Do you call firearms 'weapons?'

[DucDucGoo]

You can fluff it up anyway you like, but firearms are WEAPONS. You used examples like knives and baseballs, sure, they can be used as "weapons", but knives are designed as tools to cut, and baseballs were created to play a game. Guns were designed primarily to kill people, then hunt animals, and now target shoot competitively. If someone breaks into your home, do you grab your paper punching tool, or home defense weapon?

[xrMike]

Not usually. I say, "pistol", "rifle", or sometimes just "firearm".

"Weapon" has negative (violent) connotations that I do not want to imprint into others' psyches.

[DannyZRC]

You can fluff it up anyway you like, but firearms are WEAPONS. You used examples like knives and baseballs, sure, they can be used as "weapons", but knives are designed as tools to cut, and baseballs were created to play a game. Guns were designed primarily to kill people, then hunt animals, and now target shoot competitively. If someone breaks into your home, do you grab your paper punching tool, or home defense weapon?

Everything is a weapon if you are fighting, nothing is a weapon if you are not.

A loaf of bread is as much a weapon as a rifle when it is fed to a soldier.

[Mickael81]

The intent behind its use defines what's a weapon and what is not. My handgun becomes a weapon when i shoot to kill. My broom becomes a weapon when i break it in half and jab the jagged edge into somebodys gut.
The term "weapon" does carry a negative connotation (i don't think i spelled that word right).

As a Marine i called my rifle a weapon because i knew that when i shot it, the intent was to kill somebody. I called my Knife a Knife because all i ever used it for was to open MRE's.

[JOEKILLA]

I call myself weapon

[PyroFox79]

Well I call my AR Lauren, my sks Ivanka, my Chilean Mauser Veronica, my .357 Brunhilda and my Garand Anabelle. That's what I call them.

[Chris M]

No. Most of the people I know are not gun owners. I tend to choose my words carefully. By doing this, at least in part, I've been able to turn more than a few non-shooters into shooters.

Typically, I use specific terms - Rifle, Pistol, Revolver, Shotgun. When speaking generally, I use "Firearms".

The way I view it, a firearm can be used as a weapon, but it is not a weapon all the time. It is a firearm all the time. When you constantly call it a 'weapon' to non-shooters, they may think that that's all they're used for - which is far from true. I like to introduce people to the sporting aspects of firearms - whether it be target shooting, hunting, etc. I happen to be a fan of exhibition shooting. Personally I enjoy talking about some of the accomplishments of people like Jerry Miculek, Bob Munden, Patrick Flanigan, etc. I've found that many people tend to be intrigued by this non-weapon aspect of firearms, and it piques their curiosity.

[pipboy]

You can fluff it up anyway you like, but firearms are WEAPONS. You used examples like knives and baseballs, sure, they can be used as "weapons", but knives are designed as tools to cut, and baseballs were created to play a game. Guns were designed primarily to kill people, then hunt animals, and now target shoot competitively. If someone breaks into your home, do you grab your paper punching tool, or home defense weapon?

And this is exactly how the anti-gun lobby wants the general population to think in order to push their agenda. Remember when they wanted to outlaw rifles with certain characteristics? They needed to come up with a term in order to incite negativity and fear to sway public opinion. So they took a technical term, assault rifle, (which wasn't scary or negative enough) and coined the term Assault Weapon. A term which vilified features like pistol grips, detachable magazines, and collapsible stocks and would have people believe any rifle with these features served no other purpose (not sporting, not hunting, not leisure) other than to kill as many people as rapidly as possible. And voila the AWB was born...and now we have bullet buttons.

The same terminology game is happening with "high capacity" magazines, especially after the AZ incident. Never mind mags with more than 10 round capacity are actually standard with many pistols. The anti-gun lobby would like the public mindset to believe that any magazine capable of holding more than 10 rounds has sole purpose of committing mass murder. Are we seeing any parallels?

If you want to use the term weapon, or that's how you think of it, that's fine. I don't think there is a problem with using the term "weapon" in certain contexts or within the shooting community. But if you use the term exclusively, or go around using it willy-nilly all the time around non-shooters, you are actually perpetuating the anti-gun mentality/agenda to the public when instead you could be empowering the stance of the gun owning community. Just food for thought.

[707electrician]

And this is exactly how the anti-gun lobby wants the general population to think in order to push their agenda. Remember when they wanted to outlaw rifles with certain characteristics? They needed to come up with a term in order to incite negativity and fear to sway public opinion. So they took a technical term, assault rifle, (which wasn't scary or negative enough) and coined the term Assault Weapon. A term which vilified features like pistol grips, detachable magazines, and collapsible stocks and would have people believe any rifle with these features served no other purpose (not sporting, not hunting, not leisure) other than to kill as many people as rapidly as possible. And voila the AWB was born...and now we have bullet buttons.

The same terminology game is happening with "high capacity" magazines, especially after the AZ incident. Never mind mags with more than 10 round capacity are actually standard with many pistols. The anti-gun lobby would like the public mindset to believe that any magazine capable of holding more than 10 rounds has sole purpose of committing mass murder. Are we seeing any parallels?

If you want to use the term weapon, or that's how you think of it, that's fine. I don't think there is a problem with using the term "weapon" in certain contexts or within the shooting community. But if you use the term exclusively, or go around using it willy-nilly all the time around non-shooters, you are actually perpetuating the anti-gun mentality/agenda to the public when instead you could be empowering the stance of the gun owning community. Just food for thought.

This. You may as well go around calling it a child killer

[Gryff]

My competition pistols are "guns" or "firearms" because they are primarily sporting implements. My CCW pistol is absolutely a "weapon" because it serves one purpose...to be used to shoot someone should I need to defend myself.

If the primary purpose of a tool is to inflict violence on another, then it is a weapon.

[Lost.monkey]

The Marines drummed into my head that it's always a weapon, unless you cite the rifleman's prayer:

"This is my rifle. There are many like it, but this one is mine. It is my life. I must master it as I must master my life. Without me my rifle is useless. Without my rifle, I am useless. I must fire my rifle true. I must shoot straighter than the enemy who is trying to kill me. I must shoot him before he shoots me. I will. My rifle and I know that what counts in war is not the rounds we fire, the noise of our burst, or the smoke we make. We know that it is the hits that count. We will hit.

My rifle is human, even as I am human, because it is my life. Thus, I will learn it as a brother. I will learn its weaknesses, its strengths, its parts, its accessories, its sights and its barrel. I will keep my rifle clean and ready, even as I am clean and ready. We will become part of each other.

Before God I swear this creed. My rifle and I are the defenders of my country. We are the masters of our enemy. We are the saviors of my life.

So be it, until victory is America's and there is no enemy."

I've got this stuff so ingrained in my DNA, there's just no fighting it.

Besides, my kids have gotten into the habit of caling it a weapon, which puts them in a safety mindset. They say gun, and suddenly they give the weapon the same respect as their RYNO on Ratchet and Klank.

[tonytony86]

A weapon is a tool used with the aim of causing damage or harm (either physical or mental) to human beings.

A firearm to me is a machine or system. But in human society it mainly used as a weapon.

[Vanguard]

I usually use "rifle" or "pistol" but will interchange "weapon" with either of those words. Try calling your rifle a "gun" during a military marksmanship training course. That word makes instructor's heads explode when used to refer to a personal firearm vs. an artillery piece or armored vehicle main gun.

[glocklover]

It's a weapon.

[sniper5]

Depending on how my wife is shooting on any particular day I will either refer to her revolver as her "instrument of destruction" or her "Blunderbuss". She knows the meaning for both terms.