The term “gun control” means different things to different people. It’s a hot topic, triggering (pun-intended) political discussion. It’s not going away any time soon.
We’re pro gun-control. Let me explain.
For us, real gun control means the owner has complete control over the access, storage, and mastery of the usage of their firearm. We support gun owners and gun rights, but we also want them to stay in the right hands and prevent accidents. We like it when the good guy has the gun.
“I have a very strict gun control policy: If there’s a gun around, I want to be in control of it.” - Clint Eastwood
Lives Are at Stake
According to the Gun Violence Archive, in January of 2019 there were 128 unintentional shootings. Of that list, 32 people were killed, and 89 people were injured. That’s a lot of people. Many of them children.
Be cautious about the hype of gun-control activists. Accidents associated with firearms are on the decline. Child deaths as a result of firearms peaked in the late 70’s/early 80’s time frame. But since they’ve gone down significantly. But we still have to keep an eye on these numbers, especially when it comes to guns in the home.
According to CNN, the rates have started to increase again for accidents involving children, nearly doubling over the past decade from 0.36 per 100,000 children ages 1 to 4 to 0.63 per 100,000.
That’s still a low rate, but it’s worth taking note of, and exploring why it’s increasing so we can help address this problem. It’s likely because the proportion of owned firearms are increasingly handguns, verses long guns, which are less prone to be treated like a toy and result in an accident.
It’s About Taking Personal Responsibility
I knew a man who always told his somewhat wild son: “Son, if you don’t learn to control yourself, someone else will.”
When these accidents occur, it opens up the door for more government regulation and infringement on gun rights. One person’s negligence costs many their freedoms of responsible gun ownership.
We want to be part of the effort to improve gun safety. It starts with mindset, and continues on into proper handling, decision making, and safety practices. You understand, control and limit the who-what-where-when-why variables. And when you know how to do that, gun accidents are minimal, if not non-existent.
Only about 27% of police offers have ever fired their weapon on the job. They’re trained to de-escalate situations, and use their firearm as a last resort. Just having it on them gives them the upper hand in an altercation. They can use their firearm to protect themselves and others without ever firing it.
This isn’t the Wild West, and we’re not Yosemite Sams!
Should You Own a Firearm?
It depends. That’s right, we’re not in support of sticking a gun in every single person’s hands. Some people are not ready, responsible, or committed enough to handle a firearm. Firearms are something you should spend time mastering and hope you never have to use.
You should be committed to spending regular time at the range, not only aiming and firing, but loading, unloading, cleaning, and reacting to malfunctions. When you’re proficient with those skills, you can trust yourself to handle your firearm in a responsive situation. You don’t want to have to think about what you’re doing – it needs to be automatic actions for your brain.
How Can NHFT Help?
We want people to be able to defend and protect themselves, their home and their family. Firearms are a great tool to accomplish that. We also want them to be physically and mentally equipped to control and use them. So far, no gun accidents have ever occurred by anyone trained by North Harford Firearms Training. And we want to keep it that way.
A quick testimonial:
“I unlearned a ton, and learned great safety and gun techniques to help me a better gun owner. Very engaging and focused. some in the training went from "never shot before" to "safe and accurate" (a totally beat us all!). I highly recommend Tim and Mike! worth every penny.”
– Garry Wilson, December 15, 2018
Check out our upcoming courses and be sure to sign up and bring your spouse, friend or adult child.
Our Qualifications
Instructors at NHFT are certified as Qualified Maryland Handgun Instructors, NRA Certified Instructors in Rifle and Pistol disciplines, Certified Utah Concealed Firearms Permit (CFP) Instructors, Certified NRA Range Safety Officers and ALiCE Certified Instructors for active shooter response. We are also Recognized Educational Partners with the Committee for Tactical Emergency Casualty Care (C-TECC). With almost 10 consecutive years of scenario based, live fire training at the Academic Training Facility, our instructors have acquired much of their education and experience from military and law enforcement instructors. Our broad range of training experience includes dynamic room entry, hostage rescue, force on force training (shoot house and urban defense, precision rife and advanced pistol, carbine and shotgun training.
