A Monday night sighting of the convicted killer who escaped from an eastern Pennsylvania prison nearly two weeks ago jolted the surrounding community into high alert and prompted school closures Tuesday, after police warned the inmate now has a weapon.
Suggestions enforced by tutting on social media are not a substitute for actual laws with actual repurcussions.
That’s what irks me. Say we get a weekly report about another child shooting their brother with an unsecured loaded gun. That just prompts observatory responses from gun nuts: “Oh yeah, generally it’s a good idea to secure your guns and keep the ammo separate. Here’s a handy youtube guide for setting one up if you feel like it.”
It infuriates me to no end that the response is not the same as it is in industrial topics: “There is no such thing as an accident. Just willful ignorance of safety rules/laws.” Let’s make those into laws.
It’s just gun owners jerking each other off because it wasn’t them, they don’t actually care to fix anything and will staunchly oppose trying.
For safe storage, the talking point is usually “Safes are expensive! What about poor people? Do you hate poor people? Do you want them to be raped? Some of them might be black or gay or women! Whose the real nazi now?”.
Of course, they’re not giving away guns for free, so they’re obviously fine with a financial barrier for gun ownership, as long as that money goes into the pockets of gun manufacturers and lobbyists.
I would say that, for this example, an argument could be made that having a loaded firearm that is reasonably easily accessible to children could be defined as reckless endangerment, or negligence. I am generally in favor of punishing such behaviours; however, it should be noted that such a punishment is generally not at all black and white, so it should certainly be mostly left up to a jury.