since kids aren’t usually allowed to train with guns… were they all training with their parents before? or is it not that hard, so can any person with no expirience technically just pick up a gun and start shooting people?
(asking not 4 myself obvs, just out of curiosity)
Taught my kids the basics at 9 and 11. They need to understand the lethality of guns, what is safe and not safe, and maybe most importantly, how to recognize someone who is not being safe and get the hell away from them.
Plus, took the mystery out of the whole thing. Now they just don’t care much.
Frankly, had I been a parent and living in the US, I would have done the same. One can debate whether the circumstances that necessitate it are ideal, but as the matter stands it’s only sensible.
Denmark is, as you might expect, very different. Here, people can - and in the vast majority of cases, will - live their entire lives without ever encountering a real weapon. Certainly, it’s possible to own a gun, but obtaining a license / required insurance and meeting mandatory storage requirements is non-trivial, so only hunters, collectors and sports shooters ever bother. Collectors aside, the type of weapons favored here are also distinctly different. Shotguns used for hunting or skeet shooting are typically break-action side-by-side or over/under respectively, and hunting rifles are, well, hunting rifles - scoped bolt action. People don’t hunt with AR-15’s around here. As for sports shooters owning their own pistols, most use high quality .22LR Walther GSP’s and similar. I’ve seen a few people shoot the occasional 9mm/.45 ACP something or other and an infrequent revolver, but that’s very rare.
Practical personal defense weapons are pretty much non-existent.
Thank you for your take! American gun nuts tend to think Europeans can’t own a weapon, at all. Funny enough, what you’ve described is most of my gun collection. A dozen shotguns, mostly single shots and vintage/antiques. Loads of .22s, but my wife’s Walther .22 is a total POS! How funny is that? And yes, American hunting rifles are typically bolt-action. I think there are a couple of states where it’s illegal to hunt with an AR platform? The rounds are too wimpy for clean kills. (That’s a joke meme.)