If I asked you to picture the average employee at your local gun store I’m sure we would imagine a similar person.
Living in the southern U.S. I can confirm those stereotypes exist for a reason.
I would like to say I can overlook physical biases every time I see a person. But I’d be lying to you. There is an employee at my local range that fits the stereotype better than his coworkers.
He is gruff, may be missing a few teeth, and reeks of cigarette smoke…
Recently I swung by to pick up my new concealed carry firearm. He was the one who’d be doing the paperwork and background check.
His name may have been Alan, or Tim, or even Jeff. It doesn’t matter, they all would fit.
The process was smooth, I’ll give him that. As I filled out the BATF form 4473, he found it necessary to read the questions to me aloud.
As you’d expect, around the question asking about my sex he got snarky.
“I assume you’re not one of those freaks, right” he quipped.
I froze.
Yeah, I realized I was in a gun store. I wasn’t expecting this man to lean left of center in any form.
But there was something so malicious, and so arrogant in his tone i couldn’t help but stop. I looked up at the wall, and filled out my sex as it was on my ID without a word.
Anything else is grounds for a denial.
I am not trans.
I have friends who are though. I taught myself to shoot, and be safe around guns because they started getting death threats.
That pause I took kept my composure. I wasn’t about to argue with this man. Not in a gun store.
I always tell myself I’ll do something different. I’ll stand up to them. I’ll tell to fuck right off.
I’ll say “I’m sorry you’re so scared of your fellow human you’d kill them for being different.”
But I didn’t. And i never have. Because I’m scared.
Right there in that southern gun store, I was gray. This employee saw me as someone who held his ideals. He felt safe sharing his ideals of hatred with me.
And I hate that. I hate that I’m a raging piles of ashes from my former self. I don’t like that I’m angry at my neighbor. I dislike talking with people knowing we know we’d find ourselves on opposite sides of a gun in a lawless land.
And most of all I hate feeling like I needed to learn to shoot because of fear.
I have never wanted to shoot someone, and the thought scares me to death.
Knowing that anytime I carry my gun, there’s a chance I’ll have to choose.
A choice between watching myself or a friend get killed. Or look someone else in the face and strike them down.
I can’t reconcile fixing violence with violence…
Looking someone in the eyes, and realize that they feel fear like I do. We’re humans, and we’re scared creatures by nature.
But sometimes you need to speak someone’s language to make them understand.
And I’ll tell you that the real definition of humanity isn’t intelligence. It’s not some biological factor…
It’s what you fear.
Thank you,
-TME