Choosing the Right Weapon

(Short post this week, because we've got family coming for the first time in years!  Huzzah!)

Elmer Fudd © Looney Tunes

I was down at the Farmers' Market a couple of months ago, and there was a booth that the city had put up, asking people for suggestions to make downtown Sioux Falls better. I put in my two cents – we desperately need a large Central Park that everyone can use, that is quiet, not on any interstate, and has actual landscaping.  So did everyone else, including a lady who was telling every woman who stopped that "you need to empower yourself and get a gun. You will feel so safe."

Well, if you insist. I feel pretty empowered as it is.

I've never owned a gun, but I've known a lot of people who did and do. I've shot quite a variety of them myself, because in my younger days I attended dynamite parties down South, where it was quite common for people to show up with a few cases of beer, some stuff to grill, and a trunk full of firearms.

I quickly learned that I don't have the heft, the sheer mass, to use any kind of assault weapon without spraying bullets around like an old man in a barroom urinal after five beers. And some rifles have the kind of kick that leave you with a bruised shoulder (yep) and/or a cracked cheekbone (Nope – I would NEVER do the classic TV/movie/ad pose where you lean in with your face on a firearm. What, are you nuts?)

But I had good marksmanship with weapons that were more my weight. I could hit a distant target, and even a moving target, like a ping-pong ball hanging from a tree.

I also learned about shotguns – I could use one, if I aimed low and was ready to be knocked back, say, flat on my back to the ground. From that I learned that (at my weight) if you aim at someone's knees, you're bound to hit something serious as the shotgun kicks up, like their gonads, stomach, chest, or even head.

Which is why, to this day, if a woman asks me what kind of gun should she buy for self-defense, I always tell her to avoid any kind of handgun. If your hands shake (and they will, especially late at night in the dark), you're not going to hit your target, and you're just setting yourself up for worse than the whatever your assailant had planned. For home self-defense, buy a shotgun. Just racking the damn thing will scare the crap out of most people. Aim low, and you will hit something on the way up.

NOTE: One of my partners in crime, Leigh Lundin, pointed out that I really should tell people to keep a shotgun "pressed against their hipbone or thighbone to absorb shock and prevent the stock from slamming hard into the bone."  He's right.  Here's the thing, folks – if you never have fired a specific weapon you need to learn how to use it BEFORE you actually bring it home.

And I don't really believe in packing 24/7, because it gives too many people the idea that it makes them invulnerable, and they often do foolish things because of it. There are many true stories of a handgun falling out of a purse or a pocket and going off in the restroom. I know one armchair Rambo who managed to screw things up in the time of crisis and, while he survived, has never yet lived it down. Frankly, I've always found that a quick tongue or a quick run will get you out of most trouble, and I've lived in dicey neighborhoods in both LA and Atlanta. 

And I don't really feel like the karma or the cleanup from shooting someone, perhaps to death. I'm sticking to a baseball bat in the bedroom. Actually, I'm sticking to calling the police when I hear gunshots in the neighborhood (and I have), and otherwise trusting that the porch lights keep the critters away.  

So far, 100% success rate. 

Elmer Fudd with shotgun © Looney Tunes, Warner Bros.