I understand why people want to take photographs with a gun. I understand why people want to look at pictures of people holding a gun. (Two words: Liberte Austin.) But I don’t understand why anyone would point a gun at another person in a photograph. This violation of The Four Rules of Gun Safety makes for bad photographs. And bad outcomes. Like this [via bbc.com]:
A group of friends were posing for photos with the loaded weapon at the Park Inn Motel in Melbourne’s north.
Albert Rapovski, 20, aimed the firearm at his friend Mahamd Hassan [above], who held up his phone to take a photo.
The trainee roof plumber was killed when Rapovski fired the 12-gauge shotgun into his face.
According to court documents, Rapovski cried “I shot, Mo, I shot Mo,” before fleeing the budget motel on March 5.
Earlier in the night, friends had encouraged him to unload the weapon as they knew he did not have a good understanding of how to operate the gun – which he wasn’t licensed to carry.
As our Question Of The Day pointed out, you can’t fix stupid. But you can not be that. So don’t.