jgd@gatech.edu (John G. DeArmond) (06/11/91)
jholand%peruvian@hellgate.utah.edu (John Holand) writes: >Well I do agree the he was professing proper gunhandling. The >point I disagree on is his method of teaching this. To claim >you can take a new comer to guns and give him an "unloaded" >gun and allow him to think he can safely make mistakes is wrong. What's your alternative, John? Give him a LOADED gun and let him make mistakes? > This would give the handler the idea that it is ok the treat >an "unloaded gun" differently than we would treat a loaded gun. No it wouldn't. Not unless you have the intellect of your quarry. IN that case, of course, you probably should not have a gun at all. In point of fact, if you alledge that a learning hunter is incapable of the reasoning necessary to pretend an empty gun is loaded, how could you ever expect him to differentiate between game species and protected ones? > This is the point I made and one I stick by. If this is the >method by which you chose to teach your son I guess that is >your decision. I feel that by allowing kids to think that they >treat a gun as "safe" you are place a seed for an accident to happen. > The education needs to start long before the child ever picks >up a gun. They need to know that a gun can and will easily kill >you and others, that it is not a toy and should be treated with >respect at all time. John, how would you teach someone who did not have the benefit of lessons from birth? Is it possible that even someone who has been taught safe gun handling from birth might make more mistakes during the first stages of learning a new discipline such as woodsmanship and hunting? Would you rather that indoctrinated-but-still-neophyte hunter swing a loaded gun across your chest in his excitement of the first chase or would you rather it be a known unloaded gun? Known unloaded because you did not permit ammo on the trip. I'd personally much rather live to teach the neophyte the error of his ways. I'm personally eternally grateful that my father used this method with me. I'll readily admit that as a youngster on my first couple of outings, I got "squirrel fever" and "painted" my dad with my rifle barrel. I don't think I'd believe anyone who told me that similiar things did not happen with him while learning. It happened even after several years of range shooting, an environment where I had the rules down pat. I have similiarly been painted by the barrel of the pistol my adult gun safety students handle. This is not the exclusive province of children. Anyone in a new environment makes mistakes. Teaching the first few lessons sans ammo insures that those mistakes are not fatal. I'm dumbfounded that you could argue any other way. John -- John De Armond, WD4OQC | "Purveyors of speed to the Trade" (tm) Rapid Deployment System, Inc. | Home of the Nidgets (tm) Marietta, Ga | {emory,uunet}!rsiatl!jgd | "Vote early, Vote often"