Tuesday, October 27, 2015

How the Toddler Shooting Epidemic Debunks the Biggest Myth About Gun Control


On Saturday night, a Chicago six year-old allegedly shot and killed his three year-old brother while playing a game of cops and robbers. The Chicago Tribune reports that their father’s loaded gun had been stored on top of the family’s refrigerator. It was wrapped in his pajama pants.
Washington Post’s Christopher Ingraham found that in 2015, at least one person per week has been shot by a toddler, three years of age or younger. Using data gathered from news reports, he found that so far this year, “13 toddlers have inadvertently killed themselves with firearms. 18 more injured themselves, 10 injured other people, and 2 killed other people.”
A go-to argument for gun rights advocates on the Internet is that guns make Americans feel safer, but the very ubiquity of guns in U.S. households increases the odds of firearm-related death. The problem of gun violence isn’t solved with more guns, and if you’re the kind of person who shares NRA photos on Facebook, ask yourself: Would arming a three-year-old really have saved his life?

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