A self-described liberal gun owner posted on Reddit in recent days. While I would have ignored it, he identifies himself as from the Chicago suburbs. Okay, I’ll bite.
If you can’t read the screen capture, here’s the text from the post:
father with 3 and twins toddler total 5 I know is a lot lol , and my wife is so worried about having a gun in our household but she finally came to sense after our 47 president elected and so many crazy things happening in our country. She said I could own a gun if I take a gun safety lesson. Are there any places or liberal gun safety courses , Gun range and Gun store near like in the hills IL ? We just moved at suburb from Chicago 4 years ago. Thanks so much,
First of all, sir, welcome to the gun owner fraternity. Sounds like you AND your wife could benefit from some formal coursework in shooting and gun safety. I’m pretty sure if she learned how guns work and how to safely load, unload and shoot a gun (or multiple types of guns), her anxiety levels around guns would dissipate dramatically.
But you have to be open-minded enough to seek out help.
As far as you wife’s “come to Jesus” moment after Trump’s third election, I can’t help you there. I suppose that’s better than a thug robbing you of your car or your wallet. Or shooting you dead for your phone.
SPOILER ALERT: It’s not America’s gun owners that are a threat to you, her, me and the rest of America’s families. It’s gangs.
It’s not gun violence, it’s GANG violence.
You can take some classes in the burbs, but range time is expensive so you don’t get much at most classes. If you venture down south, I can recommend a couple of schools that will do very well for you.
Story time: A gent name Patrick brought his lovely bride to one of our classes many years ago. During introductions, she claimed he promised her a vacation to Hawaii if she tagged along to class.
She was the principal for an elementary school and terribly scared of guns. She wouldn’t allow Patrick to have guns at home until he took a class.
Mrs. Patrick barely kept it together for the dry-fire component of the class ahead of lunch. After firing her first couple of shots, she retired from the line sobbing and shaking with fear.
Our team took turns trying to console her.
We got some dry fire time in with her later in the afternoon. Thank heavens for having a bevy of instructors where we could send a couple to work with this woman.
The next morning she came an hour early and worked with one of the instructors she liked the best. He had her shoot a .22 revolver. He might have even provided some .22 short ammo.
She didn’t successfully complete the class but she did a little bit more shooting with center-fire pistols later in the day. We beat ourselves up because until that point, we’d never had someone so intimidated by guns fail to complete the course because of their fears. We worked hard to bring her around, too.
So I ran into Patrick at a gun show about six months later. “How’s it going with the wife?”
He laughed. “She bought her first gun… a revolver, just like you recommended.”
Outstanding.
A year later I got another update. Not only had she bought a second gun, but she had started taking a couple of the teachers from her school out to the range, showing them the ropes. And she was looking for her first semi-auto.
“Oh my gosh. That’s beyond great!”
Sometimes what you thought was a failure at teaching was really just a seed that didn’t germinate right away.
Yeah, there are classes out there that can help. There are a few really good instructor teams that can do great work. But people need to be willing to come with an open mind about learning.
The woman in the featured photo above? She too was terrified of guns. But she came with an open mind. Adrienne learned and felt a sense of empowerment that she had never felt before. Suddenly she didn’t need her husband to ward off an attacker. She could do it herself.
She sought more training. She practiced, took more classes and became not only confident around guns, but competent and then some.
After more training, she decided to become an instructor to help others, especially women, gain those powerful feelings of empowerment.
She knows she can protect and defend her family, including her three daughters. Now she’s teaching other women to do the same.