[gaweidert]

As an aside, I don't think a Canadian protester has ever been shot and killed by our equivalent of the National Guard.

I am old enough to have been in college during the Kent State shooting.

1) The Ohio National Guard was on campus because Kent Sate is a state owned school and the students were burning buildings. They were there to protect public property.

2) The college students, supposedly our best and brightest, were throwing rocks and bottles at men armed with M14 rifles.

3) The National Guardsmen had absolutely no training in crowd control. They were put into a bad situation without the proper tools to do their jobs. They were in a no win situation. After the Ken State shootings National Guard troops were finally the given proper training and tools needed to handle crowd control.

4) The students had backed the guardsmen into a corner. And then, according to a friend of mine who was a student at Kent State at the time and watched the whole thing, there was a sound like a gun shot. It did not come from the guardsmen or the students but seemed to be further away. At this point, a few of the guardsmen, already under a lot of pressure, reverted to the training that the did have. What is amazing how many guardsmen did not shoot. With the weapons that they did have, they could have killed dozens is a matter of a few seconds.

There was a tragic irony to the whole scenario. During the Vietnam war there were four main ways to avoid the draft.

1) Get married and have kids as soon as you graduated from high school.

2) Go to college.

3) Take the Sylvester Stallone approach and go to a foreign country and live there if you had the means. Many young men went to Canada. After the was was over, Sly came home and started making his Rambo movies and portraying himself as a genuine hero.

4) Join the National Guard. As the miliary was fufiling it's manpower goals using the draft, the National Guard was inundated with people trying to join. Very few guard units got sent to Vietnam. The ones that did were specialist units and not ordinary combat troops.

In essence, the students who were rioting and causing destruction of public property because of "The War" as we called it back then were throwing rocks and bottles at people who didn't want to go there either but were not well off enough to avoid the draft any other way.


Everybody should be trained in the proper handling of firearms. Not that you need to own one, but you should be able to safely handle and secure a firearm if you ever come across one. At least until you turn it over to authorities.

[luftfluss]

3) Take the Sylvester Stallone approach and go to a foreign country and live there if you had the means. Many young men went to Canada. After the was was over, Sly came home and started making his Rambo movies and portraying himself as a genuine hero.

Actually, that is probably untrue. The draft-dodging legend is from an unsubstantiated rumor which was published in a magazine article. Stallone sued the author and won. He was born with some kind of nerve defect in his face, so he may have even been exempt from the draft due to that.

Edit: found a reference

http://articles.latimes.com/1991-07-22/entertainment/ca-32_1_legal-file

"Stallone Wins: Sylvester Stallone got an apology and an undisclosed sum in a settlement of a lawsuit against a British magazine that had reported he evaded military service during the Vietnam War. Stallone, 45, says he tried to enlist during the war but was turned down because of a bad ear. Stallone's lawyer said that Taki Theodoracopulos, the writer of the article in the February issue of the Spectator, and the magazine agreed to pay the actor substantial damages and legal costs."

[luftfluss]

Natural selection is what is said when a three year old shoots himself!?!?!

If the parents shot themselves it would be "darwin" because they were stupid and they owned the gun! Stupidity and deadly force are a terrible combination!

This is a dead child.

-Lmd91343

I think you misunderstood the article. The boy shot and killed his father.

[boriscleto]

Natural selection is what is said when a three year old shoots himself!?!?!

If the parents shot themselves it would be "darwin" because they were stupid and they owned the gun! Stupidity and deadly force are a terrible combination!

This is a dead child.

-Lmd91343

Three year old shot the father. Learn to read.

[magkelly]

Repeat after me... guns aren't for everyone...

No, they are not. They are for people who have a decent amount of common sense and who have made sure they know how to properly use them. The man is unfortunately dead because he didn't do what he was supposed to do as a responsible gun owner or as the parent of a young child. That is not the fault of all gun owners, or all parents either for that matter. The responsibility for what happened IS his. I'm sorry but it is. He's a victim, his son is one, because he accidentally made that happen. You don't have a weapon of any kind if you aren't going to use it properly and responsibly.

You certainly don't leave one loaded where a little kid can find it. No offense, but that was just amazingly careless of him. What happened was a tragedy but in a way it's no different from leaving a kid by a pool unsupervised, or a medicine cabinet open, or a book of matches where a kid can reach them. This time the "bad thing" happened to be a gun, but it could have just as been something else at some other time, and the kid's life instead, because the man clearly wasn't thinking like a good parent should.

In my house there is a gun and yes, we have kids that come here, but that gun is locked up with a combination lock well away from where the kids can get at it. The same goes for the one at my Dad's place. It's always been that way and it always will be because none of us would let our kids anywhere near one until they're old enough to own one themselves if they want. That being said if and when my nieces and my nephew are older if they want to learn how to shoot we will make sure they learn how to use a gun responsibly and well. But long before they ever have a gun of their own they will have every rule of gun safety drilled into their heads.

My Dad and brothers have been gun owners off and on my whole life. They've had guns for hunting, and for defense and they've always been 100% careful about using them. Situations like this are exactly why they have portable locking gun chests. I can't even imagine someone putting down a loaded gun where a toddler could reach it. It just blows my mind the idea of someone being that careless because of the way I was raised. By the time I was 2 or 3 I knew what a gun was and that I was not to ever touch one if I ever saw one in a friend's house or whatever. It was like my parent's lighters, pills in the medicine cabinet, liquor in the liquor cabinet. Forbidden and I don't mean in a stolen cookie kind of way.

I knew a gun was something that could hurt me and it was to be locked up and strictly used only by the adults. That was a rule that I was not allowed to break. The one time I picked up a lighter as a toddler and tried to turn it on even though I knew I wasn't allowed my Dad whupped me a good one for doing it. I wasn't happy about being spanked. I wasn't used to that. Spankings were few and far between when I was little and it ticked me right off, but I remembered that spanking the next time I thought about it and left the lighter well alone. I'd have never, ever touched a weapon. My Dad would have skinned my butt raw for even thinking about going there.

I'm not in favor of spankings as a rule but I get why he spanked me that day. It was because he loved me and he wanted me to remain alive. He wanted to really get that message of DANGER drilled into my little head before a tragedy occurred. Fact is there are many things around a kid that can kill. It doesn't take a gun being in the house for something like this to happen. Safety isn't something you wait to teach your kids. You start as soon as they can move and talk. I feel for that poor little boy, and his mother, I really do, but it's his late father's fault his psyche is going to be damaged and I am not going to sugar coat that and not say so. Nobody should ever have to die because of carelessness but it's a fact people do. That the man is dead because he left a loaded pistol where a toddler could find it. It is a senseless death, but he could have prevented it. He didn't and he paid the ultimate price for that. Sad, but true.

[lmd91343]

I think you misunderstood the article. The boy shot and killed his father.

My apologies.

[luftfluss]

My apologies.

No need to apologize to me I agree with your general premise.

This whole story makes me want to cry a little, I just can't imagine that poor boy growing up with this hanging over his head.

[altopiet]

Any gun owner should train his family members how to use guns safely. I did that to my sons when they were about 5, and could hold an air rifle, as they got older they learned to shoot with my .22, .243, .308, 9mm pistol and pump action shotgun. I let them shoot at targets, birds, and finally some springbuck. The reason was so that they could actually see what the reality is of using a gun. It destroys and kills, and that it is not like in all these violent computer games, and movies that they spend a lot of time playing and watching, just a game where you can start over. They learned from an early age that guns are dangerous, but also necessary in the environment that we live in, either for protection or survival. They must have respect for guns, and know when and how to use them. Until they learn that, the gun owner should always ensure that when not used or under his personal control, it should be locked away in a safe, and not be accessible to kids, or anyone else for that matter.

Another person dead to appease the NRA and gun owners. He died for your sins.

Boy, 3, accidentally shoots, kills father in Indiana home - thestar.com

However to blame all gun owners as sinners is going a bit overboard.

As I understand the information on Google correctly, about half of American households have guns, so only half of them are sinners?
Just two well-known quotations from the Bible to keep some perspective.
"Why do you see the speck in your brother's eye but fail to notice the beam in your own eye?"
"They kept demanding an answer, so he stood up again and said, "All right, but let the one who has never sinned throw the first stone!""

I'm not American, but I think the day Canada are attacked by terrorists, or anyone else for that matter, or if some natural disaster strikes you, you will be glad to have all those sinners across the border, who would probably help you?

EDIT: Hmmm... Perhaps there are some sinners in Canada after all..http://news.yahoo.com/two-dead-19-injured-toronto-shooting-055204658.html, or perhaps it was the sinners from south of the border who misled those pure soles north of the border...

[bossa]

Teaching your kids about guns by allowing them to kill animals is a pretty costly lesson from the animals point of view. Just imagine if all 7 billion of us went out in a day and shot an animal each.

[altopiet]

The springbuck were eaten, there were lots of them on the in-laws sheep farm at that stage.They have very tasty meat, but if you're a vegetarian, I can understand your concern. Be assured that the hunting was not done for the sports of it

[kswier]

You don't have a weapon of any kind if you aren't going to use it properly and responsibly.

This is the key. Unfortunately, there are a number of careless people in this world. Would greater education help? I have not looked at the criteria for gun ownership at all, but an extensive safety course should definitely be required (might already be...probably depends on the state or something). At least then legal gun owners know how to use it and what proper safety techniques are. With that said, I also think there is a difference between growing up and having gun safety drilled into you, and taking a single gun safety class.

In the end, we either have to accept that some gun related tragedies will occur, or ban them. Even banning them will not get rid of all gun related tragedies.

[Medium FormatPro]

The Ohio National Guard was on campus because Kent Sate is a state owned school and the students were burning buildings. They were there to protect public property

I have quite the familiarity with the entire incident. One of my relatives was killed during their peaceful demonstration - ironically killed by a distant relative serving in ROTC.

A majority of american textbooks still to this date have it completely wrong. What a suprise

[Wheatfield]

In the end, we either have to accept that some gun related tragedies will occur, or ban them. Even banning them will not get rid of all gun related tragedies.

Guns are too deeply ingrained into American culture to be banned. The carnage will continue.

[thazooo]

Thanks for reinforcing my opinion.

Your welcome, I thought it was appropriate seeing the direction this thread is going.............

[bossa]

There's just too many cowboys and not enough Indians.