Gun-handling preparedness at arms
This week’s column is more than an FYI. It is more than just a casual mention.
This week is me reaching out — dare I use the word imploring — those individuals who own a firearm who have not touched it in years, who might not even know exactly where their home-defense piece is currently located, to up their game. This might sound far-fetched but it’s more common than you might think. More folks than one might consider, believe that simply buying or possessing a firearm makes one implicitly safe. This could not be further from the truth.
I own a piano. I walk past it many times a day. I lean on it occasionally. Once in a blue moon I sit down and pound out Chop Sticks, thus annoying my family and move on. Am I ready to give a concert to the masses? Indeed not. I can fake it up to the point where I flip the tails of my tuxedo and sit down at the bench. In the words of the legendary Colonel Jeff Cooper of Gunsite fame, “Owning a piano does not make one a pianist any more than owning a firearm makes one ready to defend oneself.” According to Cooper, in this world there is no faking it. “There is prepared and unprepared.”
So how did we get to the point where we believe that possessing a firearm equates preparedness? Well, it’s a long and precarious path. We own camouflage. We live in a rural area where many of us hunt, often own multiple guns per household and are fairly comfortable around firearms in general. If I have heard the phrase “I’ve been hunting all my life” once, I’ve heard it a thousand times. This is not that. I own a tractor. That does not make me a P.A.T. bus driver. The proof is in the pudding or maybe more correctly in the gun handling.
As soon as I begin to work with a new student I immediately get a sense of exactly what they know and don’t know. Most, admittedly, know very little. That’s why they have come to me for training and that’s a good thing. It’s what I expect and I can immediately help them to become a little more familiar. And safer. I enjoy working with novice shooters because they come with no training scars, no damage, no predispositions. Female shooters are a general joy to work with because they tend to be quite coachable. The ladies listen and tend to follow instructions very well. They are usually more athletic than they give themselves credit for being.
Men tend to be more competitive, have played sports at one time in their life and still consider themselves athletic even though it’s been 20, 30, or 40 years since they were on a ballfield. They tend to feel more self-conscious about not knowing and make a lot of excuses when receiving correction. This embarrassment makes the training all that much more difficult. This is not always the case but predictably occurs more often than not.
Keep in mind, this is not just inclusive of civilians but carries over into the law enforcement population. I have officers that are current, capable and most up to date in their training. There are also those guys who haven’t touched their weapon since the last qualification, maybe a year ago. And boy do they struggle.
So what am I getting at? First, and most importantly, if you are not comfortable with your weapon, get some training, immediately. Let me say this again. Don’t wait. Find someone, not a boyfriend, not a husband or wife, preferably not a close relative, to provide training. I have attempted this route with my own wife and daughter. It has not produced stellar results. Seek a qualified professional and take some training. It might prove life saving. I am not talking about target practice. That is another article, entirely. I’m talking about gun handling.
Learn to operate your weapon system. By this, I don’t mean just learn to send rounds down range. That’s not enough. Learn how to make your firearm safe. Learn how to safely store it. Train to incorporate your safety mechanism. Learn to load and unload ammunition as well as how to insert and remove the magazine. Learn proper reloads including both the speed reload and the tactical reload. Learn how to operate the slide lock/catch mechanism of your semi-automatic pistol. Learn what malfunctions look like, their cause and how to clear them, quickly and efficiently. If you have no idea what these terms mean, then you probably need training more than you might have first believed.
Certainly, learn the foundations of marksmanship, but don’t stop there. Dry practice safely. There are many ways to learn your gun that do not require discharging rounds. This not only makes training safer but also cheaper, which in this day and age of skyrocketing prices, ammunition is not getting any more affordable.
So, bottom line? Email me and I’ll help you locate some quality training be it me or one of the quality trainers in our area of which I am familiar.
Parting thought… train now. Don’t wait. Be safe.
Dave Bates writes a weekly outdoors column for the Observer-Reporter. He can be reached at alphaomegashootingsolutions@gmail.com