Fire All of Your Guns at Once: are some people born to be wild?
This quote from a local resident appeared in today’s SJ-R. The man said it in defense of his friend who, after firing off a few shots to blast in the new year, was himself shot by police after refusing commands that he put down his weapon.
There will be debate as to whether the police overreacted. The SJ-R didn’t open the story up for public comment, but I’m sure that some people have already determined that the police heard shots ringing out and rushed to the scene to immediately mow down in a hail of gunfire whoever they happened to find. My sense is that if the police were just driving around looking for the slightest provocation to shoot someone, there would be a lot more people being shot by the police. Therefore, I have to assume that the man did brandish his weapon at the officers who then responded as they have been trained to do.
Rather than further that particular debate here, I’d like to focus on the assumption by the friend that shooting a gun into the air at midnight is a traditional way to celebrate and no cause for police concern.
In the days of Yosemite Sam and wide-open spaces, perhaps it was acceptable to punctuate your yahoos with blasts from your six shooter. But I think that today most of us are aware of the dangers of shooting a gun into the air, especially in an urban neighborhood. What goes up, must come down and all that. It was just a few New Years back when a man who had stepped outside to fire his gun in the air was killed by a bullet from a reveler with a faster draw.
Then there is the realization that the sound of gunfire, no matter when it occurs, could be a cause of fear to someone nearby. It should come as no surprise that the police would be summoned.
I have no doubt that the man quoted is distraught that his friend was critically wounded and that the incident occurred in proximity to children, and perhaps this compelled him to disregard common sense in attempting to justify his friend’s actions. But it’s also possible that he really does believe that shooting a gun into the air is harmless, or at least within an acceptable level of recklessness given the occasion.
This is not a black/white issue, and it’s not necessarily a socio-economic one, although I would think that it does trend more heavily in lower class neighborhoods. Perhaps there were shell casings divoting Panther Creek golf course on Tuesday morning, but my guess is that nothing more powerful than Dom Perignon corks were popped off into the west end sky at midnight.
So what causes some people, regardless of class, to consider it acceptable to fire a gun into the air at the dawning of a new year? Are they not aware of the risks or do they simple discount them? And is it fair to label someone stupid, or ignorant, for thinking this way, or must we take into account the cultural influences that might encourage such behavior?
Obviously, it’s against the law to fire a weapon into the air. I just want to know if I’m being intolerant to diversity in condemning the practice outright without considering the proud heritage of a pistol-packing populace.*
*I should add that I don’t approach this issue from a particular political perspective. I don’t run exclusively with gun control advocates and several of my friends pack heat in the home. But they don’t, to my knowledge, shoot them off in fits of celebratory exuberance. Or do you?
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When I saw the post title, I thought of the Magnapop CD of the same name. But I guess it’s a Steppenwolf lyric, too?
And celebratory gunfire is more a stupidity issue than anything else.
Anonymous Communist | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
I’m having trouble understanding how the man sat in a closed bedroom all night, not celebrating with his live-in and her grandkids, but at midnight really felt like whooping it up.
nancy | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
I also wondered how the man quoted in the story can fault the police for firing when, he asserts, they should have known kids might be in the house. Apparently they should be familiar with who might be visiting every home in the neighborhood at any given time. Yet the man who fired the shots in the first place knew there were 6 children in the home that night and his friend feels he was completely within his right to unload a few rounds since he looked around and didn’t see any of them in the immediate area? Stupidity issue for sure.
Laura | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
Ignorance for sure. Although I guess its kinda ignorant for any of us to think someone who’d shoot a gun into the air with children around would actually put down their weapon when instructed to do so by authorities! What are WE thinking?!
Anon19 | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
Mr. Wells had apparently never heard of Newton or Darwin (or Blood, Sweat & Tears). I have heard of this sort of celebration before, but can’t imagine that I know anyone who thinks this would be a good idea.
And where are we as a society when people like Mr. Wells’ neighbor are actually trying to find fault with the police for firing on a guy pointing a loaded gun at them?
Wikipedia – Celebratory Gunfire
Spinning Wheel
Russ | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
How is this for a twist to the same old – same old in the comments section?:
I contend that firing a gun into the air is not quite as lethal as is portrayed in the media and by law enforcement. Dangerous? Yes. Stupid? Yes. But not quite the sinister act it is purported to be. A Google search on the topic showed many results. Many seemed to say that conditions would have to be right for a bullet fired into the air to be lethal (come down point first as opposed to on it’s side or backwards, caliber, ect.)
If it was so lethal don’t you think the media would relish in showing the voluminous dead bodies in the Middle Eastern countries from the falling bullets when the nut jobs over there are unloading their rifles indiscriminately into the air?
There was an episode on “Mythbusters” on this topic which showed basically the same results.
As one site pointed out; anything falling from a great height has potential to be lethal if the conditions are right. An example of such is a hailstone. How many people are killed by hail? Hail falls from greater heights than a bullet from a small caliber handgun.
Obviously I’m no expert on the topic, and I feel that anyone who fires a gun into the air in celebration deserves jail. However, I don’t think it is as lethal as many of the other stupid things people do on a daily basis that we don’t get upset about (talk on cell phones and run red lights, shoot guns AT other people, ect.).
Laura,
You beat me to the punch in regard to giving my assessment on what the “genius” quoted in the paper said about the kids in the house.
On a side note, Mr. Pitts has been in and out of prison his whole life. Why doesn’t the SJ-R solicit the feelings of a law-abiding Springfield citizen on this topic? Oh, wait. I know why.
M.B. | Jan 2, 2008 | Reply
Dan – I don’t think you’re being intolerant at all. My reaction when I first saw this story was that I was apparently not very knowledgable when it comes to New Years Eve ‘traditions’, and also that when a man is running around the street shooting a gun into the air (regardless of his race, social status, or location), it’s cause for concern. And if the police ask him to drop the weapon once, if not many times, and he doesn’t………….then the police did their jobs. I’ll reserve full judgement until all of the facts come out, but it seems pretty close to cut and dried as it gets based on what I’ve read and heard so far.
Brian | Jan 4, 2008 | Reply