He gets it.Originally Posted by Safetyhit
I agree with 99% of what you are saying, but this one part throws me. Some hunters I know don't have AR's, but they don't hate them. In fact, they seem facinated by mine. And other black rifle owners hate me (us) as well? Some, I suppose, but...
Can you elaborate? I know I could be missing something.
Pat, kick me back into my lane if I'm out. I'll try to explain this as I understand it, and have experienced it myself. I am a former infantry soldier, so don't take anything I say that seems faintly insulting to the military out of context.
When Pat says 'you' here, he means we who are devoted to the practice of arms and the combat mindset.Don't for one minute thing that only hunters don't like you. A large portion of the mil doesn't either.
This is a true statement. I know we like to pay homage to the military here, but when we do so, we are thinking of guys like Pat who not only served a hundred times over what most of us have, but always remembered WHAT they were protecting and defending.
There are a HUGE number of .mil people (and police) who really believe that the .mil and/or police are the only people who should have "assault weapons".
Of the ones who think it's OK in principle for YOU to have an AR15, about 85% of THOSE folks look very askance at you if you do anything with it other than shoot beer cans on the weekend. If you train, they view you as a potential threat/whacko. Even the ones who take training themselves sometimes belong to this group. I have been in several classes with a number of police and military after I was out of the military, and I think Pat will corroborate my observation that some of them are VERY uncomfortable with 'just some guy' training alongside them...to say nothing of the obvious disapproval/disbelief when that civilian guy with well-worn gear and weapon displays a very high level of proficiency for no reason that they can think of.
(as an aside, not totally relevant to this argument, but worth a thought anyway: This is one good reason for closed enrollment classes, aside from the safety aspect of making sure everyone's experience level is roughly the same. A good part of what makes an elite force elite is TELLING them they are, then expecting them to live up to the standard - and letting them get whupped in a qual course by some surgeon from flyover country isn't a good way to enhance their confidence in their training and abilities. No, the surgeon can't fall out of a plane then land nav 25 miles overnight to assault an objective, and everyone knows that, but it would still be a distraction and detrimental to the program.)
The Bubbas with the Tapco****ed SKSs worry them too, but they understand those folks' mentality, mostly. They’re idjits who are mostly dangerous to themselves or their cuzzins, no matter how pissed off they get. You, they don't understand...and things they don't understand make them very nervous. For most of the .mil and police, it's just another job. If they weren't doing that, they'd be doing something else with decent benefits. Maintaining proficiency in weaponcraft is something they do as part of the job, and nothing more. Someone doing that on their own initiative (and doing it WELL), for no reason they can understand, makes them very nervous. In fact, they’d just as soon you stop, or go away….and they’ll vote and support policies toward that end.
Soccer moms. Nuff said. Most of them are un-winnable, especially over to US. You might be able to convince some of them that black rifles are fun for sports by painting them pink and wearing colorful NASCAR-esque clothing when shooting them, but getting them to see a reason for combat weapons and training? Sheeit. You’d as likely get Kunta Kinte to have a good time at a Merle Haggard concert.Nor do soccer moms, radical religious spokesmen, trap shooters, and so forth. In fact, most other shooters hate you. Most others who own black rifles hate you.
Radical religious spokesmen – unfortunately, the only ones that are likely to see merit in your point of view are ones that you wouldn’t want supporting you in public.
Trap shooters – I could go on and on about this crowd, but suffice it to say that as a group, they are scarcely better than the soccer moms. Guns are exactly the same to them as golf clubs, and they do not perceive any threat whatsoever to their ‘golf clubs’ from the most draconian gun control measures. In fact, they are apt to support them, so as to not be lumped in with you ‘black-rifle whackjobs’. They, too, are almost un-convinceable. So also with the airgunners, muzzleloader crowd, rimfire shooters, and so on.
Other black rifle shooters hate you – Shocked by this? Why should you be? Go over to TOS and post something about training and mindset being a good thing, and watch about four guys who get it agree with you and support you, and watch a thousand others attack you with one of the following themes (please select any or all of the following):
a) Who do you think you are, Rambo? The thought that you could do anything against a terrorist attack or any other kind of conflict with a black rifle is ridiculous, and the fact that you think about such things means you’re a nut. There’s no need for civilians to have that training, and the fact that you want it or have it means you’re a nut.
b) You shouldn’t refer to your rifle as a weapon! It gives ammunition to the anti-gunners, and besides, my rifle isn’t a weapon anyway! I’m never going to shoot anybody with it, so it’s not a weapon. And since it’s not a weapon, they will have no reason to take it away from me. YOU, on the other hand, are ruining it for the rest of us with your talk about training and defensive shooting. That’s the kind of thing that’s going to get our guns taken away! Buncha goddamn nuts!
c) What do you think you’re training for? Do you think the gummint is going to come take your guns? First of all, they ain’t, and second of all, if they did you couldn’t stop ‘em anyway. You must be a nut.
d) O M G. Did you just say if someone came to take your guns you’d shoot them? You anti-government cop basher! Did you hear that, Johninaustin? This guy wants to shoot a cop! COP BASHER! BAN HIM!!
e) Trainin’? Why you wastin’ your goddamn money on trainin’? I was (select one – in duh army/grandpa taught/in JROTC/) and they taught me how to shoot. I won’t larn nuthin from that play soldier crap anyway. I knows how to shoot, boy…just because you’ve been to 20 classes in the last three years don’t mean you’re better than I am.
Yup. One cost of unrestricted freedom of speech (a price I willingly will pay) is that every dumbass in the world can run his mouth publicly, and with the net, our opponents can seize on the dumbest shit ever to dribble from a TOSer’s mouth and use it as an example of us all.Probably 100 or more people who have black rifles make statements on the errornet daily that are equal or worse as what Zumbo said.
Don't think T's don't use AK's or AR's?> Watch the news. Think tah all who own them are pure and homest and take long walks on the beach? Not hardly.
Colonel Cooper had it right, years ago. There is no such thing as a good gun or a bad gun. When the shooter is respectable, so is his weapon. When he is not, neither is his weapon.
Unfortunately, the way I see it is that we are winning some individual battles, but overall we are most definitely losing the war. Ignorant sheep outbreed more preferable types by a huge ratio, and their votes are just as good as ours. We are fighting a rearguard action.
I often tell like minded friends that in 20 years, we are going to look back on now as the good old days.
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) do not think twice about letting a law abiding citizen have whatever toys they can afford, even if it's better than what the LEA has! 
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