That is one jacked up geographical representation of Michigan. I think most fireworks are legal here, but bottle rockets are not.
And people drive cars all the time. A few of them get hurt or killed but the vast majority do not. It’s the ones that get hurt that make the news.
Does that mean we should treat fireworks with the same attitude we treat cars?
No, because driving is actually useful and in many cases necessary so that people can hold jobs, attend school, get to the doctor, and take part in the life of their community.
Last time I checked, fireworks could not lay claim to similar societal benefits.
A lot of the families (including the teenagers) in our neighborhood use fireworks illegally around holiday time. Most of the time the police have other things to do than monitor the neighborhood for fireworks, so there is the attitude among some adults in the family of why bother taking the teenagers out to the country. I think there’s always that chance that the police will make arrests. There are reasons to ignore some laws, but this isn’t one of them in my opinion.
There are a lot of dangerous activities that have no societal benefits. Bungee jumping? Parasailing? Free-climbing?
Should those be outlawed too?
Nothing wrong with bottle rockets or roman candles on the 4th of July.
I have a friend that bounced out of the back of a pick up. He broke both arms.
Also, come to think of it, I lost control of a firecracker, after some panicking (I was holding, then it wasn’t there, then someone was screaming, all in a split second) on everyone’s part, turns out it burned a hole through my sister’s shirt before popping.
My BIL I mentioned upthread is in SC- the emergency room doc who has seen way too many injuries and can’t stand fireworks.
It wasn’t a maiming, but I got multiple burns from breast to pubic area from a firecracker at my BFF’s brother’s first communion. At BFF’s wedding, one of her cousins said “I don’t think you’ll remember me…” “my abdomen does” “oops” “I’m not stupid enough to still be angry about it, but I don’t think I’ll ever forget which of you were playing with fireworks.”
If the person in the country can teach them to be safe and responsible with the fireworks, then by all means send them. Make the responsibility lesson part of the price of admission, so to speak. Otherwise, they get to come to the city celebration and hang out with the family at home.
See, you broke one of the basic safety rules of fireworks. You do not light one while holding it (unless, of course, it is one designed to be hand-held, like a roman candle.) You light it on the ground and step away. And if it is one that launches, you make sure the base of the firework or container is firmly in place with no risk of tipping over and you make sure that it is not pointed at anyone. Those three basic, common-sense precautions would take care of 99.9% of all fireworks-related injuries. You don’t misuse a tool then blame the tool.
Send the kids up north to the farm like Rover when he got a little too old.
Right- so the public health question is how likely is the tool, in it’s present configuration and with present safety features, likely to be misused? And what is the consequence of it being misused?
I can misuse a pen and poke myself with little consequence. If I misuse a car and there are no safety features (seat belts, air bags etc), the consequences are potentially high. So, with fireworks, the risks of misuse high (especially since it’s often used by kids, or at crowded parties), there are no safety features, and the consequences are potentially very high.
From a public health standpoint, close regulation makes sense.
And from the freedom standpoint, enough people don’t want to live in a nanny state that they keep that from happening.
“most”?
OK.
“Turtle”?
OK.
(I can also quote words that were never used by the other poster.)
Who needs fireworks? I support sending teenagers to the country for any reason or no reason. Just be sure they are forced to work on the farm and do something productive.
I’m struggling to understand what’s so hard about just taking the kids to a fireworks demonstration.
My error- I misread “enough” as “most” (reading too fast while I’m at work). But you could have assumed error rather than be snarky, but that’s ok.
My point stands however, it’s a public health issue. Whether you want public health concerns dictating policies that curtail your freedoms or not, the issue is not that they are safe (hardly anyone got hurt in the "60s!!!), but you want the freedom for people to do what they want even if means they will hurt themselves.
Yes, it was really stupid. They weren’t designed to be held. They looked like this and someone figured out that one color or the other shot like a bottle rocket instead of exploding, so we would unravel them and set them off one by one, the ones that shot, we would hold, we had been doing this all afternoon, no problem. I figured I would show my mom. Why she let me, I don’t know, possibly because it was the 4th, I was the ‘pyro’ of the family, usually screwing around with fire and she generally trusted me, but even so, I still kinda surprised she let me set off a dismantled firework.
Anyways, the issue was that I was crouched down and when it took off it bounced off my knee and went in the opposite direction.
So, yeah, learned my lesson there…kinda.
At a public display last weekend, the chief of police of Leechburg, PA, lost an arm in a firework injury. He is trained to handle fireworks, owns a company that does public shows, but had a mishap.
But where is the fun in that?
Yes, I do. Children hurt themselves playing all sorts of sports (probably a larger number than injure themselves with fireworks.) Do you think that all sports should be closely regulated–not just in sports leagues, but children playing catch in their backyards? Do you think that all sports should be banned for amateur participation, and that if children want to see sports, they should be required to watch a professional game? After all, all that nasty, horrible freedom (shudders) they have to play sports now means that they have a chance of injuring themselves!