Maybe 9 years of age is a bit young to have a rifle

[AJMD429]

.
...or at least one that is evidently kept loaded.

I had a 22 LR bolt action rifle of my own at age 6, but my mom doled out the ammo a few cartridges at a time, either to kill groundhogs for dinner, or if packs of wild dogs were killing our sheep.

But....

- I didn't keep it loaded
- I didn't have any siblings around to accidentally shoot
- and. . . my mom wasn't a 'prohibited person' because
- my mom wasn't a Drug Dealer....

Lotta dysfunction here - https://lawandcrime.com/crime/dad-who-s ... sister-da/

Sad for the littke girl, and really even moreso for the brother (at least for her, the suffering is over), who will have that memory haunting him forever; odds are he'll commit suicide or get into a violent lifestyle that kills him anyway, partly due to this.

[mickbr]

Doc my take is some kids can have guns but maybe some people shouldnt have kids.

[Lastmohecken]

I think I was nine when I got my first .22 single shot. I still have it. By 10 or 11, I was deer hunting with my Dad's old Swedish Mauser, 95 carbine in 6.5 x 55 and i still have it, too. Then when my dad inherited a Remington A303 30-06 from my uncle, I carried it, some. It was a good shooter, but proved to be a little bit too heavy for me, and I got tired of carrying it, went back to the little 95 carbine. By the time I was 14 or 14, I traded an old wrecked motorcycle, to my Grandfather for a minty Winchester 94 leveraction, post 64. And that started me down a long road of leveraction rifles.

[wvfarrier]

Stupidity and complacency have consequences.

That being said, all my kids (all under 10) are familiar with firearms and know what to do and not to do. We periodically test them by hiding an unloaded (also either bolt or barrel removed) in the house and seeing what happens when they locate it. Never once has any of them touched the said firearm. All they do is come find a parent.

[jnyork]

Doc my take is some kids can have guns but maybe some people shouldnt have kids.

Well said, I gotta remember that line.

[Ysabel Kid]

Doc my take is some kids can have guns but maybe some people shouldnt have kids.

+1

[AJMD429]

.
We also did the test where you disable and unload a gun, but leave it where the kids will find it. They never touched the firearm. If more than one found it, then one would stand by it so that the littler kids didn’t come near it, while the other one went to tell mom and dad.

[marlinman93]

I don't think 9 yrs. is too young to learn to handle guns safely and shoot them. But I do feel it's too young to be left unsupervised with a gun. My kids started shooting earlier than 9, but didn't ever shoot without me there.

[Ray Newman]

"Doc my take is some kids can have guns but maybe some people shouldnt have kids."
--MicBR

And I will add some people should not be allowed to drive or vote....