Safety is the centerpiece of the often heated debates, whether handling firearms or to the public. Unfortunately, the rift in ideological perspectives usually resides in constant exposure to guns and the blind, unrealistic, utopian altruism of societal norms. Those with little exposure to firearms, either personally or professionally, are the most vocal opponents to personal ownership and use of firearms. At the same time, those exposed in their formative years or who handle them regularly are the most prominent advocates.
My grandfather taught me how to shoot at age six, and I received supplemental training from the Boy Scouts and the U.S. Army. Because of my knowledge and experience, I have been teaching others how to shoot and, more importantly, firearms safety for at least the last two decades. I, admittedly, have a cognitive and perceptual bias on the subject, but I will try to remain objective in my analysis. Still, I wanted to use this article as an opportunity to highlight some of the logical fallacies and intellectual dishonesty that revolve around the divergence between gun control and gun rights advocacy.
“This is My Safety, Sir.”
There are four basic tenants of firearm safety that can often provide a visual cue on whether someone is “trained” or “untrained” in firearm use. First, treat all firearms as if they are loaded. Second, keep your finger off the trigger (and out of the trigger well) until you have identified your target and are ready to fire. Third, do not point your weapon at anything you do not intend to shoot. Finally, know your target and what is in the foreground, next to, and behind your target. I want to break each of these down and put them into proper context in the gun control versus gun rights and trained versus untrained discussions.
I will skip the first fundamental because the second principle – keeping your finger off the trigger – is usually the immediate and most visually demonstrative of an individual’s familiarity and exposure to firearms. The first indicator that someone has received proper firearms training is that you will almost always see their index/trigger finger is straight and outside the trigger well. Recent viral photos of Taliban insurgents after they seized Kabul showed numerous fighters practicing this safety measure. While not necessarily a common practice within the group, it did show these men had some form of formal training (another topic for a different day). Conversely, there have been countless pictures taken of gun control advocates, especially politicians, who, while holding up a weapon for their campaigns, have their fingers firmly wrapped around the trigger, often acting otherwise unsafely at the same time.
For example, Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA), during a 2012 Bay-area gun control event, was photographed holding an AK-47 with a drum magazine inserted and her finger on the trigger and the barrel oriented towards others alongside her. Similarly, a prosecutor for the Kyle Rittenhouse trial, Thomas Binger, during a demonstration in court pointed the weapon at people in the gallery and allegedly the jury as well, also with his finger on the trigger, although, thankfully, no magazine inserted. Finally, members of the “Rust” film crew have alleged that the scene when actor/producer and gun-control advocate Alec Baldwin’s negligent discharge fatally shot the cinematographer and wounded the director did not call for him to pull the trigger. It is rare for a gun to fire if the trigger is not depressed, and some mechanical failure almost always causes those types of accidental discharges. This item brings me to the third fundamental (do not worry, I will get to Number One).
Not pointing a weapon, loaded or allegedly unloaded, at anything you do not wish to shoot should be the most common sense fundamental on the list. But, unfortunately, common sense is no longer a common virtue. As demonstrated in the previous examples, prominent gun-control advocates unsafely “flagged” – pointed the barrel at – bystanders they had no intention of shooting. The most egregious in principle was Thomas Binger, an experienced assistant district attorney, who was prosecuting Kyle Rittenhouse in part for reckless use of a firearm. But, of course, the more inexcusable act was Alec Baldwin negligently shooting his photography and film directors when usual film safety standards require a five to ten-degree offset or other more significant safety protocols put into place. [A little shameless self-promotion, I wrote another article delving deeper into this incident; you can view it here]. Keeping to this principle is in line with the first rule, treating all firearms as loaded.
I cannot recall the number of times after a mission or coming off the firing line at the range I have checked, double-checked, and (thanks to my TBI) even triple-checked my weapon to ensure I had adequately unloaded it. I drummed into my soldiers and those I was instructing in firearms; when in doubt, recheck it. This fundamental was at the heart of the “Rust” shooting. To briefly recap the incident, the assistant director handed Baldwin a prop revolver and stated it was “cold,” indicating that it was clear of any ammunition, blank or live (which should never be on a movie set, period). Unfortunately, the novice armorer, the assistant director, or Baldwin never checked the weapon to verify that the cylinders were empty. As a result, a live round from earlier recreational use was still in the revolver resulting in the fatal shooting. Numerous actors and film production professionals have since stated publicly that these actions were aberrant to industry-standard safety practices and “insane.”
In the Binger and Feinstein examples, circumstances were a bit different but no less ignorant and unpardonable. Even though numerous people checked the weapon Binger was handling before his demonstration, he should have oriented the muzzle in a safe direction, away from people. He should have done so under the assumption that unpredictable events happen in life, and a live round may have made its way into the chamber. Similarly, Feinstein used the rifle as a photo-op prop and a high-capacity drum magazine inserted for effect. Again, it is likely that many people had cleared the weapon before the publicity stunt. Still, there is always the chance of unforeseen events leading to a dangerous and unpredictable situation. Regardless, the evident lack of proper training and firearm safety awareness demonstrated in these three instances led to the unsafe actions of these individuals.
Finally, know your target and what is in the foreground, around, and behind your target. Thankfully, this fundamental does not often apply to public statements or positions of those ideologically opposed to gun ownership; however, it has occasionally come up in discussions. The most well-known was when now-President Joe Biden declared his shotgun was more effective than an AR-style platform because you use it to shoot through your door to deter criminal trespassers and assailants. Unfortunately, even trained individuals occasionally fall victim to tunneling situational awareness during times of heightened stress. An example of this was a Louisville, KY police officer who was terminated and criminally charged for recklessly firing into an apartment. The incident occurred during a raid where other officers making entry killed Breonna Taylor after receiving fire from her boyfriend. In all these cases, save the very last one, the lack of knowledge and understanding of even the most basic safety fundamentals by the most vehement gun critics should warrant their distrust by the public in anything firearms-related.
I will close this section and caveat my arguments that even trained individuals become complacent and make egregious mistakes, such as the Breonna Taylor case above. For example, I have seen law enforcement officers and military service members load magazines upside-down, backward, or both, put optics on the wrong way around or in non-functional places or rest a body part on the muzzle as a rest. I even witnessed a field grade officer fire five rounds into a clearing barrel because he did not realize a loaded magazine was in his pistol. Complacency kills or at least presents unnecessarily unsafe conditions that trained individuals can easily avoid. However, these incidents are far more infrequent and immediately ridiculed and condemned by the firearm-using community. Familiarity and proper training can mitigate a majority of the ignorance that leads to safety violations, injury, and death from firearms.
“If You Can Walk the Walk, You Can Talk the Talk”
Proper use of weapon terminology and jargon is another quick, surefire way to tell someone’s level of firearms training. For example, when someone says “clips” when referring to magazines or calls a .223 caliber or 5.56mm round, high-powered or large caliber, one can rightfully assume they are woefully ignorant about firearms. Likewise, the term “assault rifle” is an equally disingenuous and low-information characterization of modern sporting and military-style rifles. Similarly, there is a gross lack of understanding within the public forum of what “semi-automatic” means, referring to how the weapon cycles and requires the operator to depress the trigger with each shot. Then some statements dive deep into the absurd and unapologetically uninformed, either by design or out of sheer ignorance.
The most glaring example of this was CA state senator Kevin de Leon’s word salad when trying to describe a “ghost gun” – an untraceable firearm – he was holding [safely] during a press conference. “This weapon is a ghost gun. This right here has the ability, with a thirty caliber clip, to disperse thirty bullets within half a second. Thirty magazine clip within half a second.” Even my Grammarly program found many problems with de Leon’s statement, much less almost anyone with a rudimentary knowledge of firearms.
Then there is this gem from Rep. Diane DeGette (D-CO 1st). “If you ban them in the future, the number of these high-capacity magazines is going to decrease dramatically over time because the bullets will have been shot, and there won’t be any more available.” Finally, ADA Binger again showed his ignorance of firearms when he incorrectly asserted that hollow-point ammunition explodes upon entry when, in reality, they expand on impact. Judge Bruce Schroeder had to correct him on the record and was irrelevant to the case as Rittenhouse had used full metal jacket rounds in his weapon that night. A prosecutor versed in firearms would have known that and was likely a little bit of both court theatrics to sway a jury and legitimate ignorance.
There are dozens more of these to choose from to demonstrate the lack of firearm knowledge, especially among those who wish to regulate and limit them more strictly. Unfortunately, there is little to dispute or counter these ridiculous and outrageous statements beyond knowledgeable individuals and groups pointing them out. Still, it rarely has a significant impact on public perceptions. Many people unfamiliar with firearms will accept and parrot these kinds of ludicrous assertions, either out of fear, ignorance, or misplaced trust in public officials. Even citing data and statistics can be futile because unscrupulous ideologues can manipulate the findings to exploit an unknowing populace.
“98% of All Statistics Are Made Up.”
A relevant quote from Mark Twain comes to mind related to gun violence data and statistics. “Facts are stubborn, but statistics are more pliable.” Statistics drive gun control narratives, but often the findings are misleading, misrepresented, or sensationalized. For example, in 2020, there were 113 school shootings. Still, of those, the Center for Homeland Defense and Security only classified one as an “active shooter” – someone actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill others in a populated area. The rest occurred or involved school property, usually after school hours, and many times unrelated to students or student activities. However, a person would not know these facts without looking at the data themselves or examining what was considered a “school shooting.”
Similarly, there is actual homicide by firearm statistics that ideologues and media pundits rarely convey accurately to the public. For example, in 2019, mass shootings (three or more victims) accounted for 0.2% of all firearm-related deaths, including those from suicides, unintentional, undetermined, or legal intervention. There are other forms of data manipulation similar to the example in the preceding paragraph. An example of this is the inclusion of other mass killings that do not involve firearms, such as vehicles, melee weapons, or improvised explosive devices. In this instance, the recent parade attack in Waukesha, WI, would be considered a mass killing incident and has the potential for gun control advocates to include it in mass shooting statistical data. Gun rights advocates have often researched relevant statistics, and trained individuals generally understand the proper context behind the data. Unfortunately, to the untrained, shootings are shootings, and the hows and whys are irrelevant and are exploitable by gun control ideologues.
“Lock and Clear Your Weapons, and Proceed to the Base of the Tower For Your Score”
In conclusion, the American people often have a knee-jerk reaction any time there is a newsworthy shooting incident, especially when it involves kids or schools. Dwayne “the Rock” Johnson has declared he will no longer use working prop firearms on any of his film productions, with another few Hollywood producers indicating they will follow suit after the “Rust” incident. Similarly, the shooting at an Oakland County, MI, high school yesterday [November 30, 2021] will undoubtedly reignite more fervent calls for stricter gun control measures using incomplete or distorted statistics, logical fallacies, and intellectually dishonest arguments.
Consequently, gun rights advocates and trained professionals who use firearms regularly should counter these emotion-driven responses with timely and accurate information and calls of their own for more extensive familiarization and safety training starting at an early age. Only through education, awareness, and honest discussion can Americans begin to combat the false narratives regarding firearms and gun violence to better focus on the cultural and societal issues that lead to incidents like on the set of “Rust,” the Oakland County shooting, and other firearm-related incidents.
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This first appeared in The Havok Journal on December 3, 2021.
Ben Varlese is a former U.S. Army Mountain Infantry Platoon Sergeant and served in domestic and overseas roles from 2001-2018, including, from 2003-2005, as a sniper section leader. Besides his military service, Ben worked on the U.S. Ambassador to Iraq’s protective security detail in various roles, and since 2018, he has also provided security consulting services for public and private sectors, including tactical training, physical and information security, executive protection, protective intelligence, risk management, insider threat mitigation, and anti-terrorism. He earned a B.A. and an M.A. in Intelligence Studies from American Military University, a graduate certificate in Cyber Security from Colorado State University and is currently in his second year of AMU’s Doctorate of Global Security program.
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