So You Just Bought a Gun - Now What?
I bought a gun… now what?
Part 1: Safety!
So, you’ve decided to buy a gun — that’s great! This is the first step toward what can become a safer, more empowered lifestyle. I say can be, because a lot may not be immediately apparent that should be part of the decision to purchase a firearm.
The four rules of firearms safety:
Treat all guns as loaded.
Never let your muzzle cover anything you’re not willing to destroy.
Keep your finger off the trigger until your front sight is on an identified threat and you’ve made the decision to fire.
Know your target. Know what’s around it. Know what’s behind it. You are responsible for every round you fire.
First and foremost is SAFETY. Please don’t make the mistake of believing you’re ready to handle a gun because you’ve seen them used on the screen! The absolute first thing to remember before even putting your hand on a weapon is that it could go off — so where is that bullet going to go? Interior walls won’t stop a bullet, nor will thin sheet metal — so start thinking about what in your home will. If you’re in a house, congratulations! Open a door to the backyard and aim at the ground. Large quantities of dirt stop bullets VERY well… but what if you live in an apartment, like me?
Think of choosing the safest direction like you would think of picking just one piece of chocolate from a half-full variety box. You know you’re not going to get EVERY itch scratched, but you can make the best of the situation. First thought is the immediate room. Certainly don’t point a weapon at anyone else in the room with you. Second, consider the rest of the dwelling — i.e. don’t point the weapon at another person’s room when they’re in there. Third, consider outside of your slice of it — an exterior wall is more likely to stop a bullet than an interior wall, and a refrigerator in front of an exterior wall is better still. Start thinking along the lines of layers of protection before hitting something you care about. Personally, I put my body armor in front of my gun safe — I figure that’s as much metal as I can get in front of the muzzle, and will probably be overkill when it comes to stopping a pistol round…but you can’t be too careful.
Once you’ve got your safe direction figured out, the next step is how to treat the weapon. The four rules of gun safety are part of a system of thinking, as opposed to a checklist, as they overlap in many ways — because if one rule gets violated, the others keep what can be a merely embarrassing, or damaging to property, oversight from being catastrophic (i.e. loss of life or damage to people).
Rule #1: Treat all guns as loaded.
This is the foundation of all safe weapons handling. The longer you’re around guns, and gun people, the better your odds of running into “But it’s not loaded!” guy. This individual is terrifying, because they’re relying on “I’m pretty sure” to ensure their safety. Once they’ve decided the gun is empty, they’ll put their finger on the trigger, look down the barrel, spin it on their finger, you name it — essentially treating the gun like a toy rather than the lethal instrument it is. Instead of being that (universally despised) person, think of the gun this way: Don’t do anything with it unloaded that you would regret doing loaded, with the one exception of dry firing the weapon, which we’ll cover later. To be a little more specific — don’t point empty guns at people. Don’t press the trigger unless you’re certain your sights are on something you want to shoot. Pay attention to what you’re pointing it at. Your attitude toward the gun should not change just because you’re holding an ‘unloaded’ weapon. The benefit of this is simple — if you’re ever wrong about the gun being unloaded, and do something unsafe, you’ll have to deal with those consequences for the rest of your life.
Rule #2: Never let your muzzle cover anything you’re not willing to destroy.
Imagine, if you will, a laser coming out of the barrel of your weapon. That laser is able to burn anything it comes in contact with. Would you point the weapon at a friend, family member, or priceless family heirloom? Of course not. Think of the muzzle of the weapon exactly that way. The thought behind this rule is that all firearms are mechanical devices, and while it’s exceedingly unlikely for them to fail, it’s not impossible- so keep the weapon oriented in such a way that if the complex series of unlikely mechanical and individual failures were to happen in such a sequence that the weapon does go off… it’s okay, because the bullet is going in a non-lethal direction.
Rule #3: Keep your finger off the trigger until your front sight is on an identified threat and you’ve made the decision to fire.
Rule three is like graduating from counting to addition and subtraction — following the other two rules allow you to start thinking of firing the weapon, given you’re already treating it like the lethal instrument that it is. Now, you’re starting to think of it as a tool for a task — so let’s start talking about the task! When you’ve properly aligned the sights, it’s time to start pressing the lever to make the thing go off — so don’t touch the trigger until then! Simple, common sense. Leave the trigger alone — or, as my uncle used to put it, ‘Keep your booger hook off of the bang switch until such time as it’s appropriate to shoot.’
Rule #4: Know your target. Know what’s around it. Know what’s behind it. You are responsible for every round you fire.
This is both the simplest rule in that it only requires looking at something, but also the most complex under stress. At a shooting range, it’s incredibly simple — don’t shoot anywhere but your target, right? Let’s take that a step further. What if the lane next to you is shooting a bullseye target and the center of your target is shot out? Let’s also assume that their target is just a little farther away than yours — maybe 10 yards, instead of your seven yards. The left side of your target has a really tempting 8 — where will the bullet go once it goes through your paper? If the bullseye shooter is on your left, your round might pass through your target and go into theirs! In our example here, the shooter next to you is just confused by having fired 10 shots but having over 20 holes in their target because of your unintentional assistance.
What if you’re using the weapon in a more life and death scenario? Going back to our discussion of safe direction, you need to consider not just where your threat is, but where other things don’t need to be shot are — like people, pets, and so on. A commonly used term for this is ‘backstop’, meaning what’s behind your target that’s going to stop the bullet if you either penetrate the target completely, or miss. Aiming at a threat between you and an exterior wall of your home is far better than firing at one between you and your child’s bedroom.
These rules are designed to be redundant and make sure that if one of the four is violated accidentally, the other three will keep the violation from becoming worse than it could be. Any unintended discharge of the weapon will have consequences — be it from mechanical fault or violating one of the four rules herein — so let’s make sure that the worst part of the experience is some ringing in your ears and a sudden need to change your shorts. Those are survivable — and you can learn a lesson to apply another day.
Thanks for reading, and please consider further study and training with vetted instructors!
