriate modifications of these rules in their area of responsibility accordingly. Until a shooter is shooitng under those specific conditions, however, I think that we ought to expect them to operate under rules that demand the most responsibility of them.
[edit] The additions of 2005-09-16
Two additions today... I'm not sure they should stay. But let's discuss it first.
The addition on sports shooting in the UK, isn't that a bit specific? Arguably my example about swedish gun legislation is also a bit specific. But still... I think the new addition about sports shooting is too detailed. What should we do about it? Keep? Remove? Move to some other section? Move to some other place altogether? I'm inclined to think it should be removed or extensively reworded to make the content generic.
About environmental effects at gun ranges I think that is clearly outside the realm of gun safety. Sure, it is a health and safety issue that is related to guns... but it is not "gun safety" we're talking about anymore. I vote to remove that completely.
Same for health hazards when cleaning the gun. Once again... it's a safety issue and it involves guns... but we're not talking "gun safety". I'm voting to remove that completely. --J-Star 22:19, 16 September 2005 (UTC)
I'll second the removal of both. Jwissick 09:04, 18 September 2005 (UTC)
[edit] Fifth rule
Every time I've heard the rules of gun safety, rule 5 has been on there: Maintain control of your firearm.
I've heard of many instances of police leaving their guns in a public bathroom, or on the roof of their car, etc. This also applies to leaving a gun where an untrained child can reach it. I would add this rule because it is even mentioned in the section about Gun safety while gun is not in use. That section could probably be merged into the section explaining each of the rules.
[edit] Americans for Gun Safety Foundation, opinions requested.
I have taken a look at the wiki page and their website. I see a clear (claimed) profile to educate for Gun Safety. My opinion is that unless anyone can refute that and show that "AGS is ONLY politics. THey have NADA to do with gun safety" or "AGS has nothing to do with safety. They want bans", then the link should stay.
Opinions?--J-Star 08:26, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
- What is the web address you viewed? The one linked on their wiki page is down. JG 09:18, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
- Hmm... so it seems. But this one works: AGS Foundation. Here we find many things that are written in the Gun Safety article. [1]
- --J-Star 11:57, 23 February 2006 (UTC)
Since no opinions have been enetered and the site speaks of many things we have in the article, I'm reinserting the link. --J-Star 11:15, 2 March 2006 (UTC)
[edit] Removed the link to Ahad Israfil
I removed the link to Ahad Israfil since his story does not really relate to or add value to the article. He is a victim of an accidental shooting. The question is: So what? What does it add to this article? There are thousands of accidental gunshot victims out there and we don't need to list them all. If we are to link to anyone here, they should have a very tangiable connection to Gun Safety... and I don't se ethat Ahad has this in any rare or exceptional way.
If anyone objects, bring it up for discussion here. --J-Star 07:27, 28 June 2006 (UTC)
[edit] The fifth rule
The fifth rule about "The safety is a mechanical device..." I think is not necessary for the page. It is already comprehensively covered by the existing four rules. Also it breaks the pattern of the article since there wasn't a section written for that rule. And if one would add such a section, the text therein would be a repeat of what has been said before. And finally I have not seen that rule be metioned in gun safety training. I don't think it is a generic rule and instead only part of some training syllabi.
My opinion is to not add the fifth rule and instead work its message into the previous sections. I have drafted such an addition into the first rule. Do not add the fifth rule again with discussion jere first.--J-Star 09:31, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
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- It was commonly incorporated into the classes I have seen/taken; could be a regional thing. Or, not. Hard to say. Will look for examples of where it has been taught independently from the other rules. Yaf 12:58, 15 November 2006 (UTC)
