Brickbat: Celebrating Our Freedoms

Phive2015 / Dreamstime.com

Officials in Nassau County, New York, have banned the sale and use of sparklers. They say most children injured by fireworks are injured by sparklers.

Comments

[Rat on a train]

They say most children injured by fireworks are injured by sparklers.
What can we do to get a majority of children injured by fireworks to be injured by something other than fireworks?

[Shirley Knott]

A majority of children injured are injured during childhood. Ban live birth now!
It's for the children.

[Rat on a train]

The problem is half of all children have below median intelligence.

[Shirley Knott]

Well, we'll just have to increase funding to our woefully underfunded schools!
There's no problem throwing more of other people's money at won't fix!

[sarcasmic]

Nah. Have Congress pass a law that changes the definition of median. That will make kids smarter!

[Rat on a train]

But the spending increase stays, right?

[sarcasmic]

Baseline budgeting is magic. Spending decreases and increases at the same time.

[Longtobefree]

it has been done

[Longtobefree]

it has been done

[Radioactive]

simple solution, ban stupid children...oh wait they're stupid because they're children...if they survive they can grow to be stupid adults or in simpler parlance democrats.

[Longtobefree]

It has been done

[Longtobefree]

It has been done

[Leo Kovalensky II]

Yes, but has it been done?

[Rat on a train]

Repeatedly.

[Shirley Knott]

Wildly OT, but surely this is worth taking note of.
I know it's not immigration or tariff related, but this seems like it should be red meat for Reason.
EU attacks the internet, again

[Dan S.]

They've been banned in New York City for ages. Shortly after I finished second grade, my father gave me some sparklers to twirl on the Fourth of July. I loved doing that, but I did know they were illegal and asked him why he was breaking the law for me. He explained that not all "laws" are equally deserving of respect - one of the best lessons he ever taught me.

[sarcasmic]

When I was a teen in Colorado, the fireworks stores could sell all kinds of illegal fireworks as long as you signed a paper saying you would set them off in Wyoming. So my dad got me a pile of bottle rockets and other illegal toys, and let me set them off over a pond near the house.

Same lesson was learned.

Set me on the path to being a libertarian, which is kinda funny being that the guy is a hardcore leftist.

[sarcasmic]

Most car accidents happen within five miles of home because that's where people do the majority of their driving.

In many states sparklers are the only legal firework, so that's what the majority of children play with.

So by this logic we can prevent most car accidents by banning people from diving within five miles of their homes.

[Rat on a train]

Then most car accidents will be from driving more than 5 miles away from home. Need to also ban that.

[Jerryskids]

Most people who drown do so in water, too. Probably need to do something about water.

[Scarecrow Repair & Chippering]

BAN dihydrogen monoxide!

[Rat on a train]

Oxidane if you follow IUPAC.

[Entropy Drehmaschine Void]

Been there, done that.

http://dhmo.org/

[I am the 0.000000013%]

After banning sparklers, whatever is legal and most popular will be the leading cause of injury.

Anyone want to bet how long it is till that is banned too?

[Fist of Etiquette]

Now the majority of fireworks related injuries to children will be from armed state agents confiscating them.

[Rat on a train]

Sparklers are gateways to IEDs.

[sarcasmic]

Sparklers can ignite thermite. So yeah. They are.

[Longtobefree]

Excellent timed fuses, it's true - -

[Quo Usque Tandem]

See my comment below regarding sparkler bombs.

[Gindjurra]

No worries. We really don't have much freedom to celebrate anymore anyway.

[gaoxiaen]

Nor desire.

[Scarecrow Repair & Chippering]

A poem by Howard Nemerov.

Because I am drunk, this Independence Night,
I watch the fireworks from far away,
from a high hill, across the moony green
Of lakes and other hills to the town harbor,
Where stately illuminations are flung aloft,
One light shattering in a hundred lights
Minute by minute. The reason I am crying,
Aside from only being country drunk,
That is, may be that I have just remembered
The sparklers, rockets, roman candles and
so on, we used to be allowed to buy
When I was a boy, and set off by ourselves
At some peril to life and property.
Our freedom to abuse our freedom thus
Has since, I understand, been remedied
By legislation. Now the authorities
Arrange a perfectly safe public display
To be watched at a distance; and now also
The contribution of all the taxpayers
Together makes a more spectacular
Result than any could achieve alone
(A few pale pinwheels, or a firecracker
Fused at the dog's tail). It is, indeed, splendid:
Showers of roses in the sky, fountains
Of emeralds, and those profusely scattered zircons
Falling and falling, flowering as they fall
And followed distantly by a noise of thunder.
My eyes are half-afloat in happy tears.
God bless our Nation on a night like this,
And bless the careful and secure officials
Who celebrate our independence now.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Thanks; I was heretofore unaware of that jewel by Nemerov. Very apropos.

[TGGeko]

Dumbass children, maybe.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Anyone here ever make a sparkler bomb? Take about 40 sparklers [the kind with the wooden sticks], wrap them very tightly with electrical tape several times until they are very compressed, with one sticking above the rest to serve as the fuse. Makes an incredible noise. Warning: I advise against being close to it when it explodes.

[sarcasmic]

I did a quick google and it said that sparklers are flash powder mixed with a retardant. What you describe looks like a way to ignite all the flash powder at once. Makes sense that it would make a big bang.

[Fist of Etiquette]

Burn after reading.

[Quo Usque Tandem]

After posting that it did occur to me that I might get a knock on my door; I knew a kid [now a JAG] who got drunk while visiting his girl friends college and set off some "Drano bombs" in plastic bottles. Someone called the cops on him and it was pretty dicey for a while; an arson conviction does not serve one well in the military. Fortunately a decent criminal defense atty and several thousand $$ later he was cleared and finished his academy undergrad,and went on to a career in military justice. Stupid shit can have far reaching consequences.

[Entropy Drehmaschine Void]

HTH and Brake Fluid.

'Nuff said.

[Gindjurra]

Depends on the MOS, I'd imagine. Breaking things with fire is practically a tradition for some.

[markm23]

But only according to the Rules of Engagement.

[Radioactive]

Stupid shit can have far reaching consequences....being a stupid shit....FTFY

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Being a stupid shit can be a transitional experience [as in adolescence, during which any of us worth a shit survived by the Grace of God] from which one can grow up, and stop doing stupid shit]. It would be a shame if someone's entire life was ruined from one small and insignificant transgression, as not everyone is born perfect [as you imply you must be].

There, FTFY

[Brandybuck]

I once read a book where a minor villain banned fire out of a desire to protect people from getting burned. I threw the book across the room in disgust. It was a fantasy novel but it was too unbelievable for me.

Yet we're now only a few months away from that reality.

[sarcasmic]

I decided that the world had gone mad when they banned the incandescent light bulb. In cartoons and such that has been the international symbol for a great idea. Now it is illegal. Kids will watch old cartoons and say "What's that and what does it mean?". That is if the old cartoons aren't also banned, like Road Runner and Wile E. Coyote.

[Rat on a train]

The threshold for lighting an incandescent was too great. LEDs allow realization of lesser ideas.

[markm23]

"most children injured by fireworks are injured by sparklers" by some definitions of injured. If it includes 1st-degree burns, nearly all children who play with sparklers will be "injured", until they learn to handle them carefully. If it only includes the loss of a body part, it might be possible to do that with a whole pack of sparklers, but cherry bombs and rockets are a much more likely cause.