Always lock up your guns/firearms if kids are in your house

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Aim1

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Obviously as a parent you should do this but it could also be a case of you're a granparent, aunt/uncle, friend or whomever and kids are brought to your house.

My dad showed us where he kept his revolver in his bedside drawer when we were kids and told us to never touch it......and we never did.


But times are different now.



What a tragedy.





https://www.foxnews.com/us/pennsylv...ter-teen-13-fatally-shoots-5-year-old-brother







Screenshot_20211228-125323_Fox News.jpg
 
Unfortunately, these incidents become more frequent as more people become gun owners, many of whom weren't particularly enthusiastic about guns in the first place, but felt driven by political rhetoric (how many of us were actually enthusiastic about owning 100 rolls of toilet paper?)

This rhetoric results in a lot of owners having the latest models and ammunition, but nothing in the way of proper training and safe-storage options.

I don't see this thread staying open. It's all choir-preaching here, and a well-known issue. Spread it with any new owners you know, whether or not they are excited to have a gun in the house (if they are, send 'em here to THR!)
 
Spend any amount of time in a modern gun shop and the amount of ignorance and wreckless gun handling you can observe are staggering. So many people literally have 0 idea of what they are doing in terms of storing, let alone using, firearms.

Just yesterday a guy came in to the local shop where I was doing a transfer and after flagging everyone in the store with a Glock he asked to look at, he asked the clerk if they had any “extendo drums for a Beretta deuce five”. I nearly burst out laughing at that one.

Last week at Sportsman’s Warehouse an elderly gentleman had just bought an M&P pistol and kept pointing it directly at his head and looking down the barrel while flipping it all over the place. Luckily the guy behind the counter immediately noticed and did his best to go over the operation of the gun. The buyer struggled severely with operating the slide and removing the magazine, and eventually left with a couple of boxes of ammo and a confused look on his face.
 
I am not the guy to provide a PC answer to this question- Don't let your kids become idiots around firearms.

By 13, I was well established in the shooting sports and I got my own .38 Enfield at age 14 for defensive carry around the homestead. This was in the 90's, not the 50's.

We locked our guns in a security cabinet to prevent theft, NOT to keep me out. I had the key on my pocket knife next to my band locker key all throughout high school and was the family armorer.

If the only thing that keeps your kid from shooting up his school or doing something else stupid with firearms is the lock on your gun safe, you have got far more serious problems.
 
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No children live in our house, but on the rare occasion when we are hosting a get-together with friends that have kids in tow, everything that isn't attached to an adult's body gets locked up. That said, when I was a kid in the 70's and 80's, I had an old wood rack with no lock with a couple of my guns in it. There were other rifles and shotguns stuffed in closets, along with the ammo for them. Dad's pistol was the only one that was loaded in a nightstand drawer. Growing up this way was not that unusual at the time and place where I was. Times have definitely changed.
 
Didn't they say the kid believed the safety to be on and it wasn't intentional? Nice try kid.

Now you're charged as an adult in Pennsylvania for homicide.

Poor boy was just jumping on his bed. That's the new generation's reaction to things that "trigger" them. He would make a fine Democrat, and still may if he's allowed to vote from prison.
 
MedWheeler said:
.....nothing in the way of proper training and safe-storage options.
Click to expand...

Statements indicate that the dad left the gun "on top of the gun safe" in the master bedroom.

Good Lord , what was he thinking? And - it would seem that the 13 year old was capable of making some very bad decisions , yet another reason for the parents to be extra cautious

A young life snuffed out ; the lives of surviving members forever affected. All for what?.
 
As someone who has five nieces and two nephews, they aren't allowed to enter the room where the gun safe is, much less access the safe or even touch my guns. Nobody is allowed into that room, not without my presence and permission.

Only one other person has access to my safe, and that's my dad, but that's because he's the most reasonable person I know.
 
The problem is aggravated with visiting kids that are not educated to our high standards.
Having said that and having been a kid it is nearly impossible to lock something away from a curious unsupervised kid with time on his hands. There are plenty of YouTube videos explaining exactly how to open just about any lock. If you don’t believe me Google “ how to open (your lock)”
 
When I was in late Jr. High and High School, we often handled firearms at each other homes. I remember specifically going down to my Jr. High buddy's family gun safe in the basement and taking a look at his Dad's nice Python and 1911 after school. We handled them way more carefully than most adults at a LGS. My other friend's family had an outstanding K22 that we took to the range and on some camping trips. Yet another friend and I took his Dad's .45 Colt New Frontier out for a spin at the local NF range area. In any of these occasions, the concept of doing something "wrong" with the guns wasn't even a consideration. My age group just squeaked by before the various "Under 18" weapon bans took effect in the mid-90's- knee jerk stupidity that has always failed to address the "why", only address the "how" with no concern for collateral damage and infringement.

Yes- This is a sore topic for me.
 
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BrazilianSnowMan said:
Curiosity kills.
Take the kids to the range and teach them.
Safety and proper handling of firearms.
And tell them if they wanna see your guns all they gotta do is ask, never touch it alone.
Click to expand...

Amen to all the above.

Parents and even grandparents, if your firearms are important to you, it is YOUR OBLIGATION to introduce your children / grandchildren to firearms and instill in them FIREARM SAFETY. No doubt an older generation did it for you, why would you not feel compelled to extend the same familiarity to your successors?

Your kids / grandkids should be no more curious about any firearm in your home than a crescent wrench sitting on your workshop bench. Remove the fascination, introduce familiarity, insist on a regimen of repeated firearm safety, check for empty chambers, never sweep with a muzzle, etc. Remember your kids / grandkids go to the homes of other kids, whose parents may likewise have unsecured firearms.

Make the children safe, not just a home.
 
/\/\/\

While it was not yet formalized, that was the plan shared with me from my mom and dad.
We knew about family firearms as little kids yet would not even dream of touching them.
Kids in my family were under strict orders to be nowhere a gun was present without a known adult.
 
It is all education. At ten years old a group of us would go hiking and camping on our own with our .22’s.
Mom wouldn’t let me go without mine.
Never so much as a close call.
We had all been taught to handle firearms and taught each other when needed.
Does that tell you how old I am?
 
Even if all the guns are locked up, they aint all locked up; I've always got one on me.
Yes, I know the point is not to leave unsecured guns out.
My point was I carry at home, even in a "good area" where it is definitely not needed. (Till it is) ;)
 
.455_Hunter said:
I am not the guy to provide a PC answer to this question- Don't let you kids become idiots around firearms.

By 13, I was well established in the shooting sports and I got my own .38 Enfield at age 14 for defensive carry around the homestead. This was in the 90's, not the 50's.

We locked our guns in a security cabinet to prevent theft, NOT to keep me out. I had the key on my pocket knife next to my band locker key all throughout high school. I was the family armorer.

If the only thing that keeps your kid from shooting up his school or doing something else stupid with firearms is the lock on your gun safe, you have got far more serious problems.
Click to expand...

Same here. In the 90s id come home from school grab a 22 or 410 and go hunt. Several of my friends did too. We had a gun rack. No lock. I knew of almost nobody who had a safe until I started working in a factory. Then I met several who did. My parents were pretty strict on the handguns which were all 22 oddly. I could only use that with dad around. But the rifles and shotguns were ok. And I'm in a state that actually makes you sign a paper saying you will keep them all locked. (NC). Not sure when that started.
 
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