>Guns are not a magical amulet that prevents harm from befalling you
I've never, ever said this. But by the same rote, fire extinguishers are not mythical devices that keep your house from burning down, bandages are not talismans that keep you from bleeding from a wound, seatbelts are not sorcerous devices that stop you from being in a car accident, etc.
Your statement is silly.
>Statistically, having a gun makes you more likely to be shot...either by yourself or someone in your household.
Statistically, owning a vehicle makes you far more likely to be in a vehicle accident. And yet, here I sit, after 40 years of living in gun-positive families, armed to the teeth, and still have never, ever been shot. Weird. It's almost like the statistics on this don't really matter.
>>Guns can and do go off when dropped. Sorry gun fans, there are many documented cases.
This is one that I want to do a test with you on. We can spend the time and money to do it together, or I can just video record it to your liking. I will go half and half with you on the cost, new or used, of ANY firearm manufactured after 1970, of your choosing. Any at all. Rifle, shotgun, pistol, revolver, you choose the make and model. I will alter a cartridge or shell of ammo, so it's just a blank - no projectile, but it will go boom if the firing pin is released from a shock. I will cycle the action so that the gun is in Condition 0 - hammer or firing pin cocked and ready to go, no safety on.
Then I will drop it 50 times on concrete surface, from 10 feet up.
Then I will THROW it down onto a concrete surface from 10 feet up. Spike that motherfucker any which way you like, pointed however you like, like a goddamn football.
Additional tests will be welcome. We can ruin the firearm, smashing it with a sledgehammer, dropping cinderblocks on it, throwing it out of a moving vehicle, dragging it behind a truck for a mile, etc. Just to give you a logically good handicap in your favor, I say we purchase a firearm that's notorious, in apocryphal tales, for "going off when dropped," like the Hi-Point C9, which is a cheap, cheap pistol with only a flimsy lever safety (that we will disengage, or even fully remove, for the test).
And after decades of experience, and yes, having accidentally dropped MORE THAN ONE firearm that was in Condition 0, I am willing to bet a fair wager that we will be unable to make the firearm go off.
The reason you get a lot of "it just went off" stories on firearms is that no gun owner, ever, wants to admit a negligent discharge. Doing so proves that they were being stupid and disrespectful of the weapon. You also get a lot of "the stop sign just appeared one day" and "my brakes must have failed" nonsense in traffic court. It's bullshit. Modern firearms, no matter how light the trigger pull, are designed to go off when you pull the trigger. Unless there's a SEVERE malfunction in the mechanisms of the firearm (which I will admit has happened in the past - Beretta had a HUGE recall on the Bersa Thunder .380 handgun when it was discovered that engaging the safety on a limited run of them could make the hammer fall and firing pin strike if a cartridge was in the chamber), no, you cannot - CAN NOT - make a gun fire by dropping it.
> but drop safety standards only apply to handguns anyway
There are no legal drop safety standards. Gun manufacturers make firearms that have specific mechanisms because, and I know, this is gonna sound odd, but they don't want to be known for making firearms that can accidentally go off.
no subject
>Guns are not a magical amulet that prevents harm from befalling you
I've never, ever said this. But by the same rote, fire extinguishers are not mythical devices that keep your house from burning down, bandages are not talismans that keep you from bleeding from a wound, seatbelts are not sorcerous devices that stop you from being in a car accident, etc.
Your statement is silly.
>Statistically, having a gun makes you more likely to be shot...either by yourself or someone in your household.
Statistically, owning a vehicle makes you far more likely to be in a vehicle accident. And yet, here I sit, after 40 years of living in gun-positive families, armed to the teeth, and still have never, ever been shot. Weird. It's almost like the statistics on this don't really matter.
>>Guns can and do go off when dropped. Sorry gun fans, there are many documented cases.
This is one that I want to do a test with you on. We can spend the time and money to do it together, or I can just video record it to your liking. I will go half and half with you on the cost, new or used, of ANY firearm manufactured after 1970, of your choosing. Any at all. Rifle, shotgun, pistol, revolver, you choose the make and model. I will alter a cartridge or shell of ammo, so it's just a blank - no projectile, but it will go boom if the firing pin is released from a shock. I will cycle the action so that the gun is in Condition 0 - hammer or firing pin cocked and ready to go, no safety on.
Then I will drop it 50 times on concrete surface, from 10 feet up.
Then I will THROW it down onto a concrete surface from 10 feet up. Spike that motherfucker any which way you like, pointed however you like, like a goddamn football.
Additional tests will be welcome. We can ruin the firearm, smashing it with a sledgehammer, dropping cinderblocks on it, throwing it out of a moving vehicle, dragging it behind a truck for a mile, etc. Just to give you a logically good handicap in your favor, I say we purchase a firearm that's notorious, in apocryphal tales, for "going off when dropped," like the Hi-Point C9, which is a cheap, cheap pistol with only a flimsy lever safety (that we will disengage, or even fully remove, for the test).
And after decades of experience, and yes, having accidentally dropped MORE THAN ONE firearm that was in Condition 0, I am willing to bet a fair wager that we will be unable to make the firearm go off.
The reason you get a lot of "it just went off" stories on firearms is that no gun owner, ever, wants to admit a negligent discharge. Doing so proves that they were being stupid and disrespectful of the weapon. You also get a lot of "the stop sign just appeared one day" and "my brakes must have failed" nonsense in traffic court. It's bullshit. Modern firearms, no matter how light the trigger pull, are designed to go off when you pull the trigger. Unless there's a SEVERE malfunction in the mechanisms of the firearm (which I will admit has happened in the past - Beretta had a HUGE recall on the Bersa Thunder .380 handgun when it was discovered that engaging the safety on a limited run of them could make the hammer fall and firing pin strike if a cartridge was in the chamber), no, you cannot - CAN NOT - make a gun fire by dropping it.
> but drop safety standards only apply to handguns anyway
There are no legal drop safety standards. Gun manufacturers make firearms that have specific mechanisms because, and I know, this is gonna sound odd, but they don't want to be known for making firearms that can accidentally go off.
Namaste, motherfucker!