I don’t usually pay attention to AK-47s, but there used to be some pretty scary rednecks who would ostentatiously shoot those things against a backstop right next to where I used to play airsoft, while making snide comments about “toy guns” and drinking too much (defined as “drinking anything alcoholic at all while holding a goddamn rifle with safety off in your other hand”)
In an effort to maybe not get accidentally shot by a moron, I tried talking to them about the guns (on the grounds that more talking meant fewer live rounds), at which point I learned the names of a few manufacturers of AK clones.
Now come on, that’s just being dishonest. It was a rhetorical question. If you read the entire post and my other posts on here you’d know that I’ve never said guns should be out-right banned or be restricted to the government.
My stance has been consistant: Guns should be expensive, a PITA to get, and a PITA to keep.
At least for myself, that a gun can be used for protection is a side benifit to the sporting aspect. I suspect that many, if not most gun owners are like me.
A side benifit of enjoying them for sport increases my knowledge, awareness and safety with them.
My Wife is a triathlete. She uses her bike for sports. People can call her $6000 Guru tri-bike a toy, but I would disagree.
But that depends on just what exactly you mean. If you mean that to own a gun someone should demonstrate a high level of personal responsibility, and stringent safeguards be put in place against the misuse of firearms, few are going to argue with that. But if you mean that an otherwise qualified person should be **punished **with artificially added expense and bureaucratic red tape for trying to acquire a gun in order to discourage as many people as possible from making the effort, then your stance is fundamentally anti-gun. Is the fundamental purpose behind the measures you propose to make sure that people own guns as responsibly as possible, or for the fewest number of people to own guns?
I never said not to. But those are not intended to be pointed at things and fired. Which was the original question. They are intended to be pointed away from things and fired.
(And the line thrower differs from my Mossberg 500 only in that the barrel has been swapped out.)
He’s already said this is his objective–basically, for whatever reason, he thinks only rich people should own guns. I’m sure I could pretty easily think of more reprehensible stances, sure, but that’s pretty reprehensible.
On the other hand, if you use fifty dollar bike to move troops, it’s not a toy.
At’s about the size of it. It’s either a tool: something used to make a livelihood, or it’s a toy: something for recreation, no matter how intense or beneficial.
He who dies with the most toys wins. Me, I got over 40 different Optimus Primes.
A toy is a toy. I don’t see why people need to get all bent out of shape about it. There’s nothing wrong with it being a toy. My custom-built computer is a toy. My crazy toed running shoes are toys.
Question is, why do you seem to be getting all out of shape with your gun, used for recreation, being called a toy?
I would say, to elaborate on other folks’ comments–it’s not calling it a “toy” in a vacuum that’s the problem, it’s that generally when someone calls guns a “toy” they are trying to use that as a rhetorical cheap shot to imply (if not outright argue) that
A) I treat my gun flippantly, without the respect/caution a weapon deserves
B) My gun has no legitimate uses, and can safely be regulated away
C) The fact that I own a gun implies that I’m childlike
D) Any/All of the Above
And the piece of rubber in my closet is a vibrating stimulatory device, not a sex toy. :rolleyes:
Newsflash: “Recreational object” is just a grown-up way of saying “toy.”
By some people, maybe. But not by me. A toy is a toy is a toy.
That may be some people’s intent, but not mine. Please note that I am applying “toy” to anything that people use for recreation–including my own grown-up toys. I’m also happy to create a distinction between guns kept primarily for self-defense (not toy) versus recreational (toy) purposes.
I see people objecting to the *universal application *of the word toy to items used for recreational purposes (i.e., including but not limited to guns) as just taking themselves too fucking seriously.
You see it as us taking ourselves too seriously, we see it as firearms not being taken seriously enough.
No matter how you definine it, a firearm has the potential to harm someone, so it shouldn’t be called a toy anymore than a sword or car should – toy has the wrong connotation.
I am in fact generalizing your usage of the term rather than taking you at face value, for which I apologize.
I don’t really think I’m taking things too seriously, though, given that it’s far more common on the Dope and elsewhere for my general interpretation of “toy” as derogatory to be accurate. It’s not just with guns, either, but with pretty much all of my myriad geeky hobbies–even by other geeks (I have literally been told by a geocacher I know that my PC used for both video gaming and work-from-home is a “toy”, as in literally he said “why would an adult spend all that money on a toy?”, followed up with “you should get a professional-grade GPS, they’re so useful, best tool I’ve bought in years” and all he does geocache with it. Yet I don’t turn around and say “So you bought this ‘tool’ to play asynchronous hide-and-seek?”) It gets old and I get cranky about it. Sometimes unjustifiably so, like in this instance.