Rant: guns

I'm going to an NRA (National Rifle Association) orientation for safety today.  Cool huh?  Mandatory for the next shotgun-shooting campout. 

Which kindof brings up an interesting topic.  Do guns make people violent?  My old Sunday School teacher touched on that before.  Guns aren't alive.  So they aren't evil.  They can be used for protection, hunting, for hobbies, anything.  Baseball bats are used in some gang fights.  Does that make baseball evil?  NO IT DOESN'T. :P

Nonetheless, people seem to think guns are dangerous.  True. Guns have lots of potential to hurt.  But, then again, careless-ness hurts.  Guns are extremely dangerous unless you take precautions.  That's the point of the NRA orientation.  (duh)

Another question people think is: Don't guns make you want to be violent and shoot things? Urban Taggers has a good response to that.  (this isn't mine)

Don't you think nerf guns glorifies guns/war/killing?
It depends in who's hands. Not in ours. There are those who really enjoy the thrill of shooting and simulating wars and kills. In our hands, they're more about the fact they're amazing TOYS that shoot projectiles. We don't look to hurt or harm anyone, we don't even look to pretend to kill anyone. Throwing a stone at someone is a whole lot more malicious and painful than these toy blasters could ever be as far as we're concerned. We specifically chose the term "Taggers" for this very reason; it's not going for the kill, (or even the hit) it's going for the tag.

::Pocket here. My Dad was a former soldier and in turn became so anti war and killing that I have never looked to glorify war or killing in any shape or form. "Why would you want to even pretend to kill your friends" was what he said to me growing up, and so do understand there is nothing exciting or satisfying for me about hurting someone else. When I showed my Dad my Stampede ECS the day I received it, he looked at it and laughed, but had no ill feelings towards why I had it or my motivations or intentions with it. I'm not a violent person; I learned that from him.

 Good story eh?
 To a certain extent, other dangerous sports are the same.  I have no ill feelings that would make me want to shoot guns.  Also, handling real guns make you more careful and serious with their destructive power.  Now, when I watch star wars, sometimes I wince when a clone or soldier dies.  I definitely wouldn't want to shoot at ANYONE.  No one.  EVER. 

Funny how people think "OOOH nerf guns and (maybe real guns) are violent and promote killing" 

I mean, parents buy their kids games where you run around and kill people.  They're blood and explosions.  Killing people isn't serious according to Modern Warfare.  They're rated M for a reason.  Younger people don't understand and can possibly misunderstand what they see.  Yet, parents buy violent games and movies, but panic if they see a foam dart gun. 

That was a nice long rant... :-)