Good grief... The misstatements continue.
Webster says
Main Entry: neg·li·gent
Function: adjective
1 a : marked by or given to neglect especially habitually or culpably b : failing to exercise the care expected of a reasonably prudent person in like circumstances
2 : marked by a carelessly easy manner
Webster also says
Main Entry: ac·ci·dent
Function: noun
1 a : an unforeseen and unplanned event or circumstance b : lack of intention or necessity : chance <met by accident rather than by design>
2 a : an unfortunate event resulting especially from carelessness or ignorance b : an unexpected and medically important bodily event especially when injurious <a cerebrovascular accident> c : an unexpected happening causing loss or injury which is not due to any fault or misconduct on the part of the person injured but for which legal relief may be sought d —used euphemistically to refer to an involuntary act or instance of urination or defecation
3 : a nonessential property or quality of an entity or circumstance <the accident of nationality>
All
Negligent Discharges are
Accidental Discharges, but not all
Accidental Discharges and
Negligent Discharges.
Negligent Discharges are a subset of
Accidental Discharges. To suggest that that a
Negligent Discharge is not accidental is to imply that it is intentional, as accidental and unintentional are synonyms. In fact
Accidental Discharges are sometimes called
Unintentional Discharges.
Most
Accidental Discharges are attributable to negligence, and I like to describe those as
Negligent Discharges, as it emphasizes what could have been done to avoid it. I'll typically stick with the
Accidental Discharge descriptor for mechanical failure, etc.
People often say "
Negligent Discharges are not
Accidental Discharges" or "there are no
Accidental Discharges," but then people refer to magazines as clips and refer to cartridges as bullets. People often don't understand the terminology they use, but get in the habit of repeating it because they've heard it a lot.
