3 Gun Club Guys Who Make Me Pig-Biting Mad
I’m not Ed Anger, but I do want to be him when I grow up.
If you’re older than a certain age, then you no doubt remember that supermarket checkout-line staple, the Weekly World News. Maybe you even remember my favorite columnist, Ed Anger, who was always pig-biting mad about something or other. Today, I feel a certain kinship with Mr. Anger, Esq., for I have just returned from a gun club and range, and it is only the lack of farms around here that is preventing me from catching a nasty case of trichinosis. You see, in the past I’ve written about the three types of gun-club “guys” that are pretty nice people, with their harmless foibles. And then…there are the ones I saw today. (Naturally, any of these could also apply to a woman…I generally just use “guys” because the term is mostly gender-neutral at this point.)
1. A Guy and His ‘Gram
You’ve seen this guy before. He’s the same kind of guy who complains to the waiter that his food is cold, when he spent the first five minutes after it was delivered trying to frame his plate with just the right composition and filters to look perfect on social media. He’s the guy who watches every concert, every kid’s recital, and every special holiday moment through his iPad lens. And now, here he is on the range, with a Real! Live! Gun! Granted, footage of someone shooting a gun will usually be more entertaining than pictures of his club sandwich, but my problem here isn’t the subject matter. It’s the fact that this guy is thinking much harder about getting likes and re-Tweets than he is about actually using his firearm safely. To wit:
Major props to that RSO, though.
2. A Guy and His Girl
Ah, springtime on the range, when a young man’s fancy turns to thoughts of playing a really dangerous prank on a woman he claims to care about. I’ve never understood the motivation behind this one, but I’ve seen it enough times to know it’s not just one bad apple here and there. Here’s how it goes: Guy takes girl who has never shot a firearm before to a range. He hands her something really tasty–pistol-grip 12-gauge shotgun, perhaps, or maybe a nice X-frame revolver–and without any further ado, gleefully encourages her to shoot it. He doesn’t warn her about not bringing that shottie up to her face, or bracing herself on her back leg, oh no. Where’s the fun in that? Instead, in a metastatic growth of the cancer that is A Guy and His ‘Gram, he whips out his phone to shoot some video of his lady love getting knocked on her ass, or having her teeth loosened. To wit:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPUcFTyW9-w
Leaving aside the entire matter of how cruel a trick this is to play on someone you supposedly care about, let’s talk about what happens when a person loses control of their firearm like that. What happens when someone falls ass-over-teakettle with a gun in their hands? Why, that muzzle gets pointed all over creation! And what happens when someone has something startling or painful happen to them while they’re holding something? Why, they flinch, of course! So if that booger-hook is still on the bang-switch, what you have is a muzzle being pointed every which way while the flinch reflex causes them to pull the trigger again.
3. A Guy and His Pb
Don’t get me wrong; I’m all for teaching kids about gun safety and handling when their parents feel they’re ready to start learning. What bothers me is when I see parents modeling really bad habits for their kids at the range. Letting the children goof around while Mom and Dad are shooting away, for one. Sure, they’re probably in more danger running around your average restaurant than your average range, but the RSO isn’t a babysitter and neither am I. But what really gets me mad enough to sink incisors into porcine butt is watching a family troop out together without stopping off at the handwashing station. This isn’t some gas-station-bathroom situation in which the child’s hands are probably cleaner than the sink. This is a small child with a still-developing brain who is now coated in an invisible layer of lead dust, which he is going to start eating the second you hand him the granola bar you packed. And we all know what happens when a still-developing brain gets poisoned with a heavy metal, don’t we?
Yup! They grow up to be one of the the three above-mentioned Guys At the Range Who Make Me Pig-Biting Mad.
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Dumb, mean and stupid. This may have been an opportunity to properly introduce a newbie to the fun of shooting. Instead these guys act like A-holes.
Excellent article, I am RSO and instructor. Absolutly true.
As a former RSO, current Parent and Grandparent, I agree 100% with you. I retired from being an RSO due to declining health issues. While I was active, we did convince our Range Board of banning cameras and phones from being used on the firing line.
Dirty tricks are very often unsafe tricks. What better way to insure that your significant other becomes a card carrying member of the Anti-Gun crowd. There’s nothing cute and or funny about it period. Your YouTube vidro nothing but proof of what an A-Hole you really are. Once again the phone/camera ban does wonders.
When you take a child to the range, your attention should be focused dntirely upon the child, their safe handling of the gun and their shooting with it. You’re not there to work on your skills. You’re there to work on the childs growing skills and safe practices ONE ON ONE (Safety dictates that you only work with one child at a time, so don’t show up with the whole brood at the range). You can only give one child your undivided attention.
Amen, my friend! Truer words were never spoken!
When I first read the title of the article I thought I was going to go for pork belly live on the hoof but after reading about the three types of gun swine I realized you were not referring to folks who shoot 3-Gun. Yes, now and again there is a prima dona in the bunch but as a whole no porcine influences anywhere. Only the best of intentions and helpfulness. We’ve all seen the first two types and have the same level of disdain as you describe. As for the third i’ve taken to keeping lead removal wipes in the range bag or truck at all times and freely offer them to the youngsters when they are packing up after the family shoots. It seems being at the range for any length of time seems to include food as part of or following the activity.
The example in the first vignette shows a guy that is not familiar with guns and is dangerous because he is ignorant. No need to give him a lecture if you are banning him for life. But if you want to make sure no other lives are endangered, teach the man or advise him where to go to get training. This just a first approximation analysis with out really knowing the details of what was really discussed or the man’s attitude to your lecture if there was one. I take it that the gun range managers just told the man he was unsafe to justify banning him permanently from the range and save themselves a potential deadly problem. That was the easiest solution, but not the best one. Now we have another moron in the streets with a gun and no idea of what he is doing to the detriment, sooner or later, of an innocent victim. What they ought to do is to post a really big sign stating “no inexperienced or rookie gun owners allowed in the premises”. and then proceed to question the potential client about his basic knowledge of firearms handling before taking his or her money.
Fully agree with you. Pull them off the line for the safety of others then get them into a class so we can educate them as to the right and wrong way to behave with a gun. No need to banned them for life, cause then you have a resentful Moron walking the streets who is going to show us that he/she is a real threat and knows exactly what he/she is doing with a gun. Have seen this resentment while I was an RSO and banning him/her is the easy way out. Stand up for education so we have better shooters everywhere.
Anything other than a single action .22 revolver is not safe to teach newbies with. A .22 semi-auto pistol if carrying extra rounds in a magazine is used then that presents a situation for a mishandling accident. Let them learn the joy of cowboy shooting. Everybody likes it and there is not much chance for an post-fire accident.
Nitpick: you could also use a .22LR rifle, preferably bolt-action and singly-loaded, especially if you have somewhere clean and comfortable for them to lie prone. The size and prone-ness make it a lot harder for them to wave it around and point the muzzle in inappropriate directions, and put the “noisy end” further from their ears. Lot of kids every year learn that way, safely and enjoyably, at summer camp. (It’s how I did, once I pulled up my big-boy pants and got over my fear of the noise.)
WTF!! Hard to tell who are worse, the male beta drones who were tossed from the range forever, or the asshats who obviously know less than the women they were trying to get to shoot and allowing them to be injured. It’s clowns like that that give the rest of the Gunowners a bad name. I guess If I had to pick it’s the the beta male drones. Too bad the RSO didn’t give them a beating also, They deserve it. Morons.
A private range near me had a lady from England come in and rent a Ruger .22 semi-auto pistol “because she had never shot a gun before”. Unfortunately, the person at the counter rented her the pistol and sold her a box of ammo, showed her how to load it and sent her out to the pistol range unsupervised. She loaded the pistol and having never fired any gun before, held the pistol up very close to her face and fired it. The bolt broke her nose! That, unfortunately, is all I know about the incident. I sincerely hope that the counter person lost their job for letting a real rookie get hurt because they didn’t have the time to assist the rookie and insure their safety.
Phil in TX
I think the guy and his girl thing is sometimes a guy with a small penis who needs to impress/oppress the girl, because he feels inadequate in other ways…not to put too much psychobabble into it or anything…
WOW I actually teach these things to new shooters. I have actually banned people (men) from the range for mistreating new shooters (women). When I see them heading in with a 12 ga I’ll try to talk them out of it. Even offer a .22 pistol with ammo for free to stop from creating an anti-gun person. Which is what happens when they get hurt.
I used to work at a gun shop/range and we insisted that a person that has never shot before start off with a .22 pistol. It lets them get used to the feel of a firearm and doesn’t scare the beejusus out of them.
Good point. That’s what my Son and I did to teach my Wife how to handle and finally shoot a pistol. Moved on up a caliber at a time to .45 then she picked what she liked better as more controllable and we settled on a 9mm. Next up are rifles, starting with my .22.