Discharges - Accident or negligence

[mgmorden]

I don't know why everyone seems to want to fit everything under one or the other. "Accidental" includes all unintentional discharges, whether caused by negligence or malfunction. Some people seem to want everyone to use the narrowest possible term to describe everything. Using a broader term does not make a statement inaccurate.

This is the best reply I've seen. Adjectives are not mutually exclusive. A discharge can be negligence, accidental or both. Insisting on one or the other is like insisting that the sun isn't spherical, it's bright. It can be both.

To me, the insistence on nd is trying to buck reality in order to make a point. You see the same thing when someone says "Treat every gun as if it were loaded" and someone tries to insist "No, every gun IS always loaded".

Personally, I'm perfectly capable of parsing a complex situation without dumbing it down. I think we do ourselves a disservice not to correctly identify things.

 

[nwilliams]

Accident = gun malfunction

Negligence = Careless, reckless, brain malfunction

If you're gun goes off without your intention then it's for one of the above reasons.

 

[General Geoff]

If the trigger was pulled for whatever reason, it was negligent.

If the firearm discharged without the trigger being pulled, then it was truly accidental, caused by a mechanical failure of some type.

 

[WardenWolf]

If a firearm gets dropped and goes off, that's accidental, unless it was being carried improperly (i.e., just stuffed in waistband) in the first place. A couple of years ago there was an article about a CCWer who dropped his gun while using the restroom in a fast food restaurant (I want to say Subway) and it went off and shattered the toilet. That was purely accidental, and he wasn't charged. A number of jokes came up calling it a "Headshot", though.

There's very few situations that can genuinely be called an accidental discharge. Almost all of them are negligent discharges. An accidental discharge can also be negligent if the person in control of the firearm was not exercising proper muzzle discipline (i.e., the weapon malfunctioned and went off, but they had it pointed at someone or something they shouldn't have).