Geoffrey Boothroyd wrote some letters to Ian Fleming about James Bond's armoury, which Fleming took on board. Fleming incorporated a Boothroyd character into the books who was later merged with Q.
Generally, all long guns that are not auto/semi-auto must be cycled after every shot in order to chamber another round. This includes pump-action, bolt-action, and lever-action rifles/shotguns. There are exceptions, such as revolver rifles.
There are also instances when semi-auto pistols might need to be cycled after every round.
Only Americans care about this. Most of us in the rest of world never even saw a real gun, let alone holding one in hand, and know intricate details like this.
Go to any rural community in any country in the world and you’ll probably find at least one rifle of some kind.
I’m very in favor of strict gun laws, especially for handguns, but rifles have very legitimate and important uses for people who live away from dense urban environments.
Biggest handgun myth is about dogs and self defense.
Loose aggressive dog is not a human. It is dangerous vermin that can kill you! You are absolutely allowed to play it safe, defend yourself, and shoot it (the same way you would kill mosquito).
"It just wants to play" is not an argument, you are not a "toy" for some strange dog. It was "reactive" is also not an argument, you have no obligation to suffer its "reaction" to the full end.
Dog owners will say they have a right to mangle child, for petting their dog (it was self defense). They will also insist dogs are safe around the children, two sentences latter. Do not listen to them!
I am a dog owner, and I agree that a loose and aggressive dog is a liability to humanity and you are making everyone a favor if you kill it even if you could have escaped (e.g. you manage to get into your car in time). If it was attacking you, it could be a child (or another dog, too) next time. I would say that even a loose, non aggressive dog of a breed that is very statistically likely to mangle people (e.g. Bully XL) should be taken away from their owners that same day.
I think there should be mandatory courses the owner needs to take to own these breeds (and pass the exam with satisfactory marks), loose or not if one slip of a leash can lead to a kid getting mangled then it's not safe for the owner to walk even a leashed untrained dog.
As a fellow dog owner I feel obligated to point out that not all barking is aggressive.
People not used to dogs often seem to think it is, and I'd hate for people to start shooting dogs just because they bark. Dogs bark, it's what they do.
Maybe we just do not give a damm if its agressive, or teritorial or reactive barking? The dog will bite anyway. Or maybe it just wants a quickie humping?
Like we are suppose to guess that tail wagging is safe because it is 1.5hz with 10 degree amplitude is safe (but only if ears are not raised)? Or running away is bad?
It is just a trap to blame a victim for "provoking" an attack. Dog should be secured and on leash, that is what responsible dog owners do!
Now this is certainly a take. A bad one, surely, but a take nonetheless.
Don’t pet strange dogs. Don’t let your children pet strange dogs. Don’t mess with animals you don’t know unless you’re willing to risk being bitten or worse. Simple as that.
I'm not a handgun expert at all but I've caught a few of these, like the guy who racked the slide on his revolver. The author who really impressed me, although not with his handgun knowledge, was Tom Clancy. I was in the anti-submarine warfare business in the 1970s and some of what he wrote in Red October I only knew from classified sources.
There's a rumor that Reagan very seriously asked his admirals repeatedly if it was true. I know he "couldn't put it down."
Tangentaly related observation, but Reagan may have been the only president to really pay attention to movies and entertainment for inspiration of future events, and possibilities. It was said that he had a similar reaction to War Games, and took it very seriously
Precedent: A 1944 science fiction story accurately described an atomic bomb – so much so that it prompted a visit from the FBI to the NY office of Astounding Science Fiction. Definitely a point of pride for editor John W Campbell.
If I was doing this, I'd take it to extremes: "He heard the 'snick' of the revolver's safety as the baddie slid a fresh magazine into the handle, followed moments later by the click-click as the bolt shot home".
If _you_ sound like this when talking about IT then you really ought to reevaluate your social skills. It’s not the topic, it’s the stuck-uppiness of it all.
I guess my pet peeve of "firing an arrow" is also a gun mistake of sorts. It can be found in many fantasy books. A bow is not a gun, there's no gunpowder involved. If a commander orders his archers to "fire" what should they do, set their bows on fire?
"Loose" is kind of for a volley of arrows, not aimed, just pointing in the general direction of the attacking horde. Otherwise, you shoot them, not fire them. In English.
This is a good example of movies using inaccurate depictions that audiences will easily understand instead of accurate depictions that may confuse them.
I was just watching Tom Scott's latest video, he mentioned firing a trebuchet and the guide pointed this out that you don't "fire" a trebuchet since it doesn't involve gunpowder, you launch it.
Tom's commentary later was that he disagreed with that sentiment. "I disagree with those potential comments. Words change their meaning overtime. In modern English, you can fire an arrow, you can fire a torpedo, we were gonna fire that trebuchet"
In the US Navy at least, you don't "fire" a torpedo, you "shoot" it. The lore is that "fire" has a very specific, very urgent meaning on a warship and you don't use that word unless there actually is a fire.
There are lost of these hyper-specific "reserved keywords" in the military. Another one from the US Army is "repeat", which is the command for an artillery battery to fire again with the same parameters as their previous barrage. Therefore on the radio we only ever used "say again" to ask someone to repeat their last transmission. Even if no one on the radio had ever or would ever be involved in artillery operations, I imagine it's easier to just train the entire force on a single uniform standard.
In reverse, "point blank" is an archery term indicating the distance where, with your bow fully drawn, the point of the arrow can be sighted directly on the target. (Closer and you have to bring the point down, farther and you have to bring the point above the target.)
It seems that "point blank" has come to mean simply, "a shot you can't miss".
One thing I have noticed messed up in a lot of fiction (written/tv/movies/etc) is how loud guns actually are. Scenes of multiple people without any hearing protection emptying their guns that doesn't have any kind of supressors/silencer multiple times in a closed space (usually a single room) and then just casually chatting with each 5 seconds later.
In general the sounds of guns are very bad in most movies/tv shows (Heat from 1995 comes closest for me).
I wonder if part of this is also failing to consider the acoustic effect of loud sounds in enclosed spaces. Guns don’t sound nearly as loud if you only shoot outside.
Guns are still not hearing-safe outside. And if you're indoors, you probably should double up on the hearing protection (foam plugs with over the ear protection on top)
This one is not that surprising in mass media - there's no way the good guys and bad guys are going to take a pause and actually put on PPE before the shoot out.
A buddy of mine was showing off his new Ruger hammerless .357 to me. Intrigued by the hammerless design, I asked him where the safety was. He fiddled with it and the thing went off. We were both deaf for about a week. The round went through a dresser and 2 dry walls. We found the slug in the kitchen (we were in another room). I lived to tell, but guns are indeed loud, even a 22.
I'm sure it exists, but we need this for movies. Of all the things I wish the movie industry would do, removing the sound of racking a slide or pulling back a hammer...on an automatic.. is top of my list of things that need to absolutely go.
Please, these are more often than not just creative choices, sure they may be inaccurate but accuracy is seldom the point a director is trying to make when taking creative liberties like this.
If every movie was as close to reality as possible they wouldn’t be classified as entertainment.
Honestly maybe my favourite part of being an author is being able to get briefly and deeply obsessed with any topic I choose - it's a rare privilege.
Beginning and then almost immediately dropping niche hobbies (eg flight simulators, poker, guns in the linked post) is transformed from something a spouse or partner might see as an undesirable and potentially annoying personality trait, into: "this is research, darling, it's my job", which is probably significantly more annoying.
It is easy to make mistakes with a verb one might not think to question like "cocked". Of course, ideally, you'd question every word used, so that the % of readers who understand its full associated meaning don't have their immersion in a story suddenly & painfully torn away.
To be less glib, I find that when speaking about a topic from a character's perspective - in dialogue or narration - a relatively important part of empathising with their point-of-view is understanding the physical and linguistic structure of their world. Sometimes I find there's no way to do this without putting hundreds of hours into understanding the tools they would use or the way they would live. Write what you know!
One of the things about fiction is that it gets almost everything wrong. It isn’t just guns. It’s professions like spies and snipers, cars, boats, planes, programming/hacking, technology, etc. And those are just the areas that I personally know they get wrong, because I know more than the average person in those areas.
Some people judge fiction way too harshly for inconsequential but inaccurate details which only serve for narrative structure. There are actually tons of authors who get all of these details right, but you almost never read their books because if they can get them published at all, nobody reads them, because they absolutely suck. An author that gets these details right and is actually a good storyteller is extremely rare. It’s basically a list consisting of Tom Clancy and John Le Carre.
It’s just a pet peeve. At some point you have to let it go, or you’ll end up wasting your time writing blog posts begging authors who don’t care to talk to you so they won’t get inconsequential details wrong.
When a certain now famous (in those circles) narrator was first getting started he mentioned on his FB page he wanted help with pronunciation of certain military terminology. I offered to help, knowing people in many fields plus my own. And ... my goodness, the absolute poor quality of some the writing he sent me. One author would use the full terminology for every firearm every time he looked at it, picked it up, loaded it, holstered it, drew it, released the safety, fired it, cleaned it, thought about while in the shower, whatever. You got tired of reading about the "Heckler & Koch HK45 Compact Tactical (HK45CT) MK-24 Mod-0" fully spelled out three times a page.
And then the author with his own specialty started writing about my field ... oh so badly.
So, knowledge of weapons doesn't translate in knowledge of writing (or vice versa). My only criteria any longer is just don't say "clip" unless your character has scored himself a Mauser C96 or similar and we're good.
Then most people on this comment section would have to find something else to preach and declare absolute knowledge about. Ah wait, that’s just every comment section around here.
Somehow this almost inspired me to write some fiction just for the sole purpose of including some real howlers of this kind, that the average reader wouldn't notice. I wonder how many you could squeeze into one scene.
I'm surprised that no-one has mentioned the "magic unlimited magazine" yet, especially with fully-automatic weapons. It's distracting to watch the hero shoot and shoot and shoot and never reload.
Big props to the John Wick franchise for making reloading* a first-class part of their gun-fu choreography.
* ...and badass one-handed press checks that no-one should ever do IRL.
* Finger on the trigger. Very dangerous. Pulp Fiction showed the consequences
* Using ball ammo
I actually dislike the pistols without manual safety. CCW people always say: but the Glock/P365/P320/VP9/... have an internal safety, a trigger safety and a drop safety.
But these safeties are not additive. If your trigger safety fails, the gun will go off. Same with the drop safety.
At least with a manual safety those are additional. It's not that because your car has an airbag that you stop wearing your seatbelt right?
66 comments
[ 0.24 ms ] story [ 60.9 ms ] thread* People pumping shotguns after every round, or cycling the bolt after every round
* Wrong action for the gun
* Wrong shotgun ammo for the context
* Wrong safety type for the gun (most long guns have safeties, but they are operated in a variety of ways)
* Magazine vs clip vs chamber vs tube
There are also instances when semi-auto pistols might need to be cycled after every round.
I’m very in favor of strict gun laws, especially for handguns, but rifles have very legitimate and important uses for people who live away from dense urban environments.
Loose aggressive dog is not a human. It is dangerous vermin that can kill you! You are absolutely allowed to play it safe, defend yourself, and shoot it (the same way you would kill mosquito).
"It just wants to play" is not an argument, you are not a "toy" for some strange dog. It was "reactive" is also not an argument, you have no obligation to suffer its "reaction" to the full end.
Dog owners will say they have a right to mangle child, for petting their dog (it was self defense). They will also insist dogs are safe around the children, two sentences latter. Do not listen to them!
People not used to dogs often seem to think it is, and I'd hate for people to start shooting dogs just because they bark. Dogs bark, it's what they do.
Like we are suppose to guess that tail wagging is safe because it is 1.5hz with 10 degree amplitude is safe (but only if ears are not raised)? Or running away is bad?
It is just a trap to blame a victim for "provoking" an attack. Dog should be secured and on leash, that is what responsible dog owners do!
Don’t pet strange dogs. Don’t let your children pet strange dogs. Don’t mess with animals you don’t know unless you’re willing to risk being bitten or worse. Simple as that.
Can I run away? Or is that me "messing" with strange animal and initiating a conflict?
Can I walk on "their teritory" (also known as public street or park)? Or is there some broken rule here?
What if dog is really really horny, and wants small dog I am carrying?
> willing to risk being bitten or worse
I am not willing to risk that. I will not allow that! Simple as that!
Tangentaly related observation, but Reagan may have been the only president to really pay attention to movies and entertainment for inspiration of future events, and possibilities. It was said that he had a similar reaction to War Games, and took it very seriously
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Deadline_(science_fiction_stor...
Did I make anyone grind their teeth?
I know nothing about arrows except to identify the pointy end.
https://acoup.blog/2025/05/02/collections-why-archers-didnt-...
Just think of it as a translation.
Tom's commentary later was that he disagreed with that sentiment. "I disagree with those potential comments. Words change their meaning overtime. In modern English, you can fire an arrow, you can fire a torpedo, we were gonna fire that trebuchet"
It seems that "point blank" has come to mean simply, "a shot you can't miss".
In general the sounds of guns are very bad in most movies/tv shows (Heat from 1995 comes closest for me).
This one is not that surprising in mass media - there's no way the good guys and bad guys are going to take a pause and actually put on PPE before the shoot out.
I assume a lot of writers get their misinformation from Hollywood sound effects and the countless other gun related liberties.
Like the terminator asking for a phased plasma rifle in a 40W range. Everyone knows those weren't available until 1997.
If every movie was as close to reality as possible they wouldn’t be classified as entertainment.
Beginning and then almost immediately dropping niche hobbies (eg flight simulators, poker, guns in the linked post) is transformed from something a spouse or partner might see as an undesirable and potentially annoying personality trait, into: "this is research, darling, it's my job", which is probably significantly more annoying.
It is easy to make mistakes with a verb one might not think to question like "cocked". Of course, ideally, you'd question every word used, so that the % of readers who understand its full associated meaning don't have their immersion in a story suddenly & painfully torn away.
To be less glib, I find that when speaking about a topic from a character's perspective - in dialogue or narration - a relatively important part of empathising with their point-of-view is understanding the physical and linguistic structure of their world. Sometimes I find there's no way to do this without putting hundreds of hours into understanding the tools they would use or the way they would live. Write what you know!
Some people judge fiction way too harshly for inconsequential but inaccurate details which only serve for narrative structure. There are actually tons of authors who get all of these details right, but you almost never read their books because if they can get them published at all, nobody reads them, because they absolutely suck. An author that gets these details right and is actually a good storyteller is extremely rare. It’s basically a list consisting of Tom Clancy and John Le Carre.
It’s just a pet peeve. At some point you have to let it go, or you’ll end up wasting your time writing blog posts begging authors who don’t care to talk to you so they won’t get inconsequential details wrong.
And then the author with his own specialty started writing about my field ... oh so badly.
So, knowledge of weapons doesn't translate in knowledge of writing (or vice versa). My only criteria any longer is just don't say "clip" unless your character has scored himself a Mauser C96 or similar and we're good.
Big props to the John Wick franchise for making reloading* a first-class part of their gun-fu choreography.
* ...and badass one-handed press checks that no-one should ever do IRL.
But these safeties are not additive. If your trigger safety fails, the gun will go off. Same with the drop safety.
At least with a manual safety those are additional. It's not that because your car has an airbag that you stop wearing your seatbelt right?