Whatislove said:
The replacement and installation of smoke detectors should be something that is done by the government (whether local or federal), not something left up to an 8 year old to do.
We are talking as little as $2 per unit in bulk, that should be in the budget for local fire station's government funding to cover.
Give the kid a PS4.
Actually, it's not. It's something that should be done by the INDIVIDUAL PROPERTY OWNER! Why should the "government" be footing the bill for individual fire safety within your own residence? Oh, and by the way, it's not really the "government" that's even footing the bill, but taxpayers would be doing so. So, instead of my personal responsibility of purchasing -and testing each quarter of the year- smoke alarms for nearly every room in my house, I now have to do so for the other people around my area because they cannot take personal responsibility for themselves?
Healthcare is one thing that honestly I have no qualms about when socializing, but no way in hell should we start doing every little thing. The more we allow the government to control and monitor, the more backers there are for those nutters that essentially want a Nanny State towards video games, movies, books, and any form of entertainment "for the sake of the children".
P.S. This is a tragic story of death with a happy ending of a child CHOOSING to assist where he really didn't need to. Good on him. However, let's not neglect the fact that either the mother didn't test her smoke detectors or didn't have one to begin with (and if it's a rental, most states require the owner of said rental to make sure they're there and working and if that's the case for Texas and it didn't happen, the owner can be held responsible for negligence).