Losing Our Kids to Gun Deaths–Some in Our Schools, Some In Our Own Homes

Here’s an excellent article that examines why we are losing an increasingly large number of our toddlers to shootings by their young siblings.

You may have known, for instance, that a gunshot to a small body is more likely to destroy multiple organs or other critical structures, simply because little bodies are so much more compact than adults’.  Frankly, though the idea is obvious once it’s been mentioned, it was a new idea for me.

I would have said that the answer is actually more obvious: a) guns are rapidly proliferating through our society, b) we position them such that we can grab them at a moment’s notice, c) our population is more substance addicted than ever before, d) our home lives are more stressed and miserable, e) our government is incapable (due to the  power of the gun lobby) to keep guns out of the hands of the mentally ill.  Thus: our kids will continue to shoot more of their siblings to death.

Like most of my readers, I’ve made a great number of mistakes that I have a hard time forgetting. Fortunately, I never enabled either of my two kids to kill the other with a gun, and I’ve been spared the lifetime of emotional anguish that would have ensued.

But, for more parents every year, it’s become a reality, and, as Americans, there’s not a goddamn thing we can do about it.  Wish I had better news.