By Nicole Demouth
In honor of the recent opening of the Michael Moore film Bowling for Columbine, I took a trip to the shooting range. This is what mature, levelheaded, arms-bearing sportsmen and women do when faced with choosing how to use their firearms.
Criminals and degenerates, who buy guns from car trunks, who are given a weapon for the first time by a partner in crime at a moment’s notice, or who are misled from the very beginning and sent on a mission to overthrow authority or any helpless individual are the ones who ruin it for the world of law-abiding gun owners. These citizens should be left to lead their lives quietly and safely like they always have.
When you arrive at the shooting range, you register and you pay. Then you take your firearm(s), carried in hard or soft cases, and you find an open table. You prepare and load; a “clear” is then called, and shooting is in progress. After a reasonable amount of shooting time, “clear” is called again for all to hear, and each shooter must answer back until all have ceased fire.
At a cease-fire, bolts are opened, bullets are taken out of the firearm and placed on the table, and nothing is to be touched until the next “clear.” If you do not comply with these rules, then you will be asked to leave.
A shooting range is not a place where the insane fire off rounds of ammunition, hollering, with a six-pack hanging from their belt. It is an organized area for target practice, whether you are a professional or amateur marksman or a hunter.
No thanks to the “Beltway Sniper,” antigun advocates have come out of the woodwork to protest firearms in America. Now that our interest is shifting back to terrorism from abroad, what do you know? Antigun advocates aren’t blaming guns in America anymore, because it might not be Americans who are doing the shooting!
Don’t blame your educated gun owners who prevent crime instead of committing it; target criminals who target you and fight back! Target individuals who have no regard for the lives around them.
If an innocent individual or group is kidnapped, tortured, and then murdered by firearm, it is extremely unfortunate. I can’t say it enough. Fortunately, there’s a great phrase out there: “Criminals prefer unarmed victims.” If you come after me, I will shoot you.
Children shoot themselves with guns they found by curiosity. My father had a firearm in our household my entire life. It was in two pieces at all times. Intelligent and skilled gun-owners know how to successfully take apart and put together their firearms when needed. They also know to keep them unloaded and locked when not in use for the safety of others.
In Bowling for Columbine, Moore chose to note the NRA convention that was held in Colorado a week after the Columbine shootings, portraying the convention as heartless and tacky. The NRA convention had every right to continue with its gathering despite the recent events, because the NRA is a legal, organized group of law-abiding citizens who gather like any other group.
They had nothing to do with a couple of high school kids who decided they were going to blow up their school after killing their classmates. Still, parents shunned the NRA and blamed their tragedy on everyone but the very criminals who caused it.
Like many people, I have been brought up to make the correct choices in life when dealing with whoever or whatever angers or interests me. When I get angry, I box. When I want to practice target shooting, I visit the shooting range. When I have an issue to debate or comment on, I write. I don’t mix the three together and wreak havoc on other citizens.
Perhaps we should take guns away and leave knives to do the killing. When knives become too much to handle, we can take them away and fight with our arms and legs. When our arms and legs do too much damage, we can cut them off; then we will finally be a nonviolent nation.
Soon after that, we’ll have to hire individuals from around the world to come into the U.S. to do our dirty work for us. Even worse, our frustrations from not being able to fight for ourselves and by ourselves may lead to the elements of mass destruction we’ve learned to fear today.
