Well, my grandfather used to carry a bolt action .22 in his pickup on his farm to shoot snakes, and and wild dogs and stuff that were endangering his livestock. Guess he was a coward. I still have that old .22, in my closet, it’s the only thing of my grandfathers I inherited. I’m a coward too, I guess, because I’m going to keep it.
My grandfather, back in the 40’s and 50’s would haul pulp wood across rural Arkansas and when one of the gas stations wouldn’t let his black employee use the bathroom he would stand up to them. But I guess he was a coward. Damn.
My dad had a shotgun he would use to hunt with when I was a child to put food on the table. Dad worked his way through college supporting a family and the extra meat helped out. But that makes him a coward, so be it.
Good buddy of mine was a firefighter up in Kodiak Alaska, where in order to feed his wife and kid he, you guessed it, hunted. With a gun. He’s a man who has saved countless lives, gone into burning buildings and such to pull people out, and served in the coast guard. Damn coward, he owns a gun.
Room mate of mine woke up from a nap and found a strange man in our living room, after me and her boyfriend left for work. He came at her until he saw her pointing a gun at him. I’m awful glad she was a coward, because she would probably be dead or raped had she not been one and not had a gun.
One night I came upon a guy trying to kick my neighbors door in one night. He had a big butcher knife in his hand and was seriously altered on something. My neighbor was his ex wife. When he saw how big a coward I was holding a gun in my hand, he fled. The cops went to the wrong apartment complex, so if I hadn’t been such a coward she would be dead now.
I guess all the cops and soldiers carrying guns are cowards, too.
“But wiat! Wait! That’s in the line of duty! That doesn’t count!” cry the nay-sayers.
Well, yes. But it isn’t like the cops and soldiers didn’t know going into their professions that they would be carryinbg guns, ostensibly to go into harm’s way.
Could you just see a soldier who didn’t know, in basic training, on Rifle Range Day?
“What’s this? A gun? WHOA! Nobody said anything about carrying a gun!”
“SHOOT PEOPLE? I don’t even like to yell at them, fer chrissake!”
“Leme outta this Army, I don’t wanna play soldier no more!”
Now I would never suggest that police or soldiers put on the uniform solely to get to play with a gun and shoot someone. I’ll admit that I did, though. They gave me a tank! I guess I’m a really BIG coward.
Many, I would say most, enter service to help people (like military combat medics) and hope that they never have to hurt anyone, ever. But there’s no denying the fact that “combat medic” is an inherently dangerous occupation, as is being a police officer in a dangerous part of town. Heck, it’s dangerous on the highways, it’s dangerous responding to domestic disturbances, even in high-class neighborhoods.
But all of those folks are just cowards, I suppose.
Hey, you can protest that an AR-15 isn’t really an M-16, but if I were a cop & I saw someone carrying what looks for all the world like an M-16, & could have been modified to function as one, no matter what it was when he bought it, I’d call it a f***ing M-16. And the safety would be off my sidearm immediately.
Well, I’d hardly fault a cop for erring on the side of caution in your scanrio, but IF someone were openly carrying ANY firearm down a street, I’m sure just about ANY cop in ANY city, town or hamlet would sit up and take notice. It needn’t be an all-black Scary Weapon ™.