How can someone make it through medical school....

C

CarlosDJackal

New member
...and not have ANY common sense? How can these morons be so blind that they don't consider that "child-proofing" a gun is only half the answer. Kudos to the DA and the School Superintendent for giving this program a chance.

How much would anyone want to bet the so-called doctor in this article doesn't even have children. :rolleyes:

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,171568,00.html
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Program Teaching Kids About Guns Draws Fire
Friday, October 07, 2005

BAKERSFIELD, Calif. — Five-year-old Jeff Jagels, of Bakersfield, Calif., is just starting school in Kern County (search), but he already knows what to do when he sees a gun.

And other 5-year-olds in his neighborhood are about to learn what Jagels knows, too.

"Stop, don't touch, leave the area, tell an adult," is what the youngsters are told by cartoon character Eddie Eagle.

The Eddie Eagle Gun Safety Program is a free National Rifle Association project that teaches kids what to do when they see a gun.

Click in the video box to the right for a complete report by FOX News’ Anita Vogel.

And Jeff Jagels' father thinks it’s a great idea.

“I realized that this thing is incredibly effective, and I became determined to get one into every kindergarten class in Kern County along with the accompanying teaching materials,” Edward Jagels said.

Jagels, who is the Bakersfield district attorney, is a member of the NRA (search) and said he was astonished by his son’s reaction. His little tyke wanted to watch the videotape over and over again, and quickly repeated the instructions sung by Eddie Eagle in the cartoon.

Jagels thought the project was so good, he took it to the superintendent of Kern County Schools, who liked the idea.

“The fact that we're teaching a child not to touch a gun, to walk away from it, to tell an adult about the gun, that's going to make a child safer,” said Superintendent Larry Reider.

But others disagree. Local emergency room doctor Art Kellermann has treated his share of juvenile gunshot victims. He’s skeptical of any plan that puts the burden on a young child to make a critical judgment about firearms.

“Nobody should trust Eddie Eagle to make their child any safer than before they took the program," Kellermann said. “Rather than try over and over again to gun-proof our kids, I think we ought to child-proof our guns."

The Kern County superintendent will be sending Eddie Eagle tapes out to the district next week — but says it will be up to the individual schools whether to use them.
 
Kellerman is one of many who has his head in the sand .When you teach a child to shoot it's a good thing to blow up a melon to show what a bullet can do. Kellerman would say it frightens the child .But it might get the childs attention and save a life !!
 
But others disagree. Local emergency room doctor Art Kellermann has treated his share of juvenile gunshot victims. He’s skeptical of any plan that puts the burden on a young child to make a critical judgment about firearms.

“Nobody should trust Eddie Eagle to make their child any safer than before they took the program," Kellermann said. “Rather than try over and over again to gun-proof our kids, I think we ought to child-proof our guns."
Click to expand...
So instead of organizations running big educational campaigns such as this:



... we should not teach our kids anything at all about not drinking poison and rely solely on child-resistent containers and cupboard latches.

Instead of teaching them fire safety from a young age...



... we should pretend that matches and lighters don't exist and lock them away.

And on and on...

Does this guy even realize how stupid he sounds?
 
Good point, mvpel. I completely agree. We can't just "pretend" anything that can hurt kids doesn't exist and see how long we can keep this stuff hidden from children.

It's not that hard to get the cap off a bottle of bleach, and if your kid has never been taught that you can't drink chemicals like that, you might be -1 kid when you get home from work. Same with guns. Those kids find where you keep your keys to lock up your guns and they don't know about gun safety, they'll start messing around and could easily end up shot.
 
I've started to teach my son about safety with knives and firearms.

I've let him hold my pocket knives and he quickly looses interest, I've asked him "what do you do if you see a knife" his reply, "Don't touch, tell mommy or daddy there is a sharp knife"..."They're dangerous"

We purchased him a toy lever gun, he knows not to point it at people, he knows it is a "Dangerous Tool"...he says "It's dangerous, I don't point it at people", he also knows that if he sees a gun that is not his toy gun.."Don't touch, tell a grown up"



He hunts Jagulars, Heffalumps and Woozles with his lever gun...

He's 3 BTW...

Growing up I had no "formal" training when it came to guns...my parents really only told me that guns were tools and if you missused them they could hurt or kill you or your friends...that was it...

MD
 
Just as it's easy enough for a determined kid to overcome child-resistent caps and latches, there was a demonstration a while back of how to use a popsicle stick to fire a gun with a trigger lock on it.
 
I agree...

I agree with the idea of teaching them about the dangers and not to always rely on mechanical safety measures....Kind of makes me wonder how he ever or why he ever became a doctor. I was always taught that 2 is 1, 1 is none, so therefore shouldn't we teach them and use these built in safety precautions?
 
mvpel,don't forget my pet peeve, WATER SAFETY AND DROWNING PREVENTION. Drowning is still one of the biggest killers of otherwise healthy children, year after year.

I still get tense when I go to a party and some young mother enlists me to watch her five year old kid to keep them away from the water. When Littlest Meek was 2 he could swim the length of a pool! (BTW, he could open a childproof cap before he could walk.)
 
Dr. Kellermann gave his own opinion, which is his right. His status as an ER physician tends to give it great credence, but I have to wonder............how many pediatric gunshot victims has he treated in his career? Chances are he is just parroting the AMA's anti-gun stance.

Many physicians are pro-gun. Their professional organizations are not. It is the same with nursing. The news media knew they would be able to find a dissenting opinion in health care, just as they often find the same in law enforcement when it comes to evil black guns.
 
Believe me when I tell you, I have some doctor friends who worked so hard to get through med school like daddy did that would have a hard time pouring urine from a boot w/o an instruction sheet. They were too focused on one thing with more book sense than common. Nothing in medicine surprises me.

Of course, several docs I know tell me they would do it all differently today if they could.

I know a few really good ones that are in the profession for the right reasons,
BTW. God bless 'em.
 
My wife is in med school and I think I can safely say that those opposed to guns in med school were opposed to them before they enrolled. And then (in their mindset) they spend time in the ER and see "all the harm that guns cause." Now, understand that regardless of their profession, they think that guns cause the crime anyway. (Fortunately, my wife shoots 4" groups at 7yds.:D )
 
I'm a big fan of Eddie Eagle type programs.

I think you should also make sure your kids have plenty of supervised gun handling time. I've seen several totally independent studies show how kids who have handled guns/know what they are like are much less likely to be curious and play with a real gun. My own memories of being a child and common sense totally back that up.

But why not lock guns up too? So many easy ways to lock them up that ALSO make it less likely than when you come home and open the door -- not realizing your house has been broken in to -- you will find yourself looking down the barrel of your own gun by a surprised burglar.

So many good reasons to keep a gun locked up whether you have kids or not. No reason at all not to.

Childproofing houses with latches, childproof medicine bottles, etc. save lives and keep kids out of the hospital. Take a look at the stats sometime.

While few children a year are accidentally shot, is there any reason not to take a few simple, non-life altering steps to try and reduce that even further?
 
While few children a year are accidentally shot, is there any reason not to take a few simple, non-life altering steps to try and reduce that even further?
Click to expand...

This should be situation dependent. This is like saying why carry your gun with a round in the chamber. You can't put a blanket statement out like that and actually believe it unless you are living in a vacuum (just like the so-called doctor in the article).

Gun-proofing a child is much more effective than trying to child-proof your guns. I am proof of this. I have an uncle who kept his 1911 locked. But despite this, my cousin still managed to get to it - children can be very resourceful. My parents thaught me the dangers of handling a loaded firearm, and a soldier showed me the correct way to clear and handle an M-16 (when I was about 9 years old). So I knew enough not to touch my uncle's pistol, primarily because I knew my Mom would whoop my butt (God bless her soul) if she ever found out I did so. My cousin, on the other hand, was never thaught this. Consequently, he almost shot his siblings with this very same pistol on TWO occassions!!

One of the things we teach students at the NRA Basic Pistol Course is for them NOT to trust mechanical safeties and/or devices. Even if you were to keep your guns locked up in a safe, the chances of your child figuring out how to open it is pretty good. Heck, I used to break into my Dad's safe at his work all the time (whenever I went with him on weekends). It's amazing what a curious child can learn to do given enough time and enough chances.

By all means keep your guns safe and out of reach (if your situation allows or dictates it), but for the sake of your child, teach them safety and responsibility as well. It's no different than teaching them about fire, knives, the stairs, etc.

JM2CW.
 
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