Ever wonder why women and children are not more into shooting?

[priell3]

I know several women into shooting including my wife. Two I work with, two are neighbors. I know one that has her LTCF, several others in the process of applying.

Last week, one of our neighbors - a woman in her 70s - invited my wife to go shooting at a NRA sponsered women's event.

My son has been shooting since he was 5. That is how old I was when I learned and my female cousin who is 6 months older than I. My mother, back in her day, was a crack shot with the .22 and was better than most of us.

Last week at the range besides my son and myself I observed:

2 grandparents with a father and son shooting rimfire;
A man with his mother with a small arsenal;
A grandparent, father and two teenage daughters shooting large caliber hunting rifles;
A husband and wife (probably mid to late fifties) shooting pistol.

[The_War_Wagon]

I mean, who would invest thousands of dollars in guns and equipment, millions of hours cleaning, reloading, reading, and learning about guns and ammunition just so a sensitive person new to firearms can come along and disturb you on a winning shot you've spent years to get to at an international competition, blowing the thousands of dollars in entry fees and years of practice.

Yeah! That's what web-based gunboards are for!

[ErSwnn]

I live with 5 women, 4 daughters and a wife. They all know how to shoot, some better than others. I have taken their friends shooting and I have taken co-workers (i work in a women's drug rehab, my world is filled with estrogen) and some have taken a shine to shooting.

This whole question is akin to why aren't more men doing needlepoint. Cause we don't want to.

[Brick]

I disagree with your premise right off the bat. Nearly all of the shooters I have known were more than willing to help or instruct a newcomer. Especially among the ranks of marksmanship competitors and rifle, shotgun or pistol didn't matter.

[Dosbomber]

That aside, I tend to agree with you about there being quite a few "gun people" who are annoying. Too many that I run into try to come across as though they know everything firearm related and everyone else is a window licker.

I find a lot of these types of people at the registers of certain gun shops. Apparently these guys have nothing better to do in life but hang out at the gun shop counters and tell everyone who comes in with the intent to actually buy something how much better they shoot than you, how much better their rifles/pistols/whatever are than whatever you might have, etc. ad nauseum. If you come to the counter with 2k rounds of anything, they call you weak because apparently they can carry more. I call these guys "Gun counter gurus" and you can safely ignore anything these nitwits have to say about anything.

Find a better store that doesn't have these people.

Fortunately for me, the guys I shoot with are not such people.

Same here. Specifically, I take a vacation day mid-week and go to the range alone.
That being said, the few people I *have* run into at the ranges I've visited on such days have normally been pretty decent. Only a very few (maybe 5%) have left me with the feeling of "what a jerk".

[mpan72]

My answer is simple who wants to be around a bunch of tough talking , bad attiude "macho" jerks , If we are to preseve the second amendment those of you who are like that have to take it down a notch and make it enjoyable to shoot. I love shooting have been doing it half my life and ran into more bad then good. love the sport luke warm on the people , shooting should be about two things first and most important is safety , second should be fun. I hear alot about how "I kicked in doors for 20 years" well good for you but shooting is not all about hunting and killing there is an aspect of fun and skill in it. I am not the best shooter but when I am out at a match I gauarentee I am having more fun then 90% of you out there. There is a shooting culture that is not being adressed of the people who are just in it to have fun , not hunters not trained leo's. What most of you old mean guys don't understand is YOU ARE killing the second amendment that you hold so dear. Why does it all have to be about firefights , zombies , and hunting? What happened to shooting for the sake of shooting. BTW I am not against hunting I am against me hunting.

I don't see the same things you do. Look at this site, a few mall ninjas but for the most part decent people who shoot and like guns for many different reasons.
By the way, are you a women. (not being a smartass just curious).

[XD40coyote]

I haven't seen much of the nasty machismo at all. Aside from one old man who likes to flirt with me and get me going with dirty jokes- but that's just a thing we do when we run across eachother. He may be a lil senile though, or is just entrenched in the good ol days. One time he took a slug gun out in a parking lot and wanted me to check the scope out LOL. I told him that a parking lot isn't the place for that!

I've come across a few odd ones at the meet and greats, but hey I'm weird too!

So far I have not had any men act different or plain stupid over me being a "gun woman". However I HAVE seen men act goofy and stupid over the fact that I am a taxidermist. I've got customers who have told me that friends of theirs said they can't bring an animal to a woman, and I had some mennonite guys act all weird with me once. Not to mention the BS rumors I hear about now and then. No doubt made up by a certain male taxidermist who is just a plain ol asshole all around to begin with. Then there are the bear hunters who no-showed, and their contact- my neighbor- would not answer his phone nor return my calls. I mean like WTF?

If only we could get the men in this area to be the same with taxidermy/woman as they are with women/guns. Of course if I was some hot babe, they probably would be more willing to come over- till their wives and GF's found out.

For the life of me, I can't figure out why they think women/guns is ok, but a woman doing taxidermy is like " OMG she'll cut my balls off!" or something.

[ErSwnn]

Really...your a woman AND a taxidermist. Now come on honey, that just ain't natural. Probably the reason we had an earthquake and hurricane about a week apart.

[MDJschool]

Ever wonder why women and children are not more into shooting? My answer is simple who wants to be around a bunch of tough talking , bad attiude "macho" jerks ,

I haven't wondered, and apparently neither have you. It's obvious that we both think of politicans when we talk of "a bunch of tough talking , bad attiude "macho" jerks".

The number 1 reason for so few women and children not being into shooting is the oppression that already exists by government fiat. They talk big on crime and believe themselves to be better than the lot of us, looking to outdo one another on gun control. Both men and women compound the issue by parroting government lines on arms, so, those women and children who might be sightly more predisposed to shooting are fed mis- and dis-information from those people in a position of confidence or authority to them. They are then dissuaded.

It doesn't help that children have historically faced collateral legal and societal oppression. In schools, our children are not allow to think about guns. Where will they get their healthy appreciate for them? Not from parents and other adults who parrot the government lines and spread mis- and dis-information on guns and the law. School is also known for creating sit-down, shut-up, know-your-place automatons who should become very unlikely to do anything of value standing up against power institutions in the future. Why would shooting, for the reason of becoming proficient in arms to stand up to a tyrant, ever cross their minds? In this day in age there is even a special defense to the very idea, that allowing a student to develop the idea of overthrowing an authoritarian could make him end up shooting his teacher.

Women have also come from a historically unfortunate place, although they have less room for excuse than children. I suppose if the historical power bases didn't want them to own land, they didn't want them to be too proficient or interested in arms, either. That 'ideal' probably carries on today in the mind of some husbands, for example, who would prefer subserviance over a woman more spartan. If this notion exists, we can be guaranteed that the interest of friends, which in some cases might be a husband, will never help foment an interest in guns, as interests in so many things develop. It doesn't help that we continue to perpetrate a warrior culture to some extent where we expect men to be the sole breadwinners, fighters in war, etc. (the idea of gender roles lives strong). I'm sure the government is happy that any semblence of this continues, because it's just yet another aid in assuring the disarmament of the People.

I don't wonder so much.

[customloaded]

For the record, My wife shoots with me in IDPA, has her LTCF, and OC's with me as much as possible. She is never without her piece'(s). She loves to shoot and is attending a course at the end of September, 24 hrs of good, solid training. Gotta love a women who don't take shit from anyone, even me!

CL