Enough, people. This is just getting silly.
I was at work the other day, and a twitchy fortyish guy in a Polo shirt walked over to me, brandishing an AK-47.
“Can you show me how to work this?”
“First off, watch the muzzle! Is there something wrong with it?”
“No, I just don’t know how to use it. Can you show me?”
At this point, I was tempted to say, “no…for that you need the proper mindset and a great deal of training, neither of which you’re going to get in five minutes.”
Instead, I gave him a quick run-down, making damn sure he didn’t load the thing. It was obvious he had never handled a gun before in his life. I asked him why he’d chosen that particular gun. His response was, “because Obama’s going to take it away.”
That’s not a reason, gang.
(For that matter, why buy something if you’re certain it’s going to be taken away anyhow?)
He’s never going to load his rifle, much less shoot it. He’ll have it for less than a year, at which point the wife will say, “why did you buy that thing, anyway? Get rid of it!” And he will, at quite a loss.
Really…does he think he’s going to use it to hold off the Sturmabteilung when they show up to trample the ferns and kick his puppy? The AK-47 is what it is: a short-range, inaccurate, low-powered rifle. He doesn’t hunt, and he’s certainly not interested in target shooting if he’s buying Eastern Bloc crap.
If he’s speculating on future value under the very slim possibility of another Assault Weapons Ban, he’s in for a nasty surprise. They didn’t go up that much during the Ban, and they promptly dropped in price following the sunset in 2004. There are really better ways to invest money.
So, why did Mr. Polo Shirt buy an AK-47? The answer is, he doesn’t know.
Unfortunately, we live in an age where long-term thinking has gone out the window. The average person’s attention span is six seconds, and they’re raised to go through life operating on conditioned reflex and impulse. Our friend saw or heard something, on the news or through a coworker who “knows guns,” and that knee jerked like crazy.
Sorry to sound cynical, but I saw this same behavior a week before Y2K. Thousands of people purchased (overpriced) generators and enough canned goods to feed a small country in a weird rush akin to the behavior of lemmings on speed. And all that for an apocalypse that never happened. This is no different.
I see folks buying 2 AK-47’s, an AR-15, and a Kel-Tec carbine in one sitting, then getting “just enough ammo to fill the magazines.” Then they need help finding the mag release.
Farnham’s right: if you’re not already prepared, now is too late. If you expect to need a rifle in the near future, this is what you should be doing:
- Getting a good rifle in the first place
- Making sure it works
- Making sure you can shoot it well
- Getting plenty of spare parts
- Stockpiling ammo
The problem is, most people are stopping at step one, if they even get that far. For those who really want to do it right, I’ve got some bad news: instructors are overwhelmed with new shooters, and the supply chain for several types of weapons and ammunition is drying up under the demand.
I’ve said it so many times it sounds like a broken record: this isn’t something you can learn in ten minutes, and screwing it up can get someone killed.