Back for more punishment: the "My Month with a Gun", part 2

Those of you who follow my scribblings might remember Ms. Heidi Yewman, of  Vancouver, Washington, who decided to crusade against guns by carrying one for a month, and showing how easy and dangerous it was. . .

At which she utterly failed, and multitudes of people tore her story to shreds, as she conveniently forgot to mention a lot of, shall we say, Inconvenient Truths.  As I've documented here and here. . .

Ms. Magazine decided not to carry the other 3 parts, out of "respect for Ms. Yewman's privacy and safety".  Riiiiiiight.  And Carlos Danger was just playfully flirting. . . .

Still, our Heidi soldiered on, and finally persuaded The Daily Beast to carry to rest of her diatribe.  Which is mostly political kvetching, but we'll fisk it anyway....

First, she reviews the first piece and the reaction, repeatedly pointing out how CARING and CONCERNED she is.  And how Ms. Magazine knuckled under to the hordes of gun-toting Neanderthals out there.  I also note that the rest of this came out nearly 6 weeks after the original.  I guess she must have sprained something, patting herself on the back.

And so she begins:

Responsible gun owners will seek out training. But what worries me—and what should worry everyone—is the irresponsible owners possessing some of the more than 200 million guns in the U.S. today. Here are the remaining installments of my month with a gun:

Now, I could end this right here.  Because she is CHOOSING to be irresponsible and dangerous purely to make a political point is a strawman argument, and thus invalid.   I just have a question for Ms. Yewman: have you sought out training for parenting ?  You mention your children here and there: aren't you worried about being an irresponsible parent  ??  Because raising a child or three to maturity is a FAR more complex and important task than carrying a gun, but as far as evidence shows, that's not a concern of yours.

She goes on, and, OH NOES!, forgot she left her gun in her purse, and worse still, her 15-year-old son was playing video games 10 feet away.  And he might look in her purse for the pair of socks she bought him, (Apparently, in Heidi's neighborhood, you place your purchases in your purse, instead of a plastic bag with the store logo on it.  And odder still, apparently in Heidi's neck of the woods, 15-year-old boys will stop playing video games to go on the trail of the elusive wild new socks. . . )

Mind you, most 15-year-old videogamers **I** am familiar with know their way around a gun far better than Ms. Yewman. . . I am reminded of a friend of mine, whose son's friend loaded, cocked, and fired an AK-47-pattern rifle expertly.  When asked where he had gotten so experienced with an AK, he responded "Call of Duty, bro!"

She then goes on to cite numerous statistsics on how dangerous it was to have a gun around the house.   Except, when you actually LOOK at her quoted numbers, she's including suicides in "family members killed with a gun, vs stopping a criminal.   But is she railing against sleeping pills, garages, rope, or razor blades ????

She goes on, obsessing on what she might do if she heard a noise at night, what she should do, et cetera.   Which goes right back to her refusal to do any training: the POINT of training is knowing what to do, and what not to do, in a given situation.  But actually being PREPARED, well, that's obviously wrong and totally against her attempt to make a point, so we're supposed to ignore that. . .

She mentions a neighbor kid who was given access to the family gun safe, got cut from the team the VERY NEXT DAY, grabbed a gun, and suicided.  Now while this is an awfully convenient story (with, of course, no references or links to the incident, so that the intelligent reader can draw their own conclusions. . . .), given Ms. Yewman's track record so far of omitting crucial details, we can pretty much consider this as a constructed exaggeration of something that may or may not have actually happened.

Her paranoia extends to the fear of pointing a gun at her son by mistake.  Again, her refusal to train in any way shows through, to the point of not even knowing that you do NOT point a gun at anything that you have not already made the decision to shoot. . .

And thus ends part 2.   Part 3, tomorrow. . .