Anon

I personally believe rule #1 is not a rule, but a (largely incorrect) statement.

I'm sure Jeff spent quite a bit of time and thought, boiling the rules down, and he placed that rule at number one for a reason. That said, the "rule" doesn't make sense, and should never have been adopted.

The rule (as written by Jeff Cooper, and adopteed by many as "the firest rule of gun safety") is:

All guns are always loaded.

First, let's get into how this is not a rule. For a sentence to be a rule, it must give direction for what actions are to be taken or avoided.

This "rule" is no more a rule (and no more useful) than the statement "All guns are capable of firing projectiles that can cause harm".

Now for the inaccuracy. Since most guns are currently NOT loaded, and since it is possible to render any gun unloaded, the "rule" is absolutley false, and becomes something that is easily dismissed or ignored.

I'm sure Col. Cooper pondered the much more sensible "Treat all guns as if they are loaded", and decided that this rule did not meet his criteria. However, "Treat all guns as if they are loaded" is at least a rule, as it has the ability to direct action.

I'm not arguing that having the correct safety mindset at all times around guns is wrong, I'm just pointing out that "Rule 1" is poorly conceived. So poorly, in fact, that when P95Carry started this thread, he took the time to re-write Cooper's original rule #1 (but still ended up with an incorrect statement, and not a hard-and-fast "rule").