This is just amazing.
Over the fifty years that I have had guns in my house, I have shot off a gun accidentally at least seven times. One round went through the front door and out into the street. Another time I knocked a stack of books off a wall. A third time, my twenty-year old son picked up my 45-caliber pistol and blew a hole through our storage shed. Did I ever take the gun-safety course? I teach the friggin’ course.
Read that again if your Jaw isn’t agape!
Yes, Mike was (still is?) an NRA Certified instructor, and in his hey day was making good money running the NRA Basic Pistol course that is MANDATORY for somebody to get a Mass LTC which is the Massachusetts permit to OWN a gun…..and sometimes to carry, despite the fact that it stands for “License to Carry”.
And he’s admitting to SEVEN NEGLIGENT discharges in 50 years….
Ok first to be fair, I have had Three unintentional discharges in the approximately 20 years I’ve been shooting. Two were straight-up negligent discharges. The first was before I even owned guns, and was still living in Maine. I was still very green, and I was shooting a .22 caliber pistol with friends in a sand pit. I thought the slide had locked back and dropped forward when I pulled the empty magazine. Thinking the gun was unloaded I pointed the gun at the ground and pulled the trigger to drop the hammer. **BANG** It was scary, and it wasn’t good….but it was a hot range, and everybody even still had on their ear protection.
The Second was not long after I bought my first gun in Massachusetts. I was at my club and somebody noticed my 1911 and wanted to see it. I stopped shooting, and dropped the magazine and showed him the finer points of it, including how the grip safety works. I showed him how if I didn’t have a proper grip the trigger was blocked and the hammer would not fall….but a proper grip and **BANG** Shit. we were handling guns and ammo so the range was hot. The gun was always in a safe direction so the round went into the berm, we were talking and the only ones on the range, so no ear pro, that sucked…and well the whole thing sucked, I was mortified, but nobody was hurt and we knew where the round went, so that was the end of that.
The third incident was an honest-to-God ACCIDENTAL discharge (unlike what Mike calls “Accidents”) I was shooting a friend’s custom Bullseye 1911. It had all sorts of work done on it, and a trigger pull that allegedly was 3lbs, but it felt like 14 OUNCES. I took the gun up to the firing line with the action open, inserted a full magazine, and grabbed the slide and racked a round into the chamber…. **BANG** WOAHHHH!! My finger was off the trigger! Again, hot range, and the bullet went safely into the berm, but that was a REAL surprise. I immediately cleared the gun and took it back to the owner, who noted that my combat-style reload probably jerked the gun around hard enough that the trigger shoe got enough inertia to trip the sear, and that it would be best to load that gun by hitting the slide-stop….
That is it, Those first two Negligent discharges were within two years of each-other, and it’s been almost two Decades since them. The Accidental one was more recent, and really just something I didn’t expect at all.
All of them were learning experiences that stick with me today. When I’m working with an Unloaded gun I ALWAYS check the chamber. I’ve been known to check the chamber again IMMEDIATELY after I checked the chamber, because I didn’t give it my UNDIVIDED ATTENTION and couldn’t clearly remember the look and feel of that empty chamber….so I do it again, it only takes a second to NOT have a story to tell. Shortly after the 2nd Negligent Discharge a friend sold me a gun of his. He went into the other room and came back with the pistol and handed it to me. I first opened the action….and a round fell into my lap. He was MORTIFIED as he didn’t remember loading the gun. But This is why we always clear an “Unloaded” firearm handed to you….and generally do the polite thing of handing somebody a firearm with an open action. I recently was teaching my daughter some gun safety and we had a few unloaded guns out to look at, and as I put them all away I cleared them and showed her how to verify that they were clear….some mere seconds after I had already showed her….but if the gun is out of your control, check it again, it only takes a second!
The take away is that
#1 All Guns are Always Loaded
#2. Never point a firearm at anything you don’t wish to destroy.
#3. Never place your finger inside the trigger guard until you are ready to shoot
#4. Always be sure of your target, and what lies beyond it.
The difference between a negligent discharge and an accidental one was with the accident, I broke NONE of the rules. With the other two events I broke ONE rule (Both Rule #1 if you want to keep score) but with the other 3 being followed, no harm, except for your pride.
Now back to Mike “The Gun Guy”, he is an NRA Certified instructor and a hardcore shill for gun control and gun bans. Meanwhile he admits to AT LEAST Seven “Accidents”, and the three he lists are A) All NEGLIGENT DISCHARGES, not “Accidents” B) Seem to all have taken place in residential areas, not active firing ranges, and one he openly admits “Went out into the streets”. The Third was his adult son, who I assume should have been taught all the rules as well, and again fired into a shed….no mention of what Mike DID IN RESPONSE to his son discharging his weapon (which wasn’t properly secured, clearly), which would be an important detail in the story if I was telling it….
Not only are these stories INSANLY DANGEROUS, and blatant disregards for ALL FOUR of the above listed rules, they may also be a crime.
So yeah, Mike still owns guns, and clearly has no interest in handling them safely, despite knowing better, and will even talk about it in such a flippant manner if he feels that it is in his political interest.
But now YOU, YOU need to have your guns taken away because YOU are too dangerous, says Public Menace, Mike “The Gun Guy” Weisser.
Ironically the Anti-Gun groups LOVE Mike, because he is a gun owner, and NRA Instructor and Member who supports Bloomberg gun control. Remember this next time you hear about his appeal to Authority.
