Do you own a firearm?

I guess perhaps that's true. I grew up in a small midwestern town where mine was pretty much the freak family for not owning a gun. I've never owned one myself, but I've fired em more times in my life than I could possibly quantify via friends, cousins, uncles, summer camps, etc. The idea of a life spent in the U.S. without even seeing guns seems fairly unimaginable to me.

 

Unimaginable to a lot of folks in Baltimore too.

 

I guess I've probably seen them during 21-gun salutes, like at the Fourth of July parade.

 

Don't police carry guns in your gated community, Dick? Geesh, gimme a break. Of COURSE you've seen guns in person your whole life. Every American has.

 

These are my thoughts exactly. I'm too nervous around guns to own one, but I have no problem with responsible people having them for hunting or protection or collecting.

 

I own two, a rifle and a shotgun, that I inherited from my grandfather after he passed. I don't even have bullets for the rifle (partly because .22 ammo is impossible to find and partly because my wife doesn't want ammo in the house). If they weren't bequeathed to me, I wouldn't have need, otherwise, to own a gun.

 

Geez, so far in the voting, I am the only shotgun owner. They are the ultimate household self defense weapon. In close quarters, you can blow a hole the diameter of a grapefruit, clean through someone. Awesome. Plus, if you have a pump action one, it can scare the crap out of whoever is in your house to hear that pump action click click.

OK, Spartan Squad just says he is a second shotgun owner. Good to have company!

 

The combo votes might include shotguns. Mine did, tough to go duck hunting with a pistol or rifle.

 

Would be interested in another category. Permit to carry gun or just own and keep in home.

 

I don't own a firearm, but keep an airsoft pistol next to my bed in case I need to chase off an intruder.

I shot pistols and rifles years ago and plan to take my son shooting at a range for his upcoming 18th birthday.

 

We have two -- a .38 revolver and a .22 Derringer -- that my mother in law gave to my wife years ago.
We'll take them to the country during some family gatherings, and sometimes other family members will bring theirs, and we'll turn the pasture into a shooting range. That's the only time I've shot ours. I've learned enough about them to know how they work, how to load and unload them safely, and feel comfortable with them.
Or, comfortable with the revolver, at least. It's easy and relatively safe to load, unload, handle and shoot. Less dangerous than most power tools, really. The Derringer scares the hell out of me. It's small and awkward to handle, doesn't always fire when you pull the trigger, and doesn't have a trigger guard (so that your finger is essentially on the trigger from the moment you pick it up, unlike other handguns where you don't have to put your finger on the trigger until you shoot). I like to shoot it once in a while just to practice, but I'm terrified of the thing.

 

I grew up in the northeast, and I'm not sure I ever saw a gun "in the wild" until adulthood. I think the only ones I ever saw were on the hips of police officers. Even BB guns, which were banned in my home state, were a rarity. Hunting was a thing back home, but my family didn't do it so we didn't have any rifles around or know anyone who did. The nearby bigger city was rather violent, and has gotten worse since I moved away, but our section of suburbia was quiet.
As much as I support gun rights, I'm kind of glad for it, too. Some of my friends growing up were the kind of idiots who probably would've killed someone playing around with a gun if they found one in the house. Young and stupid, with delusions of invincibility and no comprehension of future consequences.