Why Weapons

I'm at the beginning of what I hope to be a lengthy process: teaching my girls how to fence, shoot a bow and arrow, use a knife, shoot a gun, and whatever else they want to learn. If I can keep their interest and teach them to be safe, it could be the start of some lifelong hobbies for them, as well as some basic skills and confidence to take care of themselves.

Often when I study something new in mathematics or statistics, I like to go as far back as I can historically and see how the subject has developed to present day. I'll try and trace back through the references to the earliest papers I can find, and work my way forward from their. Admittedly, it isn't the most efficient way to learn, but I find that approaching things this way gives me a deeper understanding of the topic, and often takes me in directions that I didn't plan on. Applying the same approach to fencing, archery, and other weapons, I plan to trace some of the history of the weapons—by reading books about historical fencing and archery for example—and look at how the thinking and approach to their use has evolved. I've already begun reading about historical fencing, the history of kendo, iaido, and kyudo, even the history of the pocket knife.

Not likely to happen nowadays, but that's not the point.

You might wonder why anyone would want to learn how to use a sword, bow and arrow, or knife. Memorable movies such as The Hunger Games notwithstanding, studying weapons such as a sword or bow isn't about fighting or self-defense. That isn't to say that learning the sword or bow has no defense value; these are still deadly weapons, and the Japanese police still teach their officers kendo for a reason. But in the modern age we live in the most common weapon for self-defense is the gun, and with good reason. If someone breaks in to my home, I'm going to use a gun to protect myself and my family. Guns are the easiest to use and the most powerful weapons I have, so of course I'd use one. But defense isn't the only reason to learn to use a gun, and there is a big difference between owning a gun and knowing how to use one well.

Learning to shoot well requires discipline, self-control, hand-eye coordination, and a good sense of distance and spatial relationships. Fencing and archery require the same things, perhaps more so than firearms. You have to be aware of your surroundings and what the weapon is capable of doing. More than anything else, whether using and edged weapon or a firearm, safety is paramount.

Archery practice:  good for the soul.

The attention to detail that this entails can be hard to learn, especially for someone growing up in today's stimulus saturated society. An ability to focus the mind is a valuable skill, that is increasingly scarce nowadays.

There's been a lot written about the mental benefits of martial arts training, and while psychologists and liberals may not be convinced of the benefits—the general dislike of anything viewed as violent perhaps being the reason—there have been numerous studies that have provided evidence that martial arts training improves the mind as well as the body, especially eastern martial arts which are often heavily focused on spiritual and mental development.

If nothing else, I firmly believe that, contrary to what the “Eat, Pray, Love” new age narcissists of the world believe, you can't learn anything about yourself by staring at your navel and thinking about how wonderful or miserable you are. A complete person has a hobby. You find yourself by losing yourself in something external. For some people it is music, for some people it's yoga. For me it's hunting and shooting. My hope is that by exposing my girls to different things, they'll find something they like.

About This Blog

This blog is mostly about using weapons. In particular, it's about learning to use them safely. This is a scary topic for some people, but it shouldn't be. A weapon is just a tool.

“Watch where you stick that thing” is good advice in general, and it applies to a lot of situations. Special cases of this phrase includes practical things like “don't stick tweezers in an electrical outlet” and “don't stick a fork in a toaster.” Good advice to pass on to your children.

It seems to me that implicit in the words “watch where you stick that thing” is the idea of knowing how to use pointy things in particular and tools in general. Tools aren't much good if you don't know how to use them; they can even be dangerous. A circular saw in the hands of someone that doesn't know how to use it safely is an accident waiting to happen, as is a knife or a gun. If you can't use a tool safely, then you shouldn't use it.
A weapon is a particular kind of tool—one that is primarily intended to inflict damage or harm to another living thing, but just a tool nonetheless. A gun is the example that jumps into most people's minds nowadays, but there is also the bow and arrow, sword, spear, certain types of knives, a variety of martial arts weapons, etc. Like any other tool, it is important to learn to use a weapon safely. It is also important to know exactly what the weapon does. A healthy respect for a weapon is an important thing to have.

Without getting too political, I'll only say that in the United States, the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution says that “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” Arms, meaning weapons, not muskets, but weapons in general. It is clear from the Founder's writings that the right to bear arms is an individual right, necessary for people to protect themselves from tyranny of all stripes. The Supreme Court ruled on it, end of discussion.  Certainly, there are those that will keep trying to strip our (and their) rights away, but I have faith that there is life left in the Constitution yet.

Some people—I hope a minority—hate and fear weapons. They would cheerfully sacrifice all of their freedoms for a temporary feeling of safety. As Benjamin Franklin said “They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety.” These people should be pitied, because they are driven by fear, but they shouldn't be ignored, because the constitute a real danger to a free society.

Freud described the fear of weapons as a sign of retarded sexual and emotional maturity. That may indeed play a role, especially when it comes to the politicians, but I believe one of the major reasons for their fear is that anti-gun people simply have never been shown how to safely handle a weapon. They don't understand anything other than what they see in sensationalized headlines of mass killings and murders. The unfamiliar can be scary, and more importantly, the unfamiliar in ignorant hands is a menace.



Teaching familiarity with weapons teaching a person how to be safe, and how to defend him or herself. Practicing with weapons is good exercise, it's fun, and it's the development of a practical skill all rolled together. As a responsible parent, it's my responsibility to make sure my kids know how to take care of themselves and how to be safe.