You know, growing up with a gun cabinet at home is sometimes a little bit of a liability in that your opinion of what's a good gun and how to best use it most effectively is always swayed by your childhood experiences.
Sometimes this is good. For instance I think the world of Marlin rifles because my first jin you wine shootin' iron was a Marlin. I knew how to clean and handle a gun before I ever shot one. When I received my first plastic toy gun I was taught the four rules of gun safety and internalized them at a very young age. I had to obey all rules of gun safety or my toy guns were taken away from me. My parents were slick.
Sometimes this is bad. For a long time I thought the .357 Magnum catridge was the end all beat all. It's still my favorite handgun catridge but I realize now it's just another catridge swimming in a sea of choices. My mother, God bless her, had me believing for a time it's essential to become a good marksman so you can shoot people in the knee.
But overall it's paved the way for me to explore better tools, better methods, and to seek more education on the subject. I think I at last realize how much I just don't know and that's a good thing.
Now I say that to make a serious point and a not so serious point. I've recently found out that my mother will receive one of grandpa's rifles. The thought of that makes me very happy. The fact is that while it's never been the center of my life, being a responsible gun owner is part of me. And it's not the guns that are important either, it's the values they stand for.
And yet I sit in a minority. How many Americans don't have that sense of heritage?
Now that's the serious part.
Now for the not so serious part.
It's that complete lack of heritage on some people's part that gives us some real, er, well, interesting ideas about guns. Even though I've come a long way in unlearning some misconceptions at least I had a fundamental knowledge base to work from. Some people don't even have that.
You know the guy, the one that "knows all about guns".
Here's some things I have been told, mostly by my students, but a lot are from adults just to be fair:
The AK 47 is the only fully automatic rifle you can legally buy.
The only gun anyone would ever need is a Desert Eagle. It's more powerful than any rifle and it shoots shotgun shells too.
The reason a .357 Magnum revolver is so powerful is because the bullet is actually bigger than the firing chamber. That lets it build up lots of pressure.
Most semiautomatic pistols hold 2 or 3 clips with about 15 or 20 bullets in each.
I've got an MP5 that shoots .45's and 9 millimeters.
(Said while pointing to the muzzle) You put the bullets in here and they fall down into the magazine and then they're ready to fire.
(Said while making fingers in a gun shape and aiming sideways with a slight forward thrust on each accented syllable) Gat! Gat! Gat!
(Said while looking at a picture of a Colt revolver) Where do you put in the clip?
Most modern handguns fire far more powerful catridges than what the U.S. Military used in World War II. No one needs a gun that powerful.
Back in the day, most guns were made out of pot steel and that's why they were black. The rich people would have guns made out of silver.
I want an AR M4 SKS-47 with a gyroscope and two green lasers.
I've heard more but these are funniest ones I could remember. Honest to goodness real quips, even if they are from my hazy memory and thus not word for word.
My point here is not primarily to amuse, but rather to lament. I fear we fail to see sometimes what we really lose when the guns come out of the houses. We lose something more important than mere guns: we lose knowledge and skills, and in the process, we lose our heritage.
How do you think our great grandfathers would see us?
How do you think the ghost of Jim Bowie feels about Texans not being able to possess a Bowie knife?
How can we insult our veterans this way?
The cost of losing private arms is too much to pay. Yes America will be an ever changing landscape, but let's watch what we change into.
Sometimes this is good. For instance I think the world of Marlin rifles because my first jin you wine shootin' iron was a Marlin. I knew how to clean and handle a gun before I ever shot one. When I received my first plastic toy gun I was taught the four rules of gun safety and internalized them at a very young age. I had to obey all rules of gun safety or my toy guns were taken away from me. My parents were slick.
Sometimes this is bad. For a long time I thought the .357 Magnum catridge was the end all beat all. It's still my favorite handgun catridge but I realize now it's just another catridge swimming in a sea of choices. My mother, God bless her, had me believing for a time it's essential to become a good marksman so you can shoot people in the knee.
But overall it's paved the way for me to explore better tools, better methods, and to seek more education on the subject. I think I at last realize how much I just don't know and that's a good thing.
Now I say that to make a serious point and a not so serious point. I've recently found out that my mother will receive one of grandpa's rifles. The thought of that makes me very happy. The fact is that while it's never been the center of my life, being a responsible gun owner is part of me. And it's not the guns that are important either, it's the values they stand for.
And yet I sit in a minority. How many Americans don't have that sense of heritage?
Now that's the serious part.
Now for the not so serious part.
It's that complete lack of heritage on some people's part that gives us some real, er, well, interesting ideas about guns. Even though I've come a long way in unlearning some misconceptions at least I had a fundamental knowledge base to work from. Some people don't even have that.
You know the guy, the one that "knows all about guns".
Here's some things I have been told, mostly by my students, but a lot are from adults just to be fair:
The AK 47 is the only fully automatic rifle you can legally buy.
The only gun anyone would ever need is a Desert Eagle. It's more powerful than any rifle and it shoots shotgun shells too.
The reason a .357 Magnum revolver is so powerful is because the bullet is actually bigger than the firing chamber. That lets it build up lots of pressure.
Most semiautomatic pistols hold 2 or 3 clips with about 15 or 20 bullets in each.
I've got an MP5 that shoots .45's and 9 millimeters.
(Said while pointing to the muzzle) You put the bullets in here and they fall down into the magazine and then they're ready to fire.
(Said while making fingers in a gun shape and aiming sideways with a slight forward thrust on each accented syllable) Gat! Gat! Gat!
(Said while looking at a picture of a Colt revolver) Where do you put in the clip?
Most modern handguns fire far more powerful catridges than what the U.S. Military used in World War II. No one needs a gun that powerful.
Back in the day, most guns were made out of pot steel and that's why they were black. The rich people would have guns made out of silver.
I want an AR M4 SKS-47 with a gyroscope and two green lasers.
I've heard more but these are funniest ones I could remember. Honest to goodness real quips, even if they are from my hazy memory and thus not word for word.
My point here is not primarily to amuse, but rather to lament. I fear we fail to see sometimes what we really lose when the guns come out of the houses. We lose something more important than mere guns: we lose knowledge and skills, and in the process, we lose our heritage.
How do you think our great grandfathers would see us?
How do you think the ghost of Jim Bowie feels about Texans not being able to possess a Bowie knife?
How can we insult our veterans this way?
The cost of losing private arms is too much to pay. Yes America will be an ever changing landscape, but let's watch what we change into.
