+
Sign up for
The Upworthiest
Our top stories of the day delivered straight to your inbox.
upworthy

firearms

Health

How does a kid cope in life after accidentally killing his brother? John did.

A childhood game went very wrong.

Image from "American Idol"/YouTube.

John Arthur Greene (left) and his brother Kevin


A childhood game can go very wrong in the blink of an eye.

"You'll never get me!"

“Freeze! Put your hands up."

If you've ever played cops and robbers, you know how the game goes.

John Arthur Greene was 8 and he was playing that game with his older brother Kevin. Only the two brothers played with real guns. Living on a farm, they were both old hands at handling firearms by their ages.

The blast from the gun must have startled them both.

firearms, family, children

John Arthur Greene (left) and his brother Kevin.

Image from "American Idol"/YouTube.

“We were always extremely safe. They were never loaded," John said.

Except this time it was. And John's brother died in his arms while he watched.

It happens more often than you would ever want to imagine.

In federal data from 2007 to 2011, which is likely under-reported, an average of 62 children were accidentally killed by firearms per year.

Here's a chilling example from Everytown for Gun Safety:

"In Asheboro, North Carolina, a 26-year-old mother was cleaning her home when she heard a gunshot. Rushing into the living room, she discovered that her three-year-old son had accidentally shot her boyfriend's three-year-old daughter with a .22-caliber rifle the parents had left in the room, loaded and unlocked."

And the numbers may actually be getting worse.

With an increase in unfettered access to guns and philosophical opposition to gun regulations, the numbers seem to be on the rise. Here's how many accidental shootings happened at the hands of children in 2015 alone, by age:

gun safety, laws, research data on gun deaths

Unintentional Firearm Injuries & Deaths, 2015.

From January 19-26 of 2016 — just one week — at least seven kids were accidentally shot by another kid.

American Idol, guilt and sorrow, accidental shootings

Accidental shootings of kids in one week, January 2016.

If the pace holds up for the rest of the year, America would be looking at over 300 accidental shootings of children, in many cases by children, for the year. That's far too many cases of children either carrying the guilt and pain of having shot a loved one or hurting or killing themselves by accident.

John Arthur Greene has been able to manage his feelings of guilt and sorrow through music and by sharing his story for others to hear.

He told his story during an audition for the final season of "American Idol." He says music has helped him keep his brother's memory alive:

"Right now I lift him up every day and he holds me up. Music is how I coped with everything."

It's a powerful reminder. No matter how we each feel about gun safety laws, guns should always be locked away unloaded and kept separately from ammunition.

Our babies are too precious to leave it to chance.

Watch John Arthur Greene's audition for "American Idol" here:

This article originally appeared on 03.07.16

From Your Site Articles
Most Shared

A viral video about one gun owner's response to Parkland comes with a powerful message.

Scott Pappalardo of Middleton, New York, has always loved guns, but now he's having a change of heart.

Scott Pappalardo loves guns and his right to own them so much that he has the Second Amendment tattooed on his body — but now he's having a a change of heart.

In a video, now seen more than 17 million times, New York-based Pappalardo discusses why he felt a moral responsibility to get rid of his AR-15, a gun he's had for more than 30 years. He talks about how after the Sandy Hook massacre, he would have gladly traded in his weapon if it meant saving even one life and how the lack of action taken by both himself and the government made him feel as though like he needed to do something — now.

GIFs via Scott-Dani Pappalardo/Facebook.

"I guess my words [after Sandy Hook] were just empty words in the spur of the moment and now here we are, 17 more lives lost," he says, referencing the recent Florida school massacre.

He decided to not only get rid of his AR-15, but to ensure that it could never be used to take someone's life.

"I’ve decided today, I’m going to make sure this weapon will never be able to take a life. The barrel of this gun will never be pointed at someone. I mean, think about it. Is the right to own this weapon more important than someone’s life?" he says before taking a power saw to the gun, effectively destroying it.

Sure, he could have probably gotten $600 to $800, he estimates, for his gun. It's even likely the buyer would have been a responsible gun owner, like he was. Still, there was the off chance that his weapon could find its way into the hands of a child or someone set on committing a crime, and he didn't want to have that on his conscience.

Pappalardo captioned the video, "My drop in a very large bucket #oneless."

My drop in a very large bucket#oneless

Posted by Scott-Dani Pappalardo on Saturday, February 17, 2018

Others, like Ben Dickmann, were also inspired to take their weapons out of circulation and did that in a number of ways.

Dickmann documented his decision to surrender his AR-57 to the Broward County Sheriff on Facebook, saying, "I'm putting my money where my mouth is." The day earlier, in a separate Facebook post, he called on others to take similar action.

"No one without a law enforcement badge needs this rifle," he continues. "This rifle is not a 'tool' I have use for. A tool, by definition makes a job/work easier. Any 'job' i can think of legally needing doing can be done better by a different firearm. I enjoyed shooting this rifle immensely but I don’t need it, I have other types I can shoot for the same enjoyment. I have surrendered this rifle to the Broward Sheriff at the Tamarac Post. I could have easily sold this rifle, but no person needs this. I will be the change I want to see in this world. If our law makers will continue to close their eyes and open their wallets, I will lead by example."

I’m putting my money where my mouth is (from yesterday’s FB post). This is an AR-FiveSeven, I own this rifle. It’s a...

Posted by Ben Dickmann on Friday, February 16, 2018

These actions may be, as Pappalardo says, just a "drop in a very large bucket," but it's a start. Taking guns out of circulation helps prevent them from falling into the wrong hands.

There are hundreds of millions of guns across the country. Of course it's not realistic to suggest that each and every one be confiscated and eliminated. What's realistic asking people — the good, responsible gun owners — what possible use they have for AR-style semiautomatic weapons. Both Dickmann and Pappalardo admit the guns are really fun to fire, but it's worth examining what the actual practical uses of these weapons are.

Good on Dickmann and Pappalardo for making decisions they feel personally comfortable with, and hopefully they'll help inspire others to reflect on their own gun collections.

More

This simple gun violence prevention measure saves 750 lives each year.

Firearms result in more than 33,000 deaths in the U.S. per year. Many of these incidents, particularly homicides, can be prevented with a simple solution: a waiting period.

A mandatory waiting period is exactly what it sounds like. It's a delay, anywhere from one to 10 days, between the beginning of a gun purchase and taking ownership of the weapon. This allows stores time to conduct background checks where required and gives the potential buyer a "cooling off" period to potentially prevent impulsive acts of violence.

Photo by Gabriel Bouys/AFP/Getty Images.

A new study reveals that waiting periods aren't just common sense, they actually work.

The study's researchers, faculty members at Harvard Business School, found that the 17 states (including Washington D.C.) that require mandatory waiting periods have reduced gun homicides by approximately 17%, preventing as many as 750 gun deaths each year.

If mandatory waiting periods were extended to the rest of the country, the study estimates an additional 950 gun deaths could be avoided. That's 950 lives that could be saved every year.

Mark O'Connor fills out his Federal background check paperwork as he purchases a handgun. Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images.

Waiting periods also save lives when it comes to preventing suicide.

Multiple studies confirm that firearm access is a risk factor for suicide, and there is a strong correlation between states with high gun ownership and a higher number of firearm suicides than low gun ownership states.

"Many suicides (estimates range from 30% to 80%) are impulsive, with just minutes or an hour elapsing between the time a person decides upon suicide and when he or she commits the act," wrote Annmarie Dadoly, the former editor of Harvard Health. "Yet the stressful events that lead to suicidal thoughts are often temporary, such as losing a job or having a romantic relationship end."

Waiting periods allow for those dangerous, confusing, painful moments to pass without easy access to a firearm, keeping temporary feelings from turning into permanent tragedies.

Currently, there is no federal law requiring waiting periods for handgun purchases.

Many states began background checks and waiting periods in 1994, with the introduction of the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, better known as the Brady Bill.

The Brady Bill is named for Press Secretary Jim Brady, who was shot and became permanently disabled during an assassination attempt on President Reagan in 1981. The bill, in part, required potential handgun buyers (purchasing a gun from a licensed dealer) to undergo a background check and a five-day waiting period to conduct the check. In 1998, the FBI introduced the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS), a system that can return background check results in minutes, leading some states to lift the waiting period.

President Bill Clinton congratulates former Reagan Administration Press Secretary James Brady on the passage of the Brady Bill. Photo by Jennifer Young/AFP/Getty Images.

Other states allow dealers to sell the gun after three days, whether the background check is complete or not. This is how Dylann Roof obtained the weapon he used to kill nine people in the Charleston A.M.E. Church massacre.

Despite the federal Brady Bill, the U.S. still has a piecemeal set of laws from state to state and even from weapon to weapon, with handguns requiring different waiting periods than assault rifles.

The gaps and loopholes in gun laws put everyone at risk, but there's a lot you can do to change that.

If you're interested in working toward a national solution for gun violence prevention, contact your legislators and encourage them to support common sense reforms and to put an end to the moratorium on gun violence research. You can also volunteer your time or make a contribution to groups on the ground, working for safer communities, workspaces, and schools.

It's never too late to start.

A makeshift memorial on the south end of the Las Vegas Strip. Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images.

From Your Site Articles
More

A Dutch comedy show mocked America's gun 'addiction.' They left out a crucial point.

Americans are helplessly, desperately "addicted" to guns. Or so a new Dutch comedy show has suggested.

“Sunday with Lubach,” a news satire series hosted by comedian Arjen Lubach, panned Americans in a recent sketch that encouraged Europeans to be more sympathetic to our "Nonsensical Rifle Addiction," or NRA.

"NRA is a constitutional disorder caused by a dysfunction of the pre-frontal second amendment in the nonsensical cortex, causing patients to shoot people," the ironically somber narrator jabs to laughs.



[rebelmouse-image 19529585 dam="1" original_size="500x219" caption="GIF via "Sunday with Lubach"/YouTube." expand=1]GIF via "Sunday with Lubach"/YouTube.

"NRA is highly contagious," the video continues. "Parents often pass it on to their children. This happens automatically or semi-automatically."

Sure, the sketch is clever and deserving of a few not-funny-haha-but-funny-sad laughs as it drives a serious point home, in the wake of yet another mass shooting.

But is its basic premise — Americans' fanaticism over guns — a fair assessment?

America's gun problems don't stem from an "addiction." They stem from a breakdown of democracy.

Yes, Americans, as a whole, own a lot of guns. Like, there are more guns in the U.S. than there are people. But parse through the big picture data, and the numbers may surprise you. Just 3% of Americans own 50% — half! — of all the country's guns. And the vast majority of Americans — a whopping 78% — don't own any at all. In fact, nationally, gun ownership has been on a slow and steady decline since the early 1990s.

"Addiction"? Not so much.

Most Americans, including gun owners, overwhelmingly support common sense gun regulations — laws that have failed time and time again to pass through a GOP-controlled House and Senate. It's not that Congressional Republicans aren't listening to their constituents, per se; they're just more concerned with fundraising their re-election bids. During the 2016 campaigns, for example, the actual NRA (the National Rifle Association, not to be confused with Nonsensical Rifle Addiction) poured tens of millions of dollars into political races around the country, including over $30 million toward then-candidate Donald Trump.

America doesn't have an "addiction" problem when it comes to guns — it's got a "democracy" one.

Contact your representatives to demand common sense gun laws.

Trending Stories