This website tracks gun violence daily in the U.S.
It demonstrates a rising number of people shot each year with almost four thousand children and youth shot last year. As far as I know it is the first nonprofit / non political reporting venue on gun violence.
These past KARA articles cover children & guns in our neighborhoods
265 Moms, dads, brothers, sisters and selves were shot by very young children this year.
This is the first time data on people shot by children has been collected in America. I’m guessing it will go up n next year.
There are 28 states that hold gun owners criminally liable if children access their guns. There is at least one state that fines doctors (Florida- the initial bill called for a five million dollar fine and & 5 years in prison for the doctor) for counselling parents to take preventative measures with their guns if children are in the home. It’s the law. A very crazy law enforced to the detriment of children (most children accidentally shoot themselves).
Facts about children & guns;
More Americans are shot by toddlers (265) with guns than terrorists (151) just this year. This has been true for many years.
Every 30 minutes a child is killed or wounded by guns in America
Our nation leads the world in gun death
This Mother Jones Article included weapons manufacturers marketing materials aimed at very young children. It is disturbing. It was just last week a five year old Kentucky boy killed his two year old sister with his “Crickett” “my first” rifle. You can buy them in hot pink for little girls:
“The Crickett rifle is ideally sized for children four to ten years old and comes in a …Arms manufactures the following youth rifles: Crickett .22WMR Youth Rifles“
Americans killed by terrorists in the last decade (175) Americans killed by guns in the last decade (280,024)
A three year old Albuquerque NM boy shot and wounded both his parents with his pregnant mothers loaded hand gun last Saturday. His two year old sister was uninjured. Below are recent articles concerning guns and American toddlers.
Three People Shot In One Week By Toddlers
More Americans Shot By Toddlers Than Terrorists
Two Year Old Shoots Florida Mother To Death (a state that fines doctors for telling mothers to lock up their guns).
100 Children Killed by Gunfire Since Newtown (June 2014)
America has about ten times the rate of gunfire death than the rest of the industrialized world.
Guns kill more infants & toddlers than police officers in the line of duty.
A gun in the home increases the risk of suicide by 3 to 5 times, homicide by 3 times, and accidental death by 400 percent.
Since 1963, three times as many American children and teens have been shot dead than soldiers killed abroad – in 2010, five times more children and teens were shot dead than soldiers killed in Iraq and Afgghanistan.
Gun violence kills more black youth (from one to nineteen years old) every year except for car accidents. Below are stunning graphs that demonstrate these facts (courtesy of ScienceBlogs.com (the pump handle)
All across America, schools are practicing lock downs and pretend mass shootings, arming teachers, bringing firearms and terror into school to traumatize ten year old children and make educators hate and fear their work.
Kansas is requiring its teachers to carry firearms, some states are using fake blood and real automatic weapons fire in their practice drills.
How many teachers signed up expecting to be issued a pistol on the first day of school?
Is this what you want your children to live with? I’ve had a gun pointed at me, it is traumatizing and practicing this on children should be a criminal act.
It is also a false premise that you can turn art teachers into capable crime stoppers.
Police and military personnel receive extensive and very real training to reach a point where they can function effectively under combat conditions. Most people are fooling themselves to expect much out of a few hours of weapons training when the real thing happens. God I hate the NRA.
Kansas is requiring its teachers to carry firearms, some states are using fake blood and real automatic weapons fire in their practice drills.
How many teachers signed up expecting to be issued a pistol on the first day of school?
Is this what you want your children to learn and live with? I’ve had a gun pointed at me, it is traumatizing and practicing this on children should be a criminal act.
It is also a false premise that art teachers become capable crime stoppers with a few hours of weapons practice. Believe me, it takes a special kind of person to draw down and accurately fire a weapon in a life death situation.
Police and military personnel receive extensive and very real training to reach a point where they can function effectively under combat conditions. Most people are fooling themselves to expect much out of a few hours of weapons training when the real thing happens. The NRA sells guns not textbooks (remember that).
Mother Earth News this month includes weapons manufacturers marketing materials aimed at very young children. It is disturbing. It was just last week a five year old Kentucky boy killed his two year old sister with his “Crickett” “my first” rifle. You can buy them in hot pink for little girls:
“The Crickett rifle is ideally sized for children four to ten years old and comes in a …Arms manufactures the following youth rifles: Crickett .22WMR Youth Rifles”
Mom was outside & said she did not know the gun was loaded. Gun marketing pictures from the Crickett marketing page (the site was down today when I went to include the link – it will be interesting to see if it has been changed) http://www.crickett.com/
In Florida it is against the law for a Pediatrician to ask a patient about guns in the house.
In 2010 almost 20,000 children were killed or wounded by firearms in America (A child is killed or wounded every thirty minutes) (Slate article Feb 1)
Simply explaining public health issues to parents seems like a natural function of the medical profession.
At Children’s Health of Ocala, Florida, Pediatrician, Dr. Okonkwo was asking routine public safety questions about swimming pools, bike helmets & loaded guns in the home of one of his patients.
Dr Okonkwo was right about locking ammunition and guns separately as a public health issue for children.
For this he could be accused of “unnecessarily harassing” the mother of his patient (the child).
Turns out, it is against Florida law to ask questions about gun ownership or ammunition in the entire state of Florida. The initial bill called for a five million dollar fine & five years in prison (for asking a Floridian if there was a gun in the home).
The U.S. and Somalia are the only nations on the planet that have refused to sign the International Rights of Children Treaty.