Minnesota CCW: Comment on Cold Spring School Shooting

Yahoo News ^ | September 25, 2003 | Rebecca Thoman

[jdege]

Press Release Source: Citizens for a Safer Minnesota Education Fund

Comment on Cold Spring School Shooting

Thursday September 25, 3:03 pm ET

ST. PAUL, Minn., Sept. 25 /PRNewswire/ -- The following is a comment by Rebecca Thoman, M.D., Executive Director of Citizens for a Safer Minnesota Education Fund: Our condolences go to the families involved in yesterday's terrible tragedy at Rocori High School. The entire Cold Spring community will, no doubt, feel the devastating affects for some time.

Details about the incident and its causes are still surfacing, so little can be said about the specifics of the case. But larger questions emerge. Why do we allow our young people easy access to handguns? How do we accept the proliferation of lethal weapons in our communities?

Most children who use guns to kill themselves or others, obtain the weapons from their own home or the home of a friend or relative. One out of six Americans keeps a handgun in the home, many unlocked, some even loaded. A survey of Hennepin County residents showed that of families with children under age 16 and a gun in the home, a full one-third admitted to storing their weapon unlocked and, in some instances, loaded.

Most families who keep a handgun in the home do so for protection. But, according to medical research, guns in the home are more often used to kill a family member than to be used in self-defense [Journal of Trauma, 1998.] Clinging to the belief that a readily available handgun protects us, we place our children and communities at risk.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that guns be removed from environments where children are present. We agree. Parents should reassess their need to keep a weapon in the home, and be sure that firearms kept for sport are securely locked.

What drives a child to murder his classmates? The answers are complex. But the simple truth is that access to a gun can turn a desperate situation into a tragedy.

-----------------------

Source: Citizens for a Safer Minnesota Education Fund

[jdege]

To find all articles bumped to bang_list, click below:
click here >>>	bang_list	<<< click here
(To view all FR Bump Lists, click here)

Bookmark the bang_list. This is not a "ping" list (no one maintains a list of interested FReepers). It is a do-it-yourself, see-what's-been-bumped-to-the list. Anyone can bump an article to the list by sending it To: *bang_list Then, interested FReepers can (bookmark and) check the list periodically to see new articles. Please do not ask me to "add you to the list." It doesn't work like that. This is better than a ping list because (1) anyone can bump an article to the list, and any interested parties can see the list of articles 24x7.

[jjm2111]

But, according to medical research, guns in the home are more often used to kill a family member than to be used in self-defense [Journal of Trauma, 1998.]

Yea! Discredited statistics. However, what concerns me about school shootings is what drives kids to kill?

[joesnuffy]

Guns dont kill innocent people
Hard hearts do

[Aeronaut]

I knew they'd tie this totally unrelated tragedy to the handgun for protection issue.

[freedomcrusader]

Didn't take long for them to start exploiting the tragedy for political gain, did it? Vultures...

[Atlas Sneezed]

On average, I have 4 unlocked, loaded firearms around the house at any time. Plus a couple unloaded ones.

Plus [none of your business] more in the safe.

[Diddle E. Squat]

Help me out, I know that study is bullcrap, but what exactly was the problem in their methodology? I can't remember, but believe it was bogus even when just examining instances where guns were fired(of course, if we add in the fact that 98% of times when a gun is used in self-defense it is never fired, the study is completely shot to smitherenes, so to speak.)

[MCRD]

I thought I heard on the news that the shooter was the son of a policeman, so I assume we will need to disarm the police now too.

[markman46]

was not this childs father a Stearns cty sheriff too???what a BS statement to make, don't this people have nothing better to do

[jjm2111]

"guns in the home are more often used to kill a family member than to be used in self-defense"

I think the reporter was playing with words especially with the "used in self defense". I believe the study compared instances where an individual killed a family member vs. killing an intruder whereas, like you said, in the vast majority of defensive gun, the weapon isn't even fired, much less the defendee dying. A google search for the study doesn't reference the study itself only claims by various anti-gun groups about it.

[Arthur McGowan]

Since all the school shootings in recent, but one, have occurred in government schools, that seems to be a risk factor.

Adolescence is NOT a time of increased crime, pregnancy, violence, etc., except in countries in which children are imprisoned in schools.

[therut]

As a Family Physician who had as one of my teaching physician Former Surgeon General Joycelyn Elders the APA does have it written in Nelson's Textbook of Pediatrics(The Book Of PEDS) that guns should be removed from the homes that have children in them. I about had a seizure when I saw this in our new edition we got at the clinic. These people are winning and I do not know what to do about it. Seems like no pro-gun people go into broadcasting,teaching in universities, or acadmeic medicine.

[3Lean]

In reality a gun in the home is also much more likely to be used to 1)go hunting 2)shoot targets 3)sit around and do nothing.
I'm sure the same skewed statistic applies to kitchen knives, they are much more likely to be used to kill a family member than to be used in self defense. Same goes for frying pans, screwdrivers, toasters, etc.

Is the self defense/murder comparison what is known as a false dichotomy?

[IronJack]

It will turn out these kids stole this gun or got it from a peer, all of which are already illegal. But those facts won't deter the gun-haters from blaming the tool instead of the godless, amoral society that they themselves have helped create.

[GovernmentShrinker]

Statistically, schools with over 1000 students have a significantly higher incidence of shootings. Of the 3 school shootings this week, 2 schools had over 100 students, including the middle school (can't recall which high school had under 1000). Common sense should tell us that adolescents and teens (and even many adults) are not psychologically equipped to deal with these unnatural mob scenes on a daily basis.

[Sweet_Sunflower29]

This may help-

COMMENTS ON KELLERMANN - GUNS IN THE HOME

[Diddle E. Squat]

Thanks

[c-b 1]

Here is why!

In 1919 an Italian socialist named Antonio Gramsci began to publish a newspaper in Milan called, L'Ordine Nuovo, or "The New Order." Loosely rendered, he concluded that the average person would never voluntarily reject the faith and culture of the West. He concluded that the best way to implement a collectivist government was to use an intellectual elite to destroy traditional values by attacking fundamental Jewish and Christian beliefs.

Gradual revolution through infiltration & subversion by revolutionaries
1. Infiltrate the State: elective & appointed office; judgeships
2. Infiltrate the military: enlist & subvert from within
3. Infiltrate justice: undermine and discredit state constitutions
4. Infiltrate education: professors & administrators
5. Infiltrate & discredit religion: scoundrels as clergymen
6. Register, then license, then confiscate all privately held weapons

Home Schooling is the only solution I see at this point, that is not enough.

[Larry Lucido]

Similar logic: A swimming pool is more likely to drown a child than it is to drown an intruder. Ergo, the risks of owing a pool outweigh the benefits of owning a pool.