Shooting hollow points, I betcha.
I’ve been in a car wreak, seen car wreaks as they happen, and they are a heck of a lot more plausible and likely than a home break in/murdering/rapist/baby killer
So why would my supposed lack of ability to act be any more likely if I had a gun, fumbling around in the dark trying to unlock the gun safe, unlock the safety, and load the bullets all while being raped and murdered by an intruder?
Blanks.
And FYI, I live in Memphis,the city with the worst drivers in Tennessee, so my use of seat belts is self preservation, and very likely will keep me and my children safe one day.
:smack: 
So what’s your point? That people who use seatbelts elsewhere are just being paranoid?
NO, you said I was paranoid for using seat belts when I refuse to own a gun for possible intruders. You are dense. My point was I am more likely to need a seat belt than a gun. You are the one who brought up seat belts in the first place.
And answer my first question instead of using smilies.
Also, the chances that anyone will deliberately or accidentally be killed or wounded by one of April R’s seatbelts, or anyone else’s, is pretty minimal. When was the last time 20 schoolchildren were killed by a seatbelt-wielding nutcase?
AprilR: I’m not sure about SA, but to many gun owners, all the laws that require the stuff you mentioned (safe, lock, unloaded) are onerous, unnecessary, and stifle freedom. So they want to get you to the point where you’re able to just grab the loaded gun out of a drawer by your bed and fire.
I don’t believe I’m the dense one in this conversation. I’m fairly certain that to almost everyone else reading this thread it’s obvious that I brought up seat belts as way to illustrate that taking precautions does not equal paranoia, and that to keep a gun in the house to protect against intrusion does not mean people have an unreasonable fear of intrusion any more than the use of seat belts means that people have an unreasonable fear of automobile accidents.
And you call me dense.
Oh, you were serious? I thought you were being facetious…having me on, as it were. 
If you want a serious answer to all that, then I’d say yeah, you’re right, for you a gun wouldn’t be much use…pretty much in the same sense that a seat belt wouldn’t be if you kept it wadded up and stuffed down in the seat.
The chances that anyone will accidentally be killed or wounded by a gun in the home are pretty minimal too, considering the millions of them that are out there. In fact, I’m pretty sure than more far more people are accidentally killed and injured in automobile accidents than has ever been the case with handguns in the home.
But for some reason liberals haven’t picked up on cars as a hot-button issue so we don’t hear about every incident where it’s happened like we do with guns. Probably because cars are needed to buy drugs and get to abortion clinics. 
Guns left locked up do no harm, same as a car in a garage. When the statistics are adjusted for incidents per use, how do they compare?
Cars are intended for use on the road and are not kept in garages for safety’s sake but for storage and protection from the elements.
Guns are intended for use in emergencies and should be available for use at a moment’s notice and not stowed away in such a way as to defeat the purpose of their existence.
Different products, different usages, different reasons for placement when not is use. There is no comparison.
As far as the statistics you request, I have no idea as to whether they even exist let alone where to find them. Nor do I with regard to accident injury/death vs. use of automobiles.
Most of the cars sold are out on the road, in use a great deal of the time. The more they are in use the greater the chance of an accident happening. If guns were in use the same percentage of the time cars were, what would the accident rate be, do you suppose?
In my opinion they’re in use simply by being available and providing the protection they’re intended to provide. Naturally if one were to narrow down the relatively infinitesimally small number of times they were actually fired in order to compare with the number of times someone is accidentally hurt or killed, the ratio will be higher. But when people are accidentally (or intentionally, as in the case of suicide) injured or killed, it’s because someone is misbehaving. They either didn’t use proper caution, or they deliberately used the gun in a way it wasn’t intended to be used. Therefore a better comparison would be to compare the number of accidents and injuries created that way with accidents and injuries created by automobiles at the hands of drunken or drug impaired drivers.
Plus like I said upthread, I don’t believe responsible people should have to leave themselves vulnerable to intrusion and the various horrible crimes that can result because a tiny number of people choose to wrongfully handle their weapons. Again, many people choose to wrongfully handle automobiles, and to a greater number of death and injury, but there’s no outcry to ban them.
The accident and suicide argument re gun control is merely a dodge based on political opposition to firearms, which I believe to be an extension of liberals’ well known opposition to expressions of authority. Time and again liberals have shown a lack of concern for the victims of crime in order to further the cause of crime’s perpetrators. Time and again we’ve seen this mentality in action in our courtrooms, in our revolving door jail and prison policies, in our parole and early release programs, in our willingness to overturn death sentences followed by parole for our newly spared murderers, etc., etc., etc. In my opinion liberal opposition to firearms is just another expression of that mentality.
Well, that, plus their equally well known propensity to be afraid of their own shadow. Fearful and fretful are the lives of our liberal brethren, which is yet another reason why I say conservatives are happier. 
Now, having said that I have to admit I regret finding myself at odds with two of my more admired and favorite liberal posters here - Czarcasm and runner pat.
I don’t relish doing battle with you guys, and I hope you won’t take the vehemence of my arguments as a lack of regard, as I have considerable respect for you both.
If a person owns more than one firearm, are all in use at the same time, or just the one you could conceivably use at a time?
Sure, a person might conceivably want to have protection in each room of the house, or wherever they spend the bulk of their time, so as to be better able to confront trouble without first having to try to get to wherever their only gun is located. They might even want to have them scattered about at different places in one room, such as the living room, so as to be able to reach one more easily if being held at gunpoint. One hears all sorts of things. Intruders burst into a home, beat and threaten one spouse while holding the other either at gunpoint or knifepoint or clubpoint or whatever, and a moment’s distraction would be all it would take to reach to gun concealed nearby and off the bad guys. Probably wouldn’t happen, but then auto accidents probably won’t either, and I don’t fault anyone who wants to take every precaution in this day and age, where we’re manufacturing nogoodniks at an unprecedented rate.
That’s not an answer. If a person has a cabinet full of guns, are they all counted as being in use all the time, or just one? I could have a garage with a pick-up truck for hauling crap, an SUV for family trips, and a roadster for tooling around town, but no way in hell could you claim that they all were in use all the time just because they were available when I needed them.
edited to add: If you’ve got guns scattered in various hidey holes in most of the rooms in your house “just in case”, you are a dangerous loon.
No, they’re not in use in terms of protection or currently firing bullets. They are in use in providing the option to ability to use them for hunting or target shooting or whatever else they were purchased for. Pretty similar to your clothes, eating and cooking utensils, rooms in your house that stand empty most or all of the time, etc. People often own more stuff than they use at the moment. Nothing wrong with that.
Not unless you use them dangerously, you’re not. What you’ve stated is an opinion, not a fact.
Most intelligent/responsible gun owners I know keep their guns securely locked in gun safes with trigger locks on them. They store the ammunition in a different area. I can’t see anyone in their right mind storing guns throughout their house as you describe. A recipe for disaster.
If you think you need to have a gun ready in almost every room, it is my opinion that you are a loon. Anyone else have a diferent opinion?