this post was submitted on 25 May 2024
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I agree, but I will say that the armorer was exceptionally negligent. Like, seriously went above and beyond to be unsafe in her role and her handling of the weapons.
But even though she does bear some responsibility, ultimately it was Baldwin's fault. Not because he pulled the trigger, but because he was in charge of the conditions on set, was aware of all the safety concerns raised the crew, and he was responsible for keeping the completely unqualified armorer on the crew.
I am not willing to make that concession. Firearms are too simple to operate, and their risks too well known to argue that the person handling them can have zero responsibility for their operation.
If I pick up a knife on set, and I make no effort to verify its blade is dulled, or it's retractable blade functional, I am responsible if I cut or stab someone with that knife.
If I pick up a hammer on set and bash someone over the head with it, not bothering to check that it's a rubber hammer, I'm responsible for the injuries and damage I cause.
A gun is no different. If I haven't verified that the gun is non-functional, I'm responsible for whatever comes out of the barrel. People have been killed by blanks, either fired at closer range than they are safe, or behind projectiles stuck in barrels.
The industry safety standard is summarized in 4 redundant rules, intended to prevent the discharge, or, if that fails, to ensure that discharge does not cause injury or unacceptable damage. A handler violating any of these rules is negligent, but they have to violate all of them before someone gets hurt.
Yes, the movie industry does, indeed, allow us to violate safety rules. Many industries do this with all sorts of dangerous operations.
But, we can do this only when the safety measure provided by that rule is replaced with an equivalent protection. Baldwin broke all four rules, and did not replace any of them with an equivalent measure.
Baldwin didn't, yes, because he hired an incompetent armorer. In normal circumstances the armorer is the person doing everything you just said needed to be done.
A gun is different, it requires ammunition. If a gun is to fire a blank then the gun must be functional, the ammunition simply is designed to not fire a round that's meant to kill someone.
To expect every handler of a firearm to be knowledgeable enough about guns to safely unload, confirm what ammunition is in use, and then proceed accordingly when they also have to act and deal with what comes with that is insane. That's why there's a person whose professional job it is to do all of that and then tell the actor what can and cannot be done with the weapon.
Baldwin is guilty because he failed to employ a good armorer who could do their job. If it was a random actor not involved in the hiring process of the film then they'd be perfectly innocent in this situation, to think otherwise is straight up victim blaming.
Fuck that, absolutely not, every single handler of any firearm is required to know how to safely unload and confirm that it is unloaded. Period. End of story. If you don't know how to drop the mag and rack the slide then don't fucking touch that thing. Guns aren't toys, and they aren't props. The armorer is there for guidance and for double checking but there should never, ever, for any reason other than a survival emergency, be a gun in the hand of someone who does not know how it functions. Not for actors, not for cops, not for civilians. It takes less than a minute to confirm an unloading and it takes 15 minutes to teach someone how who has never seen a firearm before. There is no excuse whatsoever (BIG EDIT: assuming a competent armorer, that can actually teach this) for an actor not knowing how to confirm their own gun is ready for scene, and the armorer should check it themselves immediately before or after, before the scene starts.
Holy shit that's a lot of unformatted text to basically say:
Based on this incident, it seems that the film industry doesn't work.
You've never taken a gun safety class in your life and holy shit it shows
Wrong. I've shot many kinds of guns many times, and am fully aware of the rules.
I've also been through film school and have been on a set.
Anyone who says anything like you have been clearly hasn't done the latter and you guys always get so upset by it.
I could go on a rant but it's a really basic concept:
One professional is responsible for the guns on set. This is all they do and all they worry about, for safety. Nobody who's job is to remember memorized lines while being rained on and having mud thrown on them has to rmember if their gun is loaded in this scene or not. Less chaos, more safety.
The fact that there is a camera around does not relieve a gun handler of their responsibilities to handle a gun safely.
The role of "armorer" is comparable to that of "wardrobe" or "choreographer". If a dancer kicks a baby in the face while practicing a routine, primary responsibility falls on the dancer, not the person who supplied her dance shoes nor the person who arranged the dance.
Fair enough. Never been on a film set before. But I'm very keenly aware of the rules of gun safety and that ain't it chief. Handing a firearm to someone with no knowledge of it is the #1 biggest fuck-up in the book alongside absent trigger discipline and muzzle sweep. You should know this if you are "fully aware of the rules" as you claim.
If what you're saying is true then nobody should ever have been shot on set, right? Oh wait..... Imagine that, when you have a single point of failure, things fail.
And that's why it's the job of the trained progessional to explain to them exactly what to and not to do with that weapon once handed over.
I do, it's just fucking irrelevant.
Yes, just like every other film set that handles guns. The entire point of a criminal trial is the fact that someone didn't do their job and someone fucking died. Why is this so hard for you to understand?
Your lack of any understanding of film set weapon safety makes you look stupid again. There's more done on set for safety than just handing someone a weapon and giving them a 2 second once-over. For example: the people not in shot should not be downrange of the weapon, or if they MUST be for some reason then they're behind bulletproof materials.
Movie sets are different from normal use-cases for guns and thus operate under different safety rules. If you followed the rules of standard firearm safety on a movie set then you'd be unable to film. The rules have been adjusted to accommodate this, and they work. That's why it's incredibly rare that this happens.
Alright, fine, I concede my point. Movies do shit differently. I still think it's fucking stupid, and someone did literally die from it as evidenced by the very post we are arguing in the comments of. But I'm not an actor having dipshits point loaded guns at me so why do I care I guess. You win I'm stupid, because respecting the laws of firearm safety apparently makes me the dumbest motherfucker on the planet, and there is no point in time ever that someone hands me a supposedly safe gun and I'm not going to immediately double check it myself.
I am very salty about this still but I've made both of us angry enough over some stupid bullshit tonight. Sorry for wasting your time. This was not productive for either of us.
Correct. However, you will still be judged by the standards of the original ruleset, and not by how well you followed your own.
Baldwin did the firearm equivalent of cruising through a red light at 80 miles an hour without asking if anyone had actually closed the intersection. His excuse that it was a movie set does not exempt him from liability.