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Female Cigar smokers in bars...
- Thread starter Dawn
- Start date
Suppose you saw somebody walking down the street with a bathtub over his head, leading a goose on a leash.Dawn said:
Would you stop and look at him weird? (Or rather, look at him weird and then stop abruptly as you struck the car ahead of you, whose driver had done the same thing?)
Betcha would.
Curiosity is a predator's natural response to the unfamiliar. (An herbivore's natural response, on the other hand, is flight--which is what drove me nuts watching Jurassic Park III when the brontosauri came over to check out our heroes floating down the river in their boat toward the end.)
Whenever a woman chooses to do something that one normally only sees men doing, she attracts attention and curiosity--and mostly from men, because if she's pursuing a traditionally male activity, she's more than likely surrounded by mostly men. I've seen this happen in several areas:
* Women shooting guns (this is an interesting rarity, since women are generally better natural shots than men)
* Women hunting (whole different culture than shooting)
* Women racing cars (formally, I mean)
* Women flying aircraft
* Women being raucously loud and obnoxious in a group with men
The obverse, I think, is what causes women to congregate in depressingly large groups around gay men.
Barak I don't know where you get your info but women are not naturally better shots then men.Barak said:
Well at least I do not believe so. ???
I have noticed over the past 9 years that women are naturally worse shots than men. And it is extremely hard to teach them the proper technique.
Now do not get me wrong there are always exceptions to the norm. In my department we do have a couple of women who shoot rather well. But based on the whole I have seen, NO. Sometimes just getting them to sling lead down range can be a task.
Hmm. Okay, then, perhaps they're just naturally better shots than I am.crash0473 said:
Wayyy back in the dim mists of history, before I was married, before I found out that I was a gun nut, my future wife and I were out at the range with an old Marlin Model 60 of mine and a brand new Ruger 10/22 of hers. (Both of these are self-loading 22LR rifles.) My wife had never shot a firearm before, although she had played with BB guns; I had a small amount of experience.
I showed my wife how to load and charge her rifle, then left her to her own devices while I tried to figure out which way my scope was out of zero. Somebody had left a few balloons staked to the backstop 100yd away, and I was centering one of them, firing, and then trying to see the puff of dust indicating a hit. Back then, I didn't know about sandbags, or about zeroing 22LRs at 25yd or 50yd instead of 100yd, or that even the minor recoil of a 22LR was going to jar a 4x scope enough to make the puff unseeable through it. I was profligately wasting ammunition (I don't remember, but probably from the freehand position) and swearing to myself at the cheerfully unmolested balloon when my wife got her gun all ready to go.
"Whatcha doin'?" she asked agreeably.
"I'm shooting at that blasted balloon, trying to dial in this stupid scope," I grumped back.
"Which balloon?" she wanted to know.
"The pink one on the left," I said.
"Do you mean the light pink one, or the dark pink one?"
"Light, dark, I have no idea. Don't talk to me: can't you see I'm zeroing?!" (What I meant in the back of my mind, of course, was: Serious manly things are going on here--not the sort of thing a beginner would understand; certainly not a girl beginner.)
She threw the brand new, never-fired rifle to her shoulder and gazed across the open sights. "You mean that one?" she asked, firing with the characteristic little spit of a 22LR rifle.
Pop.
Argh!
"Ooh, this is fun!" she squealed. "Do I just shoot again?"
I opened my mouth to respond angrily, but she answered her own question. Spit-pop, spit-pop, spit-pop.
"Oh, I love this! Do you have any more balloons?" She turned to look at me glaring at her. "Oh--I'm sorry; did I do something wrong? What's the matter? Should I have left those balloons for you?"
Some years later, a female Indian coworker of mine expressed interest in going shooting. I was surprised, because she was a Brahman Hindu--you know, vegan, extremely pacifist, etc. I'm still not sure exactly why she wanted to learn to shoot, but she had less experience even than my wife: she had never even seen a gun fired in a movie or on TV. (She didn't watch that sort of thing, dontcha know: Brahman Hindu and all.) I took her out to the car and ran her through the safety rules and the correct operation of a handgun, and then we drove to the range while I continued the lecture and she handled the Glock 17 (full-sized semiauto handgun in 9x19mm), with a couple of snap caps (dummy cartridges) for the magazine, and asked a couple of quiet questions.
These days when I teach somebody to shoot, I generally start with the target at 3 yards; back then, I started her at the standard 7 yards. I fired two shots so that she could watch and understand what to expect, then guided her through the other 48 rounds in the box. The first fifty rounds that she had ever seen fired made a group that could have been covered by a tennis ball.
I walked out of that place shaking my head. I can do that well at 7yd if I really concentrate; but I've probably fired several dozen thousand rounds through that handgun, and more through others.
Whoof.
Finally, I have a Remington 700 heavy-barrel in 308Win (bolt-action centerfire hunting rifle) with a Shepherd Scope. I call it the Chick Magnet, because it seems that whenever I take it to the range, another strange woman shows up and asks if she can fire it. It's a little heavy for small people to shoot offhand, but from sandbags it's quite nice, and the weight makes the recoil very polite. Women seem to settle right into it and immediately shoot very well. (One of the women belonged to a fellow who was trying to teach her to shoot a cheap Chinese SKS (semiauto battle carbine), and after shooting the Chick Magnet, she told him in no uncertain terms that she wanted one like it. The Chick Magnet cost about five to seven times as much as that SKS; he couldn't seem to decide whether to be scandalized at the expense or gratified that he'd just been given permission to spend a lot of gun money.)
It seems that (at least among the folks I run with) there are a lot more women who irrationally hate and fear guns than men, but if you can get a woman actually interested in shooting (rather than forcing her to qualify in order to get a job, or something), look out, because she'll wax yer tail if you give her a chance. Sure, the woman who liked the Chick Magnet over the SKS was having trouble even hitting the paper at 25yd with the SKS, but after five or so familiarization rounds with the Chick Magnet, she was picking off one-inch lollipops at 100yd with only 2-3 rounds per lollipop. Given that the inherent accuracy of the gun itself makes for groups bigger than an inch at 100yd with the cheap military-surplus trash I was shooting that day, that's pretty impressive.
Dawn, I'll have to agree with you on that one. I'd rather fight a 300 lb man than a 110 lb woman. (oh by the way I,ve done both)???
Barak, I see what your talking about and your right. The females I have seen come to the county sheriff's office (where I work) range to qualify for their job or the police academy. Most of them do not seem very interested in firearms at all. I guess if your interested in it in the first place it does help.
We have to qualify twice a year with our service weapon and shotgun. Our service weapon is the Glock 22 (.40 cal S&W).
Barak, I see what your talking about and your right. The females I have seen come to the county sheriff's office (where I work) range to qualify for their job or the police academy. Most of them do not seem very interested in firearms at all. I guess if your interested in it in the first place it does help.
We have to qualify twice a year with our service weapon and shotgun. Our service weapon is the Glock 22 (.40 cal S&W).
Shadow
That's DON Shadow to you!
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- Jan 5, 2001
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I think women are just like men when it comes to shooting. Some folks have a natural aim and can pick up a pistol for the first time and shoot a pattern the size of a matchbook cover and others can't hit the broad side of a barn.
The first time I took my wife out to shoot was her first time holding a gun. She dropped all her rounds in center mass with my Chief Special, S&W 686 and my Browning High-Power!
The first time I took my wife out to shoot was her first time holding a gun. She dropped all her rounds in center mass with my Chief Special, S&W 686 and my Browning High-Power!
To continue with the hijack: Women have finer control of their motor skills than men. If they are interested in shooting and have had the proper site picture explained to them, they will out shoot a man 2 to 1. All bets off when both have been shooting for a couple of years, then it becomes a matter of pratice and desire. If anyone, male or female doesn't have to desire to do well no amount of pratice is going to help.
And a personal note: If you can't hit the center mass at 7 yards you shouldn't own a handgun.
Wascal
And a personal note: If you can't hit the center mass at 7 yards you shouldn't own a handgun.
Wascal
Whoops; sorry. I didn't realize I'd hijacked the thread until Wascal pointed it out, but he's right. [sheepish look]Wascal said:
...But moving right along...
Another coworker of mine in the same job, this time a small Chinese man, wanted to learn to shoot as well, even though he hated guns and was obviously scared to death of them.
He was very tentative, he tended to squeeze his eyes tight shut when he fired, and he flinched very badly. (For non-gun people, this is when you attempt to compensate for the muzzle-flip recoil of a handgun by shoving the muzzle forward and down just as you think the shot will break. In practice, you almost always anticipate the shot, so that what an onlooker observes is a pronounced depression of the muzzle just before the bang. If for some reason the gun doesn't go off when the striker falls, the isolated flinch can make you look very silly.)
He was making more gray streaks on the concrete floor of the pistol range than he was holes in the target. Part of the problem was that the guy in the lane right beside us had a shorty CAR-15 with one of those silly dual-drum 100rd magazines that he was firing steadily from as we practiced. Every time he fired, he'd generate a daylight-visible muzzle flash about ten feet long and three feet in diameter (the short barrel wasn't giving his powder charge enough time to burn; a significant portion of it was burning outside the barrel) and a terrific skin-numbing concussion that discombobulated my poor coworker even more than the prospect of holding a gun himself did.
But when we were done, his target was pretty evenly peppered with holes, and he was tremendously proud of it. When we got back to work, he showed it eagerly to everybody in the office, including the aforementioned Indian woman. Being Indian, of course, she left her own target in her desk drawer and congratulated him warmly.
I had to ask him, "This whole experience was obviously very disturbing to you, and there's no reason you had to put yourself through it. Why in the world are you so emphatic about learning to shoot?"
He told me something that really made me think. He said, "I'm Chinese. If more Chinese people knew how to shoot, Tianenmen Square never would have happened."
Hmm.
Same thing happened to my friend and his wife...
My friend and I go to the range during our lunch break, and he decided to take his wife.
He went through all the safety precautions, including how a semi works and she just sat there and quietly listened. When it was her turn to shot, she got up confidently, aimed and shot a grouping so tight... we were amazed!
And another quick story...
There is are 2 girls in my Jujitsu class who usually pair up with each other during "rolling" or sparring. Well one of the girls didn't make it one day and our instructor paired me up with her. She was 5' and about 100 lbs and very fragile looking... I tried to powerhouse her and she just glided around with a very nice technique and pinned me...
...damn... I need a cigar...
My friend and I go to the range during our lunch break, and he decided to take his wife.
He went through all the safety precautions, including how a semi works and she just sat there and quietly listened. When it was her turn to shot, she got up confidently, aimed and shot a grouping so tight... we were amazed!
And another quick story...
There is are 2 girls in my Jujitsu class who usually pair up with each other during "rolling" or sparring. Well one of the girls didn't make it one day and our instructor paired me up with her. She was 5' and about 100 lbs and very fragile looking... I tried to powerhouse her and she just glided around with a very nice technique and pinned me...
...damn... I need a cigar...
I think maybe women shoot better than men because they don't have such big heads about it.KLLRWLF said:
(Usually, I mean. I know one woman who owns a lot of guns and would like to shoot them, but who hasn't been to the range in years because she doesn't want to go alone, but for a lot of years she's talked an awfully big game, and she's a little scared that she won't exactly measure up to it in front of witnesses. She won a very nice M1 Garand with a $5 raffle ticket several years ago that she still hasn't fired even once.)
I never sparred with any of the girls in my judo class, but I did get paired up once with this little Japanese guy who was a black belt in aikido already, and was just in the class to add a judo notch to his bedpost or something. I was pretty sure I was going to get trounced even though I made almost two of him, so I was careful. Judo is all about redirecting offensive moves, and I was making hardly any offensive moves for him to redirect. He was too small to muscle me into anything, so we mostly just danced around holding each other's lapels until it occurred to me that I wasn't too small to muscle him around. I waited until he was in mid-step and then pulled him into a hip throw. He only had one foot on the ground and couldn't really move out of the way, so instead of escaping the throw he jumped for me off his remaining foot. I knew I was applying all muscle and no technique, and so I expected the throw to be pretty sloppy if I managed it at all; but he jumped and so managed to maintain a modicum of control over the throw even though he wasn't resisting it. I powered him up and over and smack into the mat, and he slapped hard at just the right instant, making an unexpected deafening BOOMMMMmmmm... and of course he had bounced back up and was right back at me before its echoes had died away. The sensei said that a throw like that would have been a full point (end of the match) if I had accomplished it, but it was pretty obvious that it was mostly the work of my opponent; so he gave me only half a point, and after a surprise like that I was pretty easy meat.
What does that have to do with cigars? Mmm, nothing. What does it have to do with women? Well, my wife has pulled that very same trick on me in a number of other venues. I 'spect prob'ly most wives have tried it a time or two.