"Plus, the sensory experience of target shooting-readying your stance, controlling your breath, focusing on the target—is so absorbing that I can’t indulge my free-floating worries. I can’t have a self-conscious intellectual reaction when firing a gun. It’s almost meditative. At one point I glimpse a woman in her sixties dressed in a white polo, creased khakis, and pristine white sneakers—attire for a day of golf at the country club; she’s brandishing a Glock. I have to stop myself from laughing with delight."
- Amanda Fortini
Here's a woman who grew up thoroughly in a "guns are bad, scary things!" culture of the liberals states, but expose her to to a little bit of American freedom, put her on the shooting range just once, and this is what she takes away from the experience.
And then there's this bit, and I quote,
"Yet to fire a gun is to realize you can do it: You can operate one, understand how it works."
This. This is without a doubt one of the single biggest reasons why bringing folks to the range works! One of the biggest issues folks have with guns is fear of the unknown. Fear that it's just going to go off. Fear that it'll hurt them. Fear that they won't be able to competently and safety use one. Hell, a fear they can't even verbalize. Once those first few rounds go downrange and they see holes in the target in front of them much of that goes right out the window, replaced with the exhilerating realization that they CAN do this. Fear is quickly replaced with fun.
It's funny, because this mirrors my mom's experience. All it took was a little exposure to guns and gun ownership and one single range trip to go from "I don't want a gun in the house" to being excited about having her own gun in the house.
It may take Amanda a little bit more time than that, but she'll get there soon enough. She's already taken that first huge step towards overcoming her fears. I'd say, give her a couple more trips to the range and she'll be just fine. Way to go Amanda!
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4 comments:
A firearm is nothing more than an occasionally-annoyingly-complex machine, crafted out of inanimate metals, and imbued only with whatever motivations a user has while that user is handling it. Aside from that, it will work middlingly well as a paperweight or doorstop, but not a whole lot else (though I understand you can open beers with a 1911 in a variety of fashions). Unfortunately, our media, our entertainers, and our "gun control" extremists have made an industry out of demonizing, anthropomorphizing, and fetishizing firearms to the point where people - even intelligent people - genuinely are afraid of them when they are simply sitting around, doing nothing on a table.
The only way to cure fear that deep-seated, as I see it, is through education, and thank you kindly for being willing to provide it :).
Actually, a Firearm is nothing more than a Launching Device, using Mechanical Energy (the Trigger and the Hammer) to convert Chemical Energey (the primer and the powder) which imparts Kinetic Energy to an Object (the Bullet) which will travel unless stopped and/or Gravity pulls it to earth.
And the SAME Energy Transfer Process is used to drive an Automobile. Gas Pedal (Mechanical Energy), etc. But when you tell someone that they are 2-3 more times to be killed or injured in a car Accident than be shot, the new people don't get it until you explain the similarities. This helps to reduce the fear factor.
If a person can operate a car safely then they should have no problem operating a gun safely.
Good for Amanda. I have a female friend that was terrified of guns after some guy in college took her to the range, gave her the weapon with the most kick and then laughed as it knocked her on her butt (literally). At first I'd just show her one, she's a pilot, she likes to see how things work. Then she held it. Then we had her try the little Bersa which is a fine but pretty harmless little piece from a recoil standpoint. Now she wants a .45 and has started to fondle the AR when she comes by to visit.
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