By what they DON'T say, shall ye know them....

[unixronin]

The Second Amendment column in this month's issue of Guns & Ammo magazine mentions an interesting statistic, in the course of arguing that the Gun-Free School Zones Act may well have cost more children's lives than it has saved.

The statistic:   Between 1997 and 2002, 32 students were shot and killed in elementary and secondary schools across the US.

Sounds bad, doesn't it?  Makes it understandable why there's a lot of fuss on the subject, huh?

Here's what so interesting about that number:  During the same period, in the same schools, 53 students died playing football.  That's more than half again as many.

So why don't we have a football-free schools act, "for the sake of the children"?  Surely if it's killing 65% more students every year than those horrible, evil guns, football must be a really serious problem, right?

Simple.  We don't have a football-free schools act because it's not about preventing child deaths.  It's about exploiting child deaths to ban guns, regardless of how many children's lives that saves or costs.

So next time someone tells you that guns need to be banned "for the sake of the children", ask them how they feel about banning football.  Or any of the other causes that kill more kids every year than guns do -- bicycles, swimming pools, .........

Comments

Re: In the course of classes?

[novel-tharkun.livejournal.com]

And I'm afraid you missed mine. I don't see the worth in arguing whether the law is biased, or if it is created in a mien of fair-spirit. What I attempted to do was give you, as you request in your original posting, a rationale as to why the acceptance criteria are different.

Re: In the course of classes?

[unixronin.livejournal.com]

OK, that was not immediately apparent. Re-reading your comment, I'm still not sure I can quite read that as a rationale for the disparity, but I'll take your word for it.

Oh, and I forgot to mention, regarding football-free schools ..... I grew up in a school in which we were required to play rugger every winter. In inches of mud, in cold rain, in tee-shirts and shorts and god help you if you were caught wearing anything underneath. I hated every second of it.
"Rugger builds character," my ass. What it builds is bloody hypothermia.