[bacondude3]

The first two problems would be easily prevented by keeping your firearms in a safe. If you're worried about arguments with your spouse becoming fatal, please talk to a counselor ASAP.

As for negligent discharges, which are probably the most legitimate concern, you should always follow the four rules of gun safety:

1. Treat all guns as if they are always loaded.

2. Never let the muzzle point at anything that you are not willing to destroy.

3. Keep your finger off the trigger until your sights are on target and you have made the decision to shoot.

4. Be sure of your target and what is behind it.

In my experience, these are hammered into civilian students who take firearm training classes, but soldiers in the military often haven't heard of the four rules and generally are far more casual with their guns than civilians.

[r00fus]

It's easy to dismiss the concerns out of hand and spout basic handling rules that soldiers do get, btw and are drilled into them.

The wisdom is realizing that all of this goes out the window when the shit hits the fan. Also unless you're training your entire family on weapon use, they will be untrained folks around dangerous weapons.

There is a reason barracks do not allow weapons and all that stuff is under guard in a proper armory.

Your flippant response sounds more like a religious defense than practical consideration of real situations. There's a reason a large number of firearm deaths are one of the above categories I listed.

[bigbubba]

You do not need to teach young children how to use a gun if you instead teach them to never, under any circumstances, to touch the gun. This is not hard to do, though many irresponsible people neglect to do so. And none of this goes out the window even in fantasy "shit hits the fan" scenarios; the rules for how to handle (or, to not handle) guns remain the same. The rules keep you safe when you follow them dogmatically. As soon as you start making 'common sense' exceptions to the rules, that is when you put yourself in danger. A lot of people have gotten hurt after thinking "I know I shouldn't point the gun at myself, but I KNOW I just unloaded it so logically there is no danger..."

(And anecdotally, I've personally witnessed no correlation whatsoever between military service and taking gun safety seriously. YMMV.)

[r00fus]

Great points. I agree that military service and gun safety are orthogonal.

If one can't make these dogmatic safeguards, a firearm may pose more of a danger than what it protects against.

Sometimes the best way to solve a complicated problem is to avoid the source of complication in the first place.

[8note]

If abstinence education was effective, there would be few unwanted children in red states.

A shit hits the fan scenario is when you're black out drunk or something where you're in a bad mental state, not society collapsing. Following rules does not help in a situation where you're unable to follow rules

[bigbubba]

If 'gun abstention' weren't effective, there would be a whole lot more kids with gunshot wounds in red states. The fact of the matter is that telling kids not to touch guns generally does work.

[bacondude3]

I don't doubt that you've considered your experience and knowledge in coming to the decision to not own a gun. My response wasn't flippant, and I'm sorry it came across that way.

I grew up around (unlocked) guns and knew better than to even think about touching one of them while I was a child. I am aware that many children aren't taught proper respect for firearms, which is part of why I recommended keeping them locked up. (The guns, not the children...)

My comment about soldiers is based on my personal interactions with them. I know they go through gun safety handling, but in practice they frequently have very poor muzzle discipline ("But it's unloaded!": I don't care). I've also talked to a few soldiers who had never heard of the four rules of gun safety, either by name or after hearing them listed out, so I don't think all soldiers have had gun safety drilled into them as strongly as you may have.

I don't live in barracks, but my understanding of military life as a whole is that the military has to support the lowest common denominator in their troops. If you have children, you probably aren't a hotheaded 20 year old anymore, and it seems like that should factor into your decision making process, no?

The other two points (being shot by a spouse or burglar using your own gun), frankly sound silly to me. You listed four categories, but only two of them are responsible for a large number of firearm deaths. It's extremely rare for a burglar to take and use a victim's gun against the victim, and also pretty rare for a spouse to murder the other.

And just to reiterate what I said in my first post, if you're even a little worried you might lose control and kill your spouse, or your spouse might kill you, you need to see a counselor right now regardless of whether you have guns or not. (Alternatively, if you do get along with your spouse, then I'm not sure why you factored that into your decision to not own a gun?)

I am making this post in good faith, and I hope you'll respond.

[r00fus]

For me the danger of all these externalities outweighs the potential gains.

The biggest danger of all is the perception that you are somehow in control of things that you can mitigate but do not actually control.

While you may be correct that spousal conflicts are not the biggest cause of deaths, a quick search showed that suicide is 5x more likely if that suicidal person has access to a gun.

Whether you get along with your spouse today is not guaranteed tomorrow. Counseling? Yes it helps. Guns? Statistically not.

[bacondude3]

> For me the danger of all these externalities outweighs the potential gains.

Fair enough, I'm not here to tell you how to live your life.

I know a lot of veterans struggle with depression and PTSD, so I don't blame you for taking that aspect seriously.

Regarding getting along with one's spouse, maybe that's just something I won't understand without getting married.