I’m a liberal gun owner/user. Not sure I can say the same things about all the idiot rednecks who inhabit this county. And let’s not forget all the city folks who wanna deer hunt in these woods. I’m afraid to be outside in November. They drive up and down old gravel roads hoping to scare up a deer. If they kill one they remove horns and the backstrap and leave the mess for land owners to deal with. Maybe, just maybe they didnt shoot toward my house.
Don’t get me wrong, I have no love for deer. They’ve nearly killed me in car vs deer. I’ve totalled 3 cars.
Damn, I hate deer season.
Heck I’m from Massachusetts which is probably gun control central. Guns are strictly regulated in this state. You have to go to your local police department and apply for a Firearms ID Card. After waiting several weeks, (IF you are approved), you get your ID card and are free to purchase firearms. Of course this applies only to rifles. Getting a handgun permit is even more difficult.
I do have a few rifles and I always keep one loaded and easily accessible.
Why? I live alone and I’m 5’ 3".
I have been trained in the use of firearms and have been required to possess one for extended periods of time, but don’t own one. I am, apparently, the only member of my family who doesn’t own a gun or guns (two siblings, and parents, though I’d say my mother only ‘owns’ a gun in the communal property sense, being married and all).
I have considered getting one essentially as a security blanket (that’s not an exaggeration, I would want to sleep with the thing, if not to snuggle with, at least to have at my bed side). I have elected not to get one for reasons best not delved into in this thread, but suffice to say I sleep with a knife instead (blade folded into the handle, of course: I’m not stupid).
My Dad used to hunt rabbits. We lived out in the country and rabbits are a pest in New Zealand, so hunting them is encouraged. So when I was a kid we had a rifle. After my Dad died my mother gave up the rifle, as we had no need of it, and it needed to be licensed. I think it might have been during an amnesty or something.
Aside from that I have never lived in a home that has had a gun in it since, neither mine nor another’s. They’re really not a common thing where I am.
I didn’t know which to click. We inherited an old single-shot pistol from father-in-law. It hadn’t been fired for so long that I wondered if it would be safe to fire. Then came some scare about police searches so my wife buried it in the orchard; we’d need a metal detector now to even guess where it is.
We also have a gas-charged pellet pistol; does that count? My son is a good shot and was able to use that pistol to stun a dangerous snake lurking in our garage!
Since I’m an alien here, it would be easier for my wife to apply for a gun permit than for me to, but she’s refused to do so. Her reluctance may be partly due to having an excitable and easily annoyed husband. :o
Our locale might be considered isolated and high-crime, but my wife believes, probably correctly, that a gun would have little value (or even negative value) in the most likely criminal home attack scenarios.
My dad gifted me a .22 plinker when I was 15 because he had one growing up in the countryside, and thought I should have one too.
We didn’t live in the countryside, and there wasn’t a range around, so I almost never shot it.
I went to Army basic when I was almost 18. After having to carry and clean an M-16 all day, every day for 3 months, I lost all fascination in owning or operating personal firearms.
I appreciate that guns are sexy, intricately made tools, but owning them just seems like a chore that offers no real benefit to me.
No, I haven’t owned a firearm personally in over 3 decades…not since my first son was born. I suppose, in a way, I still ‘own’ several, as my extended family, especially my father has several.
In my family, I’m the only gun-free house. My dad, uncles, nephews, brother in law all were/are big hunters, so rifles stored in gun cabinets in every home. My dad also had a few antique powder guns and a few handguns.
I’m not anti-gun, I see no issue of a person having a rifle for hunting, or a legally registered handgun for safety. I do have issues with assault rifles and public open carrying. I know a few people that have assault rifles for hunting (they claim). If you need an AR-15 to take down an animal, maybe you should switch hobbies. Public open carrying just scares me. Around here, it’s rarely a “normal” person open carrying, it’s almost always guys who believe seriously in conspiracy theories and have issues with masculinity.
I do, but nothing in the vein of an assault rifle, or even close. Several duck/dove hunting shotguns, most of which I inherited, five pistols, one of which I inherited, one of which is a 22 target pistol, and one of which is a black powder revolver. And finally, 3 rifles- two of which are WWII-vintage bolt actions, and the other is a bog-standard, unmodified Ruger 10/22.
I used to live about 5 miles from an extremely inexpensive and unusually well-appointed range (5 yard- 25 yard pistols, 50-500 yard rifle, skeet, trap and sporting clays) back when I lived in Houston, and I used to get off at 11 on Fridays, so I tended to spend the early afternoon at the range when the weather was nice. (hey- I was single, all my friends were still at work; there wasn’t much else that I could do other than play video games and watch TV)
Yes, several, and so does my wife. Both my sons who are grown and moved out have guns. One son has a large collection and inherited another large collection from a friend who died. His very large gun safe would be referred to in the media as an arsenal or small armory.
I have the one that’s assigned to me. It’s not owned by me so technically that doesn’t count. I have another that I would use if I felt the need to carry concealed.
Two others I’ve owned for about 30 years because I thought they were cool at the time and I got a good deal. I don’t have the ammunition for them in the house.
A few Christmases ago, I was gifted a .22 rifle by the family matriarch (of the family I married into, I should specify). All of the Faulkner men are outdoorsmen, hunters, 2nd-Amendment types, that sort of thing. I am… not.
I think I’ve fired it maybe five or six times in the 3-4 years I’ve had it, always at targets, never at animals or people. For now, it’s little more than an heirloom.
I have very mixed feelings on gun control. In the main, I’m all for the right to keep and bear arms, and I’ve fired my share of other peoples’ weapons (again, at targets, not at quarry). I don’t hunt, but I have nothing against hunting, and I see it as a necessary and important means of crowdsourcing critter control. And for putting food on the table for a lot of families around here.
But I also think there need to be some limits. What those limits should be is a matter for another thread.
Or if you want to keep them be aware that in almost every jurisdiction (and on the Federal level) keeping something within the blood-line doesn’t need any fancy papers or transfers. Fully automatic firearms and breech-loading artillery excepted of course. But when Dad died his stuff automatically became “ours” (Beloved Brother and myself) and there is no transfer needed unless we decide to sell them.
Yes. More than one. Although most of what I own I bought because they were old, or unusual, or downright weird, they are all functional and I do have ammunition for all of them and shoot them on occasion.
I even built an AR-15 from part a couple of years ago, because I like to build things.
But after I had it for a while I decided I didn’t have any real use for it and sold it, for more than I paid for the parts. I’m tempted to do it again, for fun, but I’d just end up selling that one too.
For those of you gun owners of a liberal bent, I would encourage you to check out the Facebook presence of, and possibly join, The Liberal Gun Club, and Liberal Gun Owners.
Despite the similarity of names, these are two entirely separate organizations, but they are both home to a bunch of (mostly) liberals who like to discuss gun issues rationally and without a lot of name calling. I can’t say that things never get heated, but they try to keep it down.