I confess to have been slightly startled someone with a username like ‘cowgirl’ wouldn’t be familiar with six-gun sports and trick shooting exhibitions, but that was a bit over the line, Martini.
Thanks for the defenses, guys. I am entirely an urban cowgirl, my only steed is a ten-speed, and literally the only gun owners I’ve ever met are on this board. I have never seen a gun in real life, and never paid the slightest attention to any sort of shooting sports. (Why would I?)
I was wondering what a civilized conversation about gun control without reference to the US Constitution would look like (because every Second Amendment conversation around here quickly descends into ugliness). It has in fact been very educational for me.
I guess Martini didn’t read far enough to learn that I don’t support a handgun ban. Better for him to jump in with … er … guns blazing, I guess.
The only gun owners you are aware you’ve ever met.
A lot of Canadians own guns too. They’re just quieter about it. I’m only vaugely loud in real life if someone asks me what kind of sports I do, after ignoring the concept of computer as a hobby.
I figured it was something of the urban sort for the name, which is why I was only vaugely surprised. Now, I’m going to support the statement that pistols can be used for sport later this evening, when I’m free to search youtube. Prepare to see some awesome stuff. Kay?
True enough. I have also recalled one gun owner who I do know. Let me restate: the topic is one that almost never comes up in my life.
Deal!
Link, please?
I’ve demonstrated innumerable times with CDC stats that most firearm death stats also include suicides, and linked to the one and only (as far as I know) international study comparing the level/percentage of firearm ownership in a given country and its corresponding suicide rate.
The study very carefully drew no conclusions, but a brief glance at the numbers tends to indicate that the percentage of any given nation’s population with firearms has little or no correlation with its suicide rate.
BFD, you say?
The last time I looked, suicide by firearm accounted for about 60% of all firearm deaths in the U.S.A., and yet consistently get tossed in with “homicide” rates.
I’m stealing this as my new sig.
:mad: Guns!.. :mad: Bill of Rights!.. :mad: Second Amendment!.. :mad:
There ya go.
I don’t know anyone who plays curling as a sport, and I’ve never paid the slightest bit of attention to it, but I am aware that there’s a sport called curling and that it is played at competition level. The same is true of many other sports, ranging from lacrosse to petanque to Camel racing.
I’m glad you don’t support a handgun ban, but unfortunately most people who ask questions about the legitimacy of civilian gun ownership DO want them banned- and even they are at least aware of the sporting uses of guns and object all the same.
The thing is, most of the people who do support handgun bans know bugger all about them and come out with nonsense about they’re only for killing people etc, and I spend a lot of my time having to deal with negative stereotypes about shooters. Senator Bob Brown (leader of the Greens here in Australia) recently called for a ban on Automatic Handguns, claiming that they were “effectively machine-guns and should be withdrawn from private ownership”; completely overlooking the fact that it’s been illegal to own a functioning Automatic Pistol or Machine Gun here since about 1934. And that’s at the “easily ignored” level of the sort of stuff sporting shooters here have to put up with- about 5 years ago a foreign student shot a couple of people at a University in Melbourne and they promptly banned a huge swathe of handguns- none of which this student used- and made the handgun shooting sports so complicated to get into that hardly anyone bothers anymore unless they’re really, really, really keen.
So hopefully you will forgive my lack of patience for people wanting to know what the legitimate uses of handguns are when they should be, IMHO, obvious to anyone with an internet connection or a TV- and saying that someone didn’t know handguns were used for sport strikes me as being somewhat like being unaware that fire can be used for illumination as well as cooking, IMHO.
Try this and the associated links down the right.
Although I know better, I’m going to pretend this is just curiosity and go ahead and answer. Anticipating what I’m sure will come up sooner rather than later- I do not now, nor have I ever, wished to be John Wayne.
I don’t “need” all that firepower. But I do have it. It’s really hard to shoot more than one at a time, and 3 is darn near impossible.
I have a locked compartment in my vehicle and keep a small revolver in there for emergencies (unless I’m leaving the car unattended for extended periods, of course).
The one on my hip is heavily customized for carry, quite comfortable and nearly as much fun to shoot as its big brother.
The one on the dresser (in a locking “handgun safe” doohickey) stays there all the time. It’s kind of like having a gun in a gun safe - it really doesn’t make any sense to not have it there. And, of course, you don’t really know if it’s loaded or not unless you open the box, and that’d annoy Schrödinger so let’s leave that one where it is.
This kind of touches on what I was alluding to earlier - an irrational fear of an inanimate object. Does it matter at all how many guns someone has or where (not how) they are stored? If I dragged every gun safe in the house into the bedroom and then loaded all the guns in them, my family would be no more nor less safe than they are with 90% of the guns unloaded and in the basement.
There are no magic guns, some are good for one use and not so good for another. As I said earlier, the average handgun isn’t much good for killing things, but a Winchester Model 70 .30-06 is cumbersome to carry around all the time and will deafen the whole family if discharged in a house, and don’t even get me started on overpenetration issues. Handguns are a heck of a lot of fun to shoot. So if you have a few and are trained and licensed, might as well haul one of them around instead. Not quite as handy as a good pocketknife, but still occasionally useful to have.
I’ve tried using two pistols at once; you know, for science. 
Needless to say, it really did not work very well. :o
I’ve gotten better at firing two fake pistols at once, thanks to some old light gun games. It’s a skill.
I thought that handguns were already almost banned in Canada. Don’t you have to show a good reason, get a background check, do the hokey-pokey, and even then you can only get a small caliber revolver or something?
Can anyone help me with this?
And #2, if I am close to right, are these legal handguns a problem? I wouldn’t think so.
It sounds like how hard machine guns are to get in the U.S. You have to go through so many hoops, and it is so expensive that a criminal would never do it. IIRC, no civilian owned machine gun has been used in a crime since registration started in the 1930s…
There’s mounds of paperwork - license to own handgun, license for the handgun in question, license to transport said handgun between your home and the range, license to turn right on red while handgun is securely stored in your trunk, etc, etc, but I’m not aware of any requirement to give a “good reason” (whatever that would be) to own one, nor any restrictions that would rule out .45 or 9mm or anything. If there are calibre restrictions (and there may well be) they’d only apply to truly outsized stuff.
It is a lot of hoops to go through, but I’d be pretty surprised if no legally owned handguns were ever used for criminal purposes. I’d expect those to be crimes of passion and the like, however, not the sorts of gang shootings that are driving the political rhetoric mentioned in the OP.
It’s been years since I last looked into this, but IIRC, there were also such things as a letter of recommendation from a safety officer at your range stating that you were a member in good standing, a visit from the police to inspect your home storage facilities (sorry, nightstand drawers and glove compartments don’t count but lockable gun safes do), license to purchase, and so on. There were no unreasonable restrictions on calibre–I knew a number of people who owned .45s and 9mms. As I said though, it’s been years since I last had to know this, and things may have changed.
But its because of all these hoops, jtgain, that there are very few problems with legal handguns in Canada. Criminals with illegal handguns don’t bother with all the paperwork, and law-abiding citizens engaged in a legitimate sport really have no choice.
Yeah, and yet they still banned the civilian transfer and ownership of machine guns manufactured after 1986. Astonishingly stupid, really.
(And even more stupidly, the amendment to the “Firearm Owners Protection Act” of '86 that included the ban was approved at night, when most of the House was absent. By an unrecorded voice vote. The result of which was “called” by the rabidly anti-gun Charles Rangel. Yeah. I don’t buy it either. :dubious: )
Actually, my understanding is that the calibre restrictions are on .25 Auto and .32ACP calibre handguns, and on handguns with a barrel less than 104mm. In short, it’s perfectly legal to own a .50AE Desert Eagle in Canada, but not a Walther PPK.
Here in Australia, you could modify a Walther PPK to have a 120mm long barrel and it would be legal to own on a handgun licence, but there’s no way you can get a .50AE Desert Eagle on a handgun licence for any reason except collecting (and you’re not allowed to fire it) or because you’re a farmer (and it’s almost impossible to get .50AE ammo anyway).
It is indeed legal to own a .50AE Desert Eagle in Canada. My son has one and it is a kick to fire that thing. Both kinds of kick.