Movies and Gun Blunders

You know what they say: You can’t believe everything you see on TV. That’s knowledge to keep in hand, for while the folks in Hollywood do have a wonderful flair for the dramatic, no one has ever accused them of being realistic.

Carrying and shooting guns is serious business. It’s crucial that every gun owner learn safe practices from the right sources—and that source does not generally include something you see in your downtown theater. Let’s consider a few Hollywood gun blunders and discuss why they’re such bad practices.

1.      Shooting without Hearing Protection!—One entertaining shooting scene comes from the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith starring Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. They’re a married couple, but each is a spy for a competing consortium. To make a long story short, they end up resolving their differences with a shootout, against each other, in their otherwise quiet suburban home. While Brad planned ahead and fought his spy-bride with a suppressed pistol, Angelina blasted away at spy-boy Brad with a 12-gauge shotgun.

You know it’s Hollywood when, after a big shootout, you never hear the characters saying, “Wait? What? I can’t hear you!” Yeah, I know, Brad and Angie wouldn’t have looked nearly so sexy wearing earmuffs and safety glasses, but that doesn’t give us real-life shooters a pass.

If you’ve ever shot indoors, it’s loud even with hearing protection. Outside shooting isn’t much better and often worse, depending on the firearm and caliber. Let’s be clear: Without hearing protection, each and every shot you endure—and this is whether you shoot on an indoor range or outside—may cause cumulative or permanent hearing loss. Always, always wear hearing protection, indoor range to pheasant field, whitetail deer stand to skeet range, .22-caliber to .50-caliber and everything in between.

Read the rest in the October 2014 National Shooting Sports Foundation First Shots newsletter!