Gun

[The Boston Crab]

Reading about Nags firing a Magnum on holiday in America and I wondered who else here has fired a gun.


What does it feel like?


I got a mate who lives in Houston and he regularly goes down to the range to spray some semi-auto bullets and pump holes in a wooden man with a hand cannon. I thought it was weird when he told me but now I think about it, I'd love a hand cannon. PTOOM. I think about the Simpsons episode and really really get the appeal of walking round knowing you've got a gun. It's the acceptable face of a public stiffy.


I can also see why they're really bad. I would have wasted so many people over relatively small potatoes like being disingenuous or misrepresenting something I said and I probably would have blown my own brains out twice as often over something like failing to get a high score or there's no milk. Thank God I didn't grow up in a country with guns.


How do you educate people about responsible gunmanship when you're dealing with the lunatic mind of a high functioning citizen, though? It seems like far far too much power to put in anyone's hand unless they've been trained and brainwashed to see it only as a tool. Even then, plenty of soldiers snap and 'get some'. For the common man, slighted at every turn by institutions and the vagaries of circumstance, a gun very quickly joins the dots.


Despite the dangers, though, carrying a Magnum around would give you such a spring in your step. I was reading about antidepressants in America being prohibitively expensive and doctors prescribing carrying a Beretta to approximate the benefits to wellbeing. And I totally get it.


A mate of a mate goes shooting probably once a month and while I've turned down the offer of joining on the grounds of animal cruelty (which I somehow forgive myself for with fishing), I am tempted to join on the grounds of having a good fire of a gun and from speaking to him, while he enjoys the hunting element and so on, I get the sense that it's just all about shooting a big fuckin GUN in the countryside. He otherwise has it all locked up safely and zero indiscretions and he takes the responsibility very seriously which I know I wouldn't do. I'd probably have it in the bath with me! I also do think rifles and shotguns aren't that exciting though, it would be much more interesting to be firing at pheasants with a Magnum or Gatling gun.





Any thoughts?

[Shoulders?-Stomach!]

I got a mate who lives in Houston and he regularly goes down to the range to spray some semi-auto bullets and pump holes in a wooden man with a hand cannon

Turns around and his mum has left a mug of tea on the bedside table

[The Boston Crab]

Hahaha

[Alberon]

I've fired a .22 rifle in a basement firing range in New York. It was great fun. As a non-member or non-citizen (I forget which) I couldn't fire anything bigger, but someone there did turn up with a magnum which was fun to watch.

I totally get the appeal of guns but I totally get why the general public shouldn't have them. Wish there were sanctioned shooting ranges in this country where you could try an assault rifle or proper handguns.

[Pijlstaart]

Did pellet-gunning at a holiday camp, didn't hit any targets, straight into the wall. Massive breakfasts though, the best hash browns I've ever had. It's not for everyone, I'm more into mallets. Mallet-based combat, and booby traps. We have to play to our strengths.

[shiftwork2]

Quite a few times.  Clay pigeon shooting with a shotgun, range shooting with a friend's handgun near Toronto, and a brace of machine guns in Las Vegas.  The latter was interesting.  Targets depicted Bin Laden.  Still got him rolled up somewhere, riddled with my bullet holes.  It turns out I'm a good shot and one day, when they rise up, I can keep my family (don't have one) and property safe.

[poo]

Got stories.

[Danger Man]

What does it feel like?

They are very loud. Much louder than on telly except for that episode of The IT Crowd where somebody fires a gun and everybody goes deaf for a few minutes. Imagine if Linehan had got that wrong and spent the rest of his life on Twitter moaning about guns.

I fired a few guns on a shooting range in the UAE. Standard target and I was happy to get all the shots on the body. My wife just went for head shots. Bless.

[ZoyzaSorris]

Was in the CCF so have fired an LSW light machine gun and an SA-80 assault rifle at a range. I'm massively anti-militarism and just joined the cadets as an excuse to bunk off school on Friday afternoons but firing guns is fun.

[NoSleep]

They are very loud. Much louder than on telly except for that episode of The IT Crowd where somebody fires a gun and everybody goes deaf for a few minutes.

It's running joke in Archer. They sometimes muffle the audio and add a high-pitched signal over it to emulate Archer's (and others in the room) tinnitus; "mawp, mawp," they go.

[Dex Sawash]

Love to kill the clay pigeons. Always feel sad when I just clip the edge of one and it continues to fly but wobbles a bit, redemption when follow on shot absolutely fucks it though.

Childhood friend's dad was a collector with 100s of guns and let us shoot all his stuff all day all summer. Had a pair of Edsel station wagons we could shoot at but we weren't supposed to hit any of the chrome or windows. Wish there were pics of 12 year old me and friend tooled up like Pancho Villas with poor sense of any proper period aesthetic.

Only own a .22 rifle now, reluctant to get rid of it in case gummint crosses a tyrannical line in the sand and the tree of liberty needs watering (with my blood, obvs)

[Icehaven]

I was in the Air Cadets in my teens and we went .22 rifle shooting a few times. I mostly remember it hurting like hell when it recoiled into my shoulder, but that's probably because I was a 15 year old girl and the gun was nearly bigger than I was.

[H-O-W-L]

Partially deaf in my left ear because I had a shotgun fired next to me without ear protection. Thirteen, I was. Not some sort of daring robbery or dastardly abuse case like most of my grim, cyclepathic anecdotes, though. Was tagging along with some extended family on a shoot and they neglected to give me ear plugs.

[Blue Jam]

Love me a violent FPS. Fucking terrified of guns though.

[Ferris]

Firearms licenses in both the UK and Canada, but no longer own any because live in tiny downtown apartment with small child and wife who doesn't really like them. Still think they're completely fine to own for civilians and entirely safe if you are sensible, but totally understand why people with limited exposure don't like them. Different strokes, innit.

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

Anyone here ever killed a man? What was it like?

[Dr Trouser]

Fired an M16 on the Las Vegas police firing range after the police who arrested me thought I was a freedom fighter in the Sons of Owain Glyndwr and needed some 'techniques against the occupying English' (this was 1990)

Absolutely fucking terrifying things guns.

[pancreas]

Shooting fish in a barrel, here.

If you had any self-respect you would have persisted with the paed bifida thing.

[maett]

I was in the Air Cadets in my teens and we went .22 rifle shooting a few times. I mostly remember it hurting like hell when it recoiled into my shoulder, but that's probably because I was a 15 year old girl and the gun was nearly bigger than I was.

Same but 14 year old boy. Wasn't as much fun as I expected it to be.

[Icehaven]

Same but 14 year old boy. Wasn't as much fun as I expected it to be.

It's not is it. Were you also told the cautionary story of the cadet that turned around with the rifle and got kicked in the face by the officer he inadvertently ended up pointing it at?

[hamfist]

Fired an uzi, a glock and a magnum on a stag thing in Bratislava.

I was the only one who didn't kill the hostage.

I hate the idea of guns, but I am quite good at them. The safety glasses and ear defenders took a lot of sensory feedback away somehow, felt quite disconnected from the shots.

As a teenager my brother and I used to shoot .177 air rifle & pistol in the back garden. I once shot a wasp to paste with a cleaning pellet across my bedroom.

[Mister Six]

Done clay pigeon shooting with over-and-under double-barrelled shotguns in China and the UAE, and range shooting in the UAE with a magnum revolver, a .22 pistol with a stock (the only one I was any good at because my accuracy is shit) and a 9mm pistol. Wanted to have a go on the scoped rifle but they wouldn't let me because I'm left-handed and it would have ejected casings into my face.

Something that doesn't come across in films is how fucking LOUD ranges are. Guns are loud anyway, but put them in an enclosed space and it's terrifying. Every movie scene that involves a shootout indoors should end with the hero sticking his finger in his ear to get rid of the ringing. I assume they stick bits of wax in the actors' ears or something if they're firing blanks.

As for how fun it is - clay shooting is great because there's actually a point to it, and a sense of actual competition. Range shooting just felt meaningless, though I imagine if I was going regularly to improve my aim rather than to just experience shooting stuff I'd feel differently.

One odd thing - I felt fine with the shotguns but very, very nervous with the pistols. And not just because the dangerous bit is further away from you. I think it's because you rarely see long-barrelled, double-barrelled shotguns being used to kill people in films - whereas handguns are ten a penny. So handguns feel dangerous in a way that the shotguns don't. To me, at least.

[H-O-W-L]

Wanted to have a go on the scoped rifle but they wouldn't let me because I'm left-handed and it would have ejected casings into my face.

That, and depending on the rifle, it could break your cheekbone/split your jaw open with its reciprocating bolt. This is one of the many design flaws that made squaddies hate the L85. It's a bastard to reconfigure for lefties.

[Bronzy]

shot me load all over ya mum once

[Elderly Sumo Prophecy]

[tag]Andy Murray enters thread, hides under table[/tag]