Guns and kids: How to avoid Accidents

I think this was asked before and given that we’re talking about the ownership of guns lately its important to look into it.

The best thing to do is of course keep your guns secured in a safe.

A small one to keep a handgun in doesn’t cost much, there’s some with electronic locks that cost around 100 USD. Kept in the closet you’ll have your gun within easy reach and safe from kids and unauthorized users.

A women once mentioned me the problem she had regarding owning guns and a suicidal family member living with them at the time.

Tough call, but if your gun stays with you at all times like you should do when carrying concealed (perfect excuse to get your carry permit and pack at all times!), and stays in the safe while you sleep, I’d say its pretty safe. I doubt a suicidal person would try to put a grinder to the safe while you sleep a few feet away.

When it comes to kids, you have to see for yourself and make your own call regarding when you feel they are responsible enough to handle firearms under the close supervision of an adult of course.

Explain to your children that whenever they want to see or handle a gun, all they have to do is ask you. Make sure you make the time to keep your word. They’ll ask you a few times, after handling the empty gun they’ll eventually lose interest but if you don’t do this, they’ll make it a personal mission to get hold of such gun on their own.

That’s a kid spending his entire spare time and imagination planning on how to get to a firearm, you sure don’t want that.

There’s no such thing as a perfect plan so you always have to have a plan B. Plans B are pretty much the essence of preparedness. So, what happens when you leave a gun within reach of a child by accident?

Don’t say it will never, happen, it will.

Even if your Mr. Perfect, what happens when your kid is playing at the neighbor’s and the guy commits a mistake himself or happens to be one of the many irresponsible gun owners?

What I did was this, and I believe it’s the best solution:

1)Want to see a gun? Dad will show it to you every time you ask.

2) What if you FIND a gun lying around or a FRIEND brings a gun or finds one?

In both cases, you DON’T TOUCH IT, leave the room and find an adult to explain what you found. If you’re home that would be the parents. If its someone else that found it, a friend for example, find the nearest responsible adult. Tell your friend not to touch it, LEAVE the room or the house if you have to but don’t EVER stay in a place where friends are playing or fooling around with a gun.

After talking about this several times I put it to test. I purposefully left a gun on a table and waited near by, keeping an eye on it (do I need to remind you the importance of such gun being empty? better yet, remove the barrel just to make sure).

When my son found it he did as I was told, he didn’t touch it, came looking for me and told me what he had found.

Its important to repeat these rules to your children, then test it again a few weeks and a few months later on.

I found out that children can learn this at a very early age, as soon as they can follow basic instructions.

Just like everything else in life, its work and training. Train your kids not to touch guns without the supervision of parents and to go looking for an adult if they ever find one on their own and that’s exactly what they’ll do. Do nothing and if such an incident ever occurs it’s a potential tragedy.

FerFAL

Arm Thy Neighbor

Arm Thy Neighbor

by Matthew Bracken 

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2481166/posts

If you don’t presently own any firearms, you may have been considering taking that step in order to protect yourself and your family. Or perhaps you already have what you consider to be an adequate home armory, but is it really enough? In the event that our economy tanks, one certain outcome will be much higher levels of criminal violence. Read Fernando Aguirre’s excellent “The Modern Survival Manual: Surviving the Economic Collapse,” based on his experiences in Argentina after 2001, to see what happens to civil society when a national currency collapses and the banks are closed. Today’s career criminals will be that much more desperate and willing to use violence against their victims. The feral youths who need little encouragement to bust heads for sport in times of relative plenty may be starving, and no moral consideration will keep them from sticking a gun in your face or a knife in your back.

At the same time, the federal government may define this surge of criminal violence as civil disorder and enact emergency decrees, especially if armed citizens begin to fight back on a wide scale. One need look no further than the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina to see how officials react toward ordinary people with firearms during a period of civil disorder. A freeze on gun sales and/or ammunition is a predictable outcome during government-defined “emergencies.”

Most of the readers of this column probably don’t need to be convinced of the wisdom of owning and practicing with firearms. You may even believe that you already possess all of the guns you need, whether a .38 caliber revolver in your bedside table or a small battery of handguns, shotguns and rifles in your closet or gun safe. You may even own one or more of those liberally despised so-called assault rifles. In any of these cases you may think you don’t need to consider any more gun purchases.
There is, however, one reason to purchase at least a few more weapons: to arm thy neighbors. I can hear you saying, “What is Bracken talking about? If that foolish grasshopper of a neighbor didn’t bother about his security when guns were readily available, why should I worry about him now? Besides, he may even be an anti-gun liberal, so the hell with him!”

This reasoning is short-sighted on several levels. First, we have all heard the old saying that “a conservative is a liberal who has been mugged.” When violence explodes during an economic collapse, millions of new conservatives will be created from former left-wingers. And besides philosophically anti-gun liberals, many folks simply grow up in families where guns are not present and reach adulthood having never touched a firearm. But no matter why they don’t own firearms, when the ultra-violence breaks out your neighbors down the street will deserve a way to defend themselves from criminal predation. Simple charity, Christian or otherwise, suggests that we should not leave the elderly couple, the widow or the single mom with young children defenseless against evildoers bent on rape, robbery or murder.

When the incidence of home invasions, carjackings and “express kidnappings” skyrockets, some of your neighbors will discover a sudden interest in acquiring firearms, just when firearms may not be available through normal channels. These unarmed neighbors may then ask if you have any extra firearms to lend to them. Which one of your carefully considered collection of guns will you hand over to arm your defenseless neighbor? Your high-end “concealed carry” pistol, which fits your hand like a glove? Your wife’s? Your pump-action shotgun? Your AR-15 Sport Utility Rifle? The fact is, you will be loath to give away any of them, not even to a neighbor in need. You have acquired each of them for a carefully thought-out reason! But your neighbor is still defenseless.

That is why I encourage you to buy a few extra firearms in anticipation of this future need. I would suggest that a revolver is the simplest entry-level firearm to provide to a non-shooting neighbor. There are no magazines, safety catches or slides to learn to manipulate. You simply open the cylinder, insert the bullets, close the cylinder and the revolver is ready to go. A revolver has the shortest “learning curve” of any firearm. Anyone can learn basic gun safety and effective close-range self-defense with a revolver in one afternoon. In dire extremes you could hand a revolver to a non-shooter after a five-minute period of instruction and dry-firing. Revolvers are intuitive; you can even see if they are loaded or unloaded simply by looking at the cylinder.

Of course, a much greater level of firearms training is highly desirable if there is time for it. If possible, take your non-shooting neighbor to a gun range now, in advance of a period of “civil unrest.” Training a non-shooter in the safe operation of firearms also shows your own overall knowledge of security issues. This demonstrated firearms proficiency will stand you in good stead when your leadership skills and tactical knowledge may benefit your overall neighborhood security posture.

Beyond the simple morality of providing a means of self-defense against criminal violence, there is another reason to be prepared to arm thy neighbors: the force multiplying synergy of multiple fields of fire. Recall the old cowboy movies when the gang of black hats rode into a town where the citizens were forewarned and prepared. As an historical example, consider what happened to the vaunted James Gang on the Northfield Minnesota Raid when they lost the element of surprise. Only Frank and Jesse escaped unhurt. The rest of the armed gang were killed by the townsfolk or captured shortly after, badly wounded.

An armed and alert neighborhood is a very dangerous environment for criminals. In a time of rampant violence, with the ever-present threat of home invasions, more armed neighbors mean more angles of fire for the criminals to confront. Instead of focusing their evil intent on a single home, selecting one sheep in a helpless flock, they will be threatened by fire from many directions and their retreat may be cut off. This compounds their risk compared to attacking a neighborhood where most folks are unarmed and cringing in corners, praying to remain unmolested.

Of course, it is best if your neighbors have all received a high level of firearms training. Otherwise, the risk of a “friendly fire” accident while repelling an armed gang with shots from multiple directions is increased. And of course, you should not provide a firearm to a drunk, a druggie, or a mentally unstable neighbor for obvious reasons. But the danger of living in an unarmed neighborhood is even greater, because such an area is a magnet for repeated violent criminal attacks.

The best outcome would be to leverage your training of individuals in safe firearms usage into general neighborhood self-defense drills. Then if the “James Gang” rides in…they won’t necessarily ride out! Word will get around, and your neighborhood will achieve an aura of armed strength that deters future criminal incursions. Consider why tiny Switzerland has never been invaded by its much more powerful and often bellicose neighbors. It’s not because of the Alps. It’s because the Swiss have a strong tradition of armed self-defense at every level. Both invading armies and criminal gangs go around “hard targets” that are known to shoot back!

If nothing else, from a strictly selfish standpoint, the humble .38 revolver you lent to that widow might provide you with a critical early warning of imminent danger when she fires it in self-defense. Forewarned is forearmed, even if the warning is a rapid series of pistol shots heard from up the street at oh-dark-thirty. But in any case, I would rather hear the widow’s defiant shots than her helpless screams.

So, consider buying a few extra firearms and ammunition while you can easily and inexpensively do so. A used revolver in good working condition can be purchased for as little as $250, a used pump-action shotgun for not much more. And if you don’t know what an SKS rifle is or what they cost, find out. Then you will have the option of arming your neighbors in a time of extreme peril, without diminishing your own family armory.

This essay was written by Matt Bracken. I often mention his novels because they hit sore spots in many ways regarding watching your country slowly fall into socialism, then a Chavez type communism where the words “redistribution of wealth” are applauded in public speeches. Before you even know it,  your… “president” … is walking around saying “take over!” while pointing with his finger to several buildings.

While today you have to consider the legal consequences of arming another person, specially in Argentina where only people with gun permits can handle guns and you are legally responsible for what gets done with your weapon, the ability to arm others shouldn’t be underestimated.

I once mentioned that I gave my brother a 38 Special snub nose revolver just a couple hours after he landed in Argentina. 

My brother doesn’t know how to perform a tactical reload, he doesn’t know what SUL means or the best way to resolve corners, but I trust him enough not to shoot anything that doesn’t need to be shot. That’s enough in most cases where you end up arming others.

If the situation is bad enough, there no help coming. You have to ask yourself, how long can I stay alert before falling asleep, how long can I stand guard? With some basic instruction you can have a few people doing shifts after some basic instructions, mostly about gun safety handling and when NOT to shoot. 

Later on if the situation goes on you can teach them more but none of this would even be possible if you don’t have the minimum tools. That is, a few extra guns, ammo and holsters.

I have a couple extra 38 special revolvers for this reason. Also a couple more Hi Power 9mms and 45 ACP pistols. 

I have 5 or 6 extra police surplus leather flap holsters. These come with the cross chest sling needed to carry it. You can simply tote it like that.  A belt would add extra stability but you can do without it, and the holster itself has an extra magazine pouch. Space for two mags for the 45 ACP. Not the latest tactical piece of gear, not even the best or the most practical, but its perfect for a grunt newbie and it cost less than 3 dollars each. 

As of right now, there are some towns and districts in Argentina were the neighbors themselves run patrols and stand guard at night, armed. Legal? No it isn’t but it’s the unwritten agreement they made with authorities that simply can’t protect the people. Saw it on the news a couple days ago.

Chile is another good example. People organized and look after each other. There was a man that explained the problem he had, not having anyone nearby to stand guard when he fell asleep.

The chances of this happening may not seem that big, but it does happen and there’s many scenarios where you may need armed neighbors. Recent, real world scenarios.

These are things that can be taken into account when adding more weapons to your collection.

FerFAL

What Does the 2nd Amendment Really Mean?

Hi guys, this is the latest clip for Grab the Apple. Hope you like it and it helps understand what some of the terms mean: well regulated (well equipped) miliita (armed adults)free state (as in contrast to one that isn't free, such as a dictatorship) Keep and bear (own firearms and carry then on you)



FerFAL

Gun Ownership and Wives

Dear Mr. Aguirre,

Hello and thank you for your blog and book. I read both regularly, and I have come to understand that firearm ownership is essential for my family's protection. However, I am having a great deal of difficulty convincing my wife that a gun is a good idea, as she feels it poses a greater danger to people living in the house than any would-be intruder. If you could give me any ideas and/or persuasive techniques that could help me resolve this disagreement, I'd be eternally grateful. I could easily go out and get a gun myself, but ideally, out of respect for my spouse and matrimonial harmony, I'd like to convince her of a firearm's safety and necessity. I hope you can post my email so I may garner useful advice from your numerous knowledgeable readers. Thanks again for all you do, and I look forward to the day you can come to the U.S. permanently.

Regards,

Drew F.
Hi Drew,
Good question and I’m sure a lot of readers are going through the same.
Let me ask you guys a question: Do you guys drive?
Car accidents kill way more people than gun accidents do but no one is questioning the wisdom of driving to work instead of using public transportation which may in fact be cheaper and less stressful for you.

Statistically, a gun in someone’s house is 40 times more likely to hurt a family member than a bad guys.
Statistically, you should never marry, because statistically speaking you’ll end up divorced anyway.
Statistically speaking, people are so stupid that they shouldn't own guns, drive cars or even use matches.
The question is, are you part of that dumb, almost brain dead mass?
Let me answer that for you: No, you are not.
I’m better than the average person, and so are you just because you read my blog, because you show interest in these subjects, care enough and clearly pretend to rise above this average mass.

We are better than the average person that would willingly resing his/her freedom only so as to not be held responsible for their own well being.
If for some reason, gentle reader, you’re still not sure about this, then make it an undeniable fact: Practice shooting at least once a month, take defensive shooting lessons and train them dry firing every week. Take defensive shooting classes every 6 months, no less than once a year. Finally, make a decision and take responsibility for it.
Do that and you wont be part of the average mass. You’ll be part of the elite that takes for themselves the responsibility of their well being in a serious manner.

My wife didn’t like guns, but it wasn’t something that was up for discussion either. I didn’t ask “look dear, maybe we should probably buy a gun just in case…” wrong approach.
I had a gun with me ever since I assume the responsibility of protecting my family because it’s the tool I need for such a task if something bad ever happens. Its not a matter of “maybes” or “probably”. It’s simply the way it is and if she doesn’t see that then maybe she married the wrong guy. More than enough metrosexual, psychologically castrated excuses of men out there to pick from if that’s what she fancies.

Worried about accidents? That’s what gun safes are for along with training. I can’t emphasize professional defensive shooting training enough. You may think that dad or grandpa taught you all you need to know, but you’re wrong. Do take classes and take your wife with you. Even better have her go separately, so that there’s no pressure or distraction.

Women LOVE shooting, its just that so many never even tried it or are afraid of guns. They like shooting simply because they are better at it than men. Women don’t feel the need to prove how macho they are or how fast they can shoot, they just listen and follow instructions and that’s what shooting is all about.
In spite of not liking guns, my wife listened when I told her how to use the gun we had when we got married. One day when I got back home I found my Glock on the living room table. Someone had rattled the front gate’s door, either trying to break in or see if it was unlocked. She was very scared but remembered what I had told her.

As things slowly get worse in terms of crime the probability of having to use your firearm and defensive knowledge increases. As of today, the probability of such things happing in your lifetime is greater than what most people think.
And its not about actually shooting someone either. The most likely scenario is you pulling the gun and the bad guy leaving like anyone that wishes to live a bit longer would. But you need a) to have a gun to draw in the first place b) To have the training so as to not shoot someone that doesn’t require it c) To use lethal force if the situation calls for it.

Have a good conversation with your wife. Explain to her what's on your mind. Maybe you’ll even have to explain that you now see things differently than you once did and she’ll have to accept this, and that you’d appreciate her support instead of being an obstacle. Would you have an ear removed if your wife asks you to? No, right? Its one of those things that simply aren't up for discussion. Same thing here. You can talk and explain all you want but its one of the things you'll do anyway. You'll explain to her WHY you are buying a gun, not IF.

You have a house, a family you’re responsible for, correct? You need a gun and the skill to use it, just like you need to provide for your family in ever other way. It is after all, your responsibility, one you assumed before God when you married. Don’t take it lightly.

Last year there was this incident, a guy forced two women inside their apartment, the boyfriend of one of them was inside. The attacker wasn’t even armed but the boyfriend, scared, laid on the floor as he was told to do while the guy raped both women, ate food from the fridge, then raped them again. The guy stayed on the floor all the time.
Do you want to be that guy?
I’d rather be dead than live with that in my conscience.
But here’s people that will gladly accept that they would have done the same thing. That they are unable to fight, or hurt another person let alone kill someone else in self defense.

You have to make up your mind as of right now, the kind of things you’ll put up with and the ones you wont. Where will you draw the line and what are you capable of doing.
As I usually say during these type of conversations; is there something in your life that you’d kill or die to protect? Then you need a gun and ammo. If the answer is no you need a gun too but just one round is enough.


FerFAL

Good people gone bad???‏

Ferfal,

Have you known of any good people that you personally knew that just turned into total pieces of trash and started robbing and killing people after the crisis?? Or were most of these maniacs at the lower end of society to begin with and the collapse just sent them over the edge??

Tyler

In most cases violent crime is strongly linked to the poor sector of society as you can expect, with an important amount of increased drug use sprinkled all over it.

Regarding middle class, frauds and scams became much more common and I do know of people that, previously considered respectable members of the local community, just stole from their neighbors.

There was this business man, highly respected, that took money from lots of neighbors and friends, people that sent their kids to the same school this man did. He was giving back good profit rates for the loans.

One day when he had enough people giving him money, he took off with his lover to some foreign country, leaving the wife and kids behind. Everyone was left dumb folded. 

When times get tough people do these things, even the nice guy next door with the well educated kids and the latest SUV parked in front.

Another common crime among middle class and upper middle class was tipping other bad guys about sales, arranging kid kidnappings and such for a share. Having the business partner murdered to keep his share was something that also happened.

In general the lesson is to really trust no one, even if you think he’s set financially (it might all he appearance and he might in fact be broke, capable of anything to save his life standards) and certainly not talk about business, important sales and such with them either.

Recently there was some criminals in their 20’s, they lived with their rich parents in private gated communities and they robbed the houses of their own wealthy neighbors. Who would have thought the rich kid next door did it? 

In some other cases professional criminals rent fancy houses in these communities, spend months doing intel jobs and then robbing in these homes after they leave or organize other crimes as well such as kidnappings or whatever opportunity they may see.

Its VERY common for successful criminals (bank/business robbers, drug smugglers and producers, asphalt pirates) to live permanently among the wealthy under some other identity. You never know if the guy that says he’s into international trade, imports/exports, has a successful company in some other province/state actually does that for a living.

Don’t trust appearances guys and keep you mouth shut!

FerFAL