I was on social media yesterday and was reviewing a thread with an embedded video. I pulled it up and it was a fat women getting knocked one her ass by ICE. Not beaten, not shot, just knocked down when she laid hands on one. I thought it was a little silly until today. I was on another (lesser) gun forum about a point of aim issue. There was an embedded photo with another sensitivity warning and the "check that you are over 18" thing. I was curious so I clicked it. The photo was of a TARGET WITH HOLES IN IT. Not a dismembered corpse, not a "beaver shot," just a GD target with holes in it. Why, SpongeBob? I already have to state I'm over 18 to look at guns, ammunition, gun magazines, reloading equipment, and liquor ads. What the hell?

I of course cannot say why any particular sensitivity warning exists, but a few possibilities:

“Click bait” of the sort that attracts rather than discourages viewing. “Oooh: If someone has to be 18 to see it, it must be juicy. Lemme look.”

In response to actual complaints which are becoming more common all the time—largely because we as a society have allowed them to have so much influence and control over us.

The Wall Street Journal recently had an opinion piece about “suicidal empathy,” which essentially refers to the practice and habit of caring too much about what some people think and complain about, i.e., “‘maladaptively irrational altruism.’ On immigration, crime, homelessness, taxation, schooling, environmentalism and transgenderism ….”
If someone says, “Oh, I don’t want my child to see an actor smoking a cigarette,” rather than being told, “If you believe that he’s going to start smoking because he saw a TV cowboy smoking a cigarette, then you’re doing a piss-poor job of raising him, and you shouldn’t even be allowed to have children,” it’s “Oh, sorry; we’ll include a warning notice so you’ll be aware of the danger.”

And if one wants a nefarious motive, how about this: “We are doing our best to develop aversion responses in people so that they will become more likely to develop certain ideas and attitudes. If they become conditioned to the idea that a paper shooting target is something that should distress them, then they will certainly be adverse to the idea that it should be possible for people to own guns that make such targets possible.” Or rather than something specific like that (i.e., antigun attitudes), it is a way of conditioning people to believe that they are fragile and require protections by the government, big business, or other activities such as “influencers” or representatives.

Click bait plus pushing the pussification of the US populous.

I went and vented my frustration by making holes in some targets this morning. Brand new range 5 miles from the house. It's actually a state run range, and if you get a fishing or hunting license, you shoot free. The license cost me 14 bucks and is good for a year. I'm in tall cotton!

Smoking.
Flashing lights.
Anything weapon related.

Just with films or shows it’s ridiculous. If Aliens was released today, the Alien sequel, there would be a full page of warnings before the movie started.

There are ranges that won't let you use a target even vaguely humanoid-shaped.

MI DNR recently built a firing range in Sands Twp.
No silhouette targets and you must shoot your handgun through a square cutout about 18 inches wide.
The stupidity of this is astounding!

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
MI DNR recently built a firing range in Sands Twp.
No silhouette targets and you must shoot your handgun through a square cutout about 18 inches wide.
The stupidity of this is astounding!

What? Are they training you to shoot through a passenger side window? Driveby shoooting training by DNR?

I have no idea what a “MI DNR” is, but I strongly doubt that its intent with the shooting portal is training for anything. Its purpose is probably to ensure that shots are confined to a small arc of fire to help prevent them from going in bad directions. It’s really no different than rules against drawing from a holster or rapid fire.

The sad and sorry truth is that a large percentage of gun owners are not very skilled, if not just dangerously reckless. I am fortunate to have places to shoot where I’m usually alone because I am frequently appalled when I’m around other shooters.

I can sympathize with anyone who finds such restrictions inane at best as well as severely limiting, but in some ways people are lucky to have even that much.

MI DNR = Michigan Dept. of Natural Resources.

Opps. Wrong thread.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: SpinZone,

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:
There are ranges that won't let you use a target even vaguely humanoid-shaped.

They would most likely frown on my silhouettes with photo-faces - I find them quite motivating!

quote:

Originally posted by sgalczyn:
They would most likely frown on my silhouettes with photo-faces

A bit of a drift, but not too much.

According to LTC Dave Grossman (On Combat, etc.), the reason soldiers in Vietnam fired their rifles more often than soldiers in WWII was because during the Vietnam era targets were changed to sort-of humanoid silhouettes rather than the bull’s-eye targets that were commonly used for training in WWII. He believed that because the later soldiers were more accustomed to shooting at targets that had the vague outline of people, they were less reluctant to shoot at real people.

That theory has always struck me as very contrived and ignores various variables along with being based on dubious assumptions and studies. But he has written books and I haven’t (yet), so he must know more than I do about the subject—right?

In any event, I do believe that if we’re training for serious purposes, having realistic-looking targets is a benefit, if for no other reason than encouraging proper aiming. I shoot a lot of precision rifle drills, and for head shot hostage rescue practice they all use photo-realistic AI-generated images*. The most common handgun drill I shoot also uses realistic photo-type targets.

All that is another reason why I’m fortunate to not be limited to shooting ranges that have stupid rules, and my sympathies to those who are.

* A few years ago it was discovered that a law enforcement agency was using actual mug shot photos for their sniper practice, and that resulted in public outrage. Lesson? Don’t use photos of real people—not even of various ayatollahs, and certainly not of American politicians.

There's definitely something to what you said. A second reason could be that in RVN after mid '67, I think, the grunts were rocking M-16's with 20 rd mags of .223. The WW II infantry had 8 ads of .30 cal. The big war guys had fewer chances to hit and a better chance of a knockdown when they did.

And in the later conflict if you flick the giggle switch there is a certain satisfaction in lighting the whole place up and have some to spare.

quote:

Originally posted by YooperSigs:
MI DNR recently built a firing range in Sands Twp.
No silhouette targets and you must shoot your handgun through a square cutout about 18 inches wide.
The stupidity of this is astounding!

I remember in the 70’s at Proud Lake Recreation Area the rule was single round at a time. A nuisance with a revolver or a bolt action, ridiculous with a pistol or semi auto rifle.

^^ Pure Michigan...

quote:

Originally posted by wishfull thinker:

Good points that I agree with as well. If someone has less ammunition, he may be less inclined to just spray it away. There was a Bill Mauldin cartoon of Willie and Joe looking in their ammunition clip pouches, and one says, “Yeah, nothing but cigarettes.”

I was not in the infantry in Vietnam and never fired a shot “in anger,” but what I had during alerts were two bandoleers plus the magazine in my rifle: eight mags loaded with 18 rounds each and seven stripper clips with 20 rounds each: over 280 rounds for someone who was just waiting for someone to come to me. At eight rounds each, that would have required 35 M1 Garand clips.

Early on, anyway, there was much more emphasis on marksmanship in WWII, and some soldiers may have believed that if there was nothing visible to shoot at, they shouldn’t waste ammunition.

Grossman makes some interesting points in his books, but overall I wasn’t that impressed with them. (Thus endeth the thread drift.)