Boston police are asking parents for permission to search children’s rooms for firearms. Some parents welcome the effort to keep guns out of the hands of youths. Others see it as a clear invasion of privacy.
Boston police are asking parents for permission to search children’s rooms for firearms. Some parents welcome the effort to keep guns out of the hands of youths. Others see it as a clear invasion of privacy.
Shouldn’t parents be searching those rooms?
If I suspected that my 16 yr. old daughter had any contraband in her room, I would not hesitate to search it. Heck, I’ve searched her room for the gameboy when I suspected (rightly) that she had taken it up there to play when she was restricted from it. If I suspected drugs or weapons or stolen property, I would not hesitate to search her room. As my wise father said to me many times “As long as you live in my house, you obey my rules.”
There is no such thing as “unreasonable searches” by a parent. My daughter does have some expectation of privacy, but that can be recinded by her mother or me for what we (and we alone) deem “just cause.”
YBIC,
Phil Snyder
Well, my son has one rifle and one pistol in his room, both .22 cal. I gave him the rifle for his 10th birthday and he inherited the pistol from my father. Of course, in a sane state like Kentucky, this is perfectly legal. Boston is another matter.
It’s being smart and secure if they’re searching other people’s kids’ rooms. It’s an unconstitutional invasion of privacy if they’re coming into my house, though.
As long as they are asking permission and abiding by the decision of the homeowner, I have no problems. It isn’t an invasion of privacy if you say “sure, come on in.”
The question is whether the permission is coerced.
#3 – I haven’t heard something that funny in years. If something like that were true in the United States (it being legal for a 10-year-old to have a rifle), I would have been supporting the pro gun control lobby with even [b]more time, energy, and money[/b] than I do currently.
It’s not all that uncommon. When I was 13 I inherited my grandfather’s 12 gauge shotgun, and I was 10 when I first was taught how to shoot a .22 bolt action rifle and a 20 gauge shotgun. Only reason I didn’t have one at 10 was a lack of anyplace to shoot it.
#7 – I got my first .22 at 10, my first shotgun at 14 and my first high-powered rifle at 16. Got my driver’s license at 17. Been in a lot more life threatening situations with the car. It is the respect that people show for others that is the determining factor, not a pompous, self-righteous anti-gun attitude that makes us safe and free.
Let me explain this situation here, for there is clearly a cultural misunderstanding happening. I am guessing most readers of TitusOneNine live in the suburbs, as do most Anglicans. I live in Boston in what one might call the “inner city”. The issue at hand is this.
Many of the gun searches that will be done will be done in public housing. Now, there is a rule that if the housing authorities ever suspect that a resident has a gun in their apartment than they can remove the resident. Remember I said suspect, not prove. And we must also remember that anyone in the community can report to the police that they believe someone owns a gun in an apartment. So lets imagine this.
A kid had beef with another kid (or even a nice old lady) and advises the police about that. The police knock on the door and ask the parents to search the kid’s room. Now most of the people who do the shooting in the city usually have someone else hold the gun for them. That is where 10-14 year olds come in. They are not old enough to do the killings (although sadly, some do) but they can hold guns. So the parent agrees to the search either because they are too tired from their two jobs, don’t understand the laws or simply because they have never set foot inside their kids room and don’t think he/she has a gun. The police go in and don’t find a gun. No problem right? Wrong. Either a videotape sees the police officers go into the room (they are everywhere in public housing) or a neighbor or someone else reports that the police searched this kids apartment to the housing authorities. The families will be asked to move out of public housing. Now we don’t only have gun violence but increased homelessness.
This is why people are upset with this law. Questions?
charles,
You are so out of touch if you think it ISN’T legal for a 10 year old to have a rifle. My grandfather gave my father the .22 cal. Windhester for his 10th birthday. My father gave the same rifle to me on my tenth birthday, I gave it to my son on his. I personally bought a 30-06 Springfield in downtown Lexington, KY, when I was 13 and rode home from Main Street on the city bus with the rifle between my knees. Nobody gave it a second thought. I also had a pistol in my car throughout high school. We obviously inhabit different worlds. Oh, and by the way, neither my father, I, or my sone have broken the law in any of this, despite the efforts of folks like you to make us criminals.
Hi Evan,
We obviously do inhabit very different worlds. I in no way advocate making you a criminal, nor do I think or claim that you’ve done anything illegal. It is scary to me that you were able to ride the city bus with a rifle – and makes me want support the pro-gun-control lobby even more.
Supporting changing the law in a democratic fashion does not equal “making criminals out of people.”
Charles,
Why do you find it scary? Why did nobody find it so 44 years ago, but they might now? I would submit that it is because firearms have been demonized by the media and the advocates of gun control, rather than focusing attention of the societal and behavioral causes of criminal violence (a culture of entitlement, breakdown of the family, prevalence of illegal drugs, etc. and NOT guns).
Unfortunately, folks who believe as you do have enjoyed far too much success in enacting laws that effectively disarm only the law-abiding.
Having lived in both worlds there is a major difference in the risks and benefits of gun ownership in rural and urban areas.
In urban areas, conflicts are common since more people are packed in a limited area. A weapon is a threat that will result in an escalation of a conflict. More guns equal more violence. The way to be safe is to disarm the population and to call 911 if there is a problem. A well armed police force will be there in 4 minutes. In the meantime, screams for help will be at least heard by the neighbors who probably will at least call 911, whether or not they actually try to help you.
In rural areas conflicts are much less common because there are fewer people to come into conflict. However, homeowners largely face any altercation alone. A burglar entering a rural home will have ample time to beat up or kill the occupants before police are even notified. There are no neighbors around to notice. If the police are notified they will be there in about 30 minutes to up to an hour and one half. Therefore the major deterent to violence in rural areas is the presence of the ubiquitous large and vicious dog patrolling the grounds, together with the certain knowledge that every home has several weapons, and that even the youngest child is probably capable of accurately firing his dad’s 22. More guns means less violence in rural areas, as it deters break ins.
Me I live in the suburbs. I have noticed that with cutbacks in the police force, response times appear to be falling at a time that violence appears to be rising. (It is not much of a problem yet, but I think it may be a very serious problem in 5 years. I plan to learn to shoot this summer, and will teach my children gun safety and shooting also. I probably will not buy weapons this year unless it looks like gun control laws will be passed, in which case I will most certainly buy weapons. I have already bought a gun cabinet, though right now it is just holding passports and birth certificates.
Clueless,
It is precisely in those situations where conflicts are common that I most value my right to be armed. The well-armed police arriving on the scene four minutes after I’ve been beaten to death, stabbed, or robbed, might be able to catch the perpetrator, but that won’t be much comfort to me.
They also have their place in urban areas. I was made a beliver when, during college, a drug-addled homeless man I had fed on several occasions was attempting to beat my door down, screaming incoherrently at the top of his lungs. Luckily the police arrived before he decided to try to use the large window next to the door in order to gain entry, but it was really luck. If he’d been a bit less out of his mind he may easily have broken the window and gained admittence that way.
My experience, growing up in rural Oregon, was that by and large guns weren’t thought of as primarily “weapons.” At least not weapons for use on other people. Most people who had guns in the house — and I think most people did — weren’t thinking of the burglar scenario (although the guns would certainly be used in that case.)
Guns were utilitarian and recreational tools used for hunting, pest control, target shooting, and the like. They could also be used for self-defense, but that wasn’t what most people had in mind when they bought a gun.
In urban areas, for the most part the mindset seems to be “gun = weapon = a thing to kill humans.” I remember running across this in college when talking to a friend who had grown up in Miami. I forget how the topic came up, but I mentioned that I had been taught that you always leave guns unloaded and you keep the guns and the ammo in separate places and ideally in separate locked storage. He looked at me baffled, and asked, “But why would you even have a gun if you don’t keep it loaded?” He had an entirely different concept of what a gun was for and why anyone would have one.
Cars do kill more people than guns.
But just as there are some people who shouldn’t be allowed to drive, some shouldn’t be allowed to have guns.