Just a stupid question about guns for a Sunday night

[GMDino]

Seriously.  Not starting a fight I just found this interesting and a bit amusing.

I caught a bit this afternoon of a comedian talking about guns and he made a joke (paraphrasing):


"Every gun owner know that one person that even they think shouldn't have a gun.  That guy, that you're at the range and you're like 'Derrick is here? we're all gonna die."

So, do you?  Do you know a fellow gun owner that make you a little nervous?

If I had been asked this 30 years ago I'd have answered the kid that lived next to us in the dorm.  He decided he "needed" a gun our senior year and bought one.  Fast forward and he's a very responsible gun owner from what I can gather with lots of training. 

[*jason*]

The door dash guy that was mistakenly pounding the shit outta my door around midnight probably thinks I shouldn't have one.

I do know a coupla borderline nutjobs that I'm not sure should own firearms... One of them is a III%er. Shot a couple of interesting games of pool with him and another one in a garage back in early 2018... Before I knew what the hell that was all about.

[*Nately120*]

When I was in high school one of our classmates shot himself in the foot with a .22 rifle because he wanted to see if the bullet would ricochet off his steel toed boot.  He also saw a group of us in the Chinese restaurant downtown and he opened the door and screamed "Pearl Harbor!" and then had the most self-satisfied grin on his face afterwards.  He's a sex offender now.

I know people who own guns who have this sort of vague fantasy that someday they are going to either kill an intruder and/or die fighting "the government."  I don't quite grasp why this seems like such an inevitability for some people, but we all have our own realities, I guess.  

[BigPapaKain]

I mean, I probably shouldn't own a gun with my long standing history of violent rage of the self destructive sort, yet here I am. Of course, I follow every single safety precaution on the books so sometimes people just grow up.

[Belsnickel]

I've definitely encountered quite a few people that I don't like being around when they are armed. In fact, I would say that when I was young and dumb I was one of those people. One thing about the firearm community, though, is the vast majority try to police our own. Flag someone at the range? You're going to get kicked off. Post a photo showing improper trigger discipline? You're going to get a lot of flak for it.

[*michaelsean*]

I’ve known a couple but in reality the odds of them actually doing something stupid enough or evil enough to hurt someone else is close to nil.

I did however have a really good friend who I thought shouldn’t be around guns due to possible self harm and he did indeed kill himself (suicide) when we were 18.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(03-22-2021, 07:27 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: I've definitely encountered quite a few people that I don't like being around when they are armed. In fact, I would say that when I was young and dumb I was one of those people. One thing about the firearm community, though, is the vast majority try to police our own. Flag someone at the range? You're going to get kicked off. Post a photo showing improper trigger discipline? You're going to get a lot of flak for it.

Pretty much this.  I don't know anyone personally that I'd have concerns about.  I have encountered more than a few idiots at the range though and your assessment is spot on.  That's one of the main reasons that I only ever shoot at an outdoor range now, where you get your own bay with huge berms between them. 

[fredtoast]

Myles Cosgrove

[Benton]

Vincent vega.



Seriously though, most of those people are a bigger danger to themselves than anyone else.

[*jason*]

(03-22-2021, 12:39 PM)Benton Wrote: Vincent vega.



Seriously though, most of those people are a bigger danger to themselves than anyone else.

I just shot Marcus...

Also Plaxico Burress.

[fredtoast]

William Burroughs

[TheUberHuber]

I have 3 gun loving work connections/ former coworkers that had accidental discharges. One shot himself in the foot and another in the leg cleaning their weapons. The 3rd almost shot me in the foot while trying to clear the chamber to show me his new hand gun. (I think alcohol played a part here) I think he was excited or something idk. I am not even a gun person so I don't know why he felt the need to do that. I thought he was playing a stupid joke for a second until I saw his face. Then I realized what just happened. Pretty sure i lost some hearing function in my right ear. Was soooo loud lol. Very thankful he had a thick rug on his cement floor or this story probably would have had a more tragic ending. They are all engineers so I wouldn't say they are necessarily idiots, or people I would be generally concerned about. Although the one does drink way too much. The 2 that shot themselves are hard-core nra gun people.

[NATI BENGALS]

Had a friend pointing a gun directly at another friends face finger on the trigger ready to pull swearing it wasn’t loaded. For whatever reason decided to test his theory it wasn’t loaded by pointing it at the closet and blew a hole in the back of his closet.

There was a riflemen in my company that was a total moron. When we got to Afghanistan his squad leader with the rest of the platoons backing took every magazine but one from him. It was the live fire rushing drill that was the icing on the cake. Where we work our way closer to the objective, every other person rushes while the ones not rushing cover fire. Well he never moved and just kept firing. With everybody else moving in and him still way in the back shooting his little heart out things got way to close for comfort. He ended up joining the Army once he got out of the USMC and my already low opinion of the Army has forever been brought even lower.

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(03-22-2021, 06:34 PM)TheUberHuber Wrote: I have 3 gun loving work connections/ former coworkers that had accidental discharges. One shot himself in the foot and another in the leg cleaning their weapons. The 3rd almost shot me in the foot while trying to clear the chamber to show me his new hand gun. (I think alcohol played a part here) I think he was excited or something idk. I am not even a gun person so I don't know why he felt the need to do that. I thought he was playing a stupid joke for a second until I saw his face. Then I realized what just happened.  Pretty sure i lost some hearing function in my right ear. Was soooo loud lol. Very thankful he had a thick rug on his cement floor or this story probably would have had a more tragic ending. They are all engineers so I wouldn't say they are necessarily idiots, or people I would be generally concerned about. Although the one does drink way too much. The 2 that shot themselves are hard-core nra gun people.

(03-22-2021, 07:25 PM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Had a friend pointing a gun directly at another friends face finger on the trigger ready to pull swearing it wasn’t loaded. For whatever reason decided to test his theory it wasn’t loaded by pointing it at the closet and blew a hole in the back of his closet.

There was a riflemen in my company that was a total moron. When we got to Afghanistan his squad leader with the rest of the platoons backing took every magazine but one from him. It was the live fire rushing drill that was the icing on the cake. Where we work our way closer to the objective, every other person rushes while the ones not rushing cover fire. Well he never moved and just kept firing. With everybody else moving in and him still way in the back shooting his little heart out things got way to close for comfort. He ended up joining the Army once he got out of the USMC and my already low opinion of the Army has forever been brought even lower.

Dear god, the two of you know some real clowns when it comes to firearm safety.  First off, and apologies if this comes off as pedantic, but the correct term is negligent discharge.  Discharges caused by negligent handling are not accidents.  An accidental discharge would be a cook off (which will rarely happen in the civilian world), a mechanical failure (which are exceedingly rare but do happen, see the Remington 700 recall), or a delayed primer ignition.  There are obviously several rules when handling firearms, but to me the most important ones are treat every firearm as if it's loaded at all times, always keep your finger off the trigger until the moment before discharging the weapon, and never point a firearm at something you don't intend to shoot (while making sure that target is safe to shoot).  Seems to me that everyone in your examples, with the exception of Nati's bizarre Corps squad mate, violated all or several of these.  As to him, I'm surprised they didn't reassign him to something in which his ability to cause havoc was limited, like cook or logistics.

I'm friends (not professional acquaintances) with 20+ gunowners.  I've gone shooting with all of them several times.  We have never had even one such incident between all of us combined.  Learn your manual of arms and follow the basic rules at all times and firearms are as safe as any mechanical item.  I clear my firearms after shooting, before I place them in the range bag/rifle case, before I clean them and before I store them.  Hell, I check them every time I pick them up, even if I checked it two minutes ago.  Good habits prevent horrible accidents.

[*Nately120*]

I recall talking on this message board...or the old one, about that news story where some Kentucky parents bought their 5 year old son a rifle for kids and he shot his 2 year old sister. What I found the most interesting about the story was when they interviewed the parents and grandparents they were all shrugs and pretty much said that it was just a crazy random thing that no one saw coming. They also made a point that the girl was in heaven now and life goes on. That's some admirable peace of mind they've got there.

Here is a gun, kid.
*BANG*
Wow, didn't see that coming in a million years. Welp, at least she's in heaven...what's for dinner?

[NATI BENGALS]

(03-22-2021, 07:48 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I'm friends (not professional acquaintances) with 20+ gunowners.  I've gone shooting with all of them several times.  We have never had even one such incident between all of us combined.  Learn your manual of arms and follow the basic rules at all times and firearms are as safe as any mechanical item.  I clear my firearms after shooting, before I place them in the range bag/rifle case, before I clean them and before I store them.  Hell, I check them every time I pick them up, even if I checked it two minutes ago.  Good habits prevent horrible accidents.

Yea somebody could clear a gun as I watch and hand it to me and the first thing I do is clear it myself. Pretty simple stuff to play it safe.

I actually witnessed a cook off too. We were doing another live fire drill us machine gunners were set up in a berm. Riflemen we’re going in clearing a trench system. Some super high up (maybe a one star or something can’t remember) showed up and watched for awhile then wanted to go down range and see what the setup was down there. Apparently one of the machine gunners didn’t do a very good job clearing their weapon because the officer started making their way down range we were off smoking and joking and bam one of the 240G’s sitting up on the tripod with no one around went off. I can’t recall anybody’s head rolling after that though which is surprising.

[Belsnickel]

(03-22-2021, 07:48 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Dear god, the two of you know some real clowns when it comes to firearm safety.  First off, and apologies if this comes off as pedantic, but the correct term is negligent discharge.  Discharges caused by negligent handling are not accidents.  An accidental discharge would be a cook off (which will rarely happen in the civilian world), a mechanical failure (which are exceedingly rare but do happen, see the Remington 700 recall), or a delayed primer ignition.  There are obviously several rules when handling firearms, but to me the most important ones are treat every firearm as if it's loaded at all times, always keep your finger off the trigger until the moment before discharging the weapon, and never point a firearm at something you don't intend to shoot (while making sure that target is safe to shoot).  Seems to me that everyone in your examples, with the exception of Nati's bizarre Corps squad mate, violated all or several of these.  As to him, I'm surprised they didn't reassign him to something in which his ability to cause havoc was limited, like cook or logistics.

Not to be even more pedantic, but I wouldn't consider a delayed primer ignition an accidental discharge. Rather, I would call it a hangfire.

But yeah, I have to agree with all of this. I have had the "accidental" discussion with quite a few people. It applies to firearms and auto collisions. The vast majority of incidents in both are due to human error, which means it wasn't an accident. An accident implies it could not have been prevented.

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

I mean, maybe my Grandma? But that's more age than lack of morals/knowledge. Same with old people and driving.

But even if there's people out there who probably shouldn't have one due to lack of common sense, that's the price we pay for everyone to be given the freedom. Just like how it sure would be nice if we could have muted Donald Trump for 5 years, but that's now how free speech works. Just like how I wish people who just vote their party straight down the ballot without knowing any of the people they are voting for shouldn't be allowed to vote so we could get new ideas and agendas into our government, but that's not how the right to vote works. 

[Sociopathicsteelerfan]

(03-22-2021, 09:49 PM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Yea somebody could clear a gun as I watch and hand it to me and the first thing I do is clear it myself. Pretty simple stuff to play it safe.

I actually witnessed a cook off too. We were doing another live fire drill us machine gunners were set up in a berm. Riflemen we’re going in clearing a trench system. Some super high up (maybe a one star or something can’t remember) showed up and watched for awhile then wanted to go down range and see what the setup was down there. Apparently one of the machine gunners didn’t do a very good job clearing their weapon because the officer started making their way down range we were off smoking and joking and bam one of the 240G’s sitting up on the tripod with no one around went off. I can’t recall anybody’s  head rolling after that though which is surprising.

Yup, as we all stated, it's easy to be safe and stupid not to be.  I appreciate the story, and it rather reinforces my point that you'll very rarely get a cook off outside the military.  Most civilians aren't going to fire their weapon rapidly enough to create the conditions in which you'll get one.

(03-23-2021, 07:41 AM)Belsnickel Wrote: Not to be even more pedantic, but I wouldn't consider a delayed primer ignition an accidental discharge. Rather, I would call it a hangfire.

But yeah, I have to agree with all of this. I have had the "accidental" discussion with quite a few people. It applies to firearms and auto collisions. The vast majority of incidents in both are due to human error, which means it wasn't an accident. An accident implies it could not have been prevented.

To be sure.  I realize some could interpret our point as a semantic one, but it's really not.  Handled properly, a firearm is completely safe, IMO far more safe than a chainsaw.  BTW, and I'm revealing a trade secret here, every department has at least one officer/deputy, who didn't know that shotguns have no drop safety and have shot a hole in the roof of their patrol vehicle when stowing their shotgun.

[Dill]

(03-22-2021, 07:25 PM)NATI BENGALS Wrote: Had a friend pointing a gun directly at another friends face finger on the trigger ready to pull swearing it wasn’t loaded. For whatever reason decided to test his theory it wasn’t loaded by pointing it at the closet and blew a hole in the back of his closet.

There was a riflemen in my company that was a total moron. When we got to Afghanistan his squad leader with the rest of the platoons backing took every magazine but one from him. It was the live fire rushing drill that was the icing on the cake. Where we work our way closer to the objective, every other person rushes while the ones not rushing cover fire. Well he never moved and just kept firing. With everybody else moving in and him still way in the back shooting his little heart out things got way to close for comfort. He ended up joining the Army once he got out of the USMC and my already low opinion of the Army has forever been brought even lower.

Nati, where were you at in A-stan, and when? Jus' wonderin'.

Also, since the theme here seems to be weapons carelessness/dangerous practices, 

were you ever around Afghan Army troops?