I just had an odd experience...

[Archae]

I am up at my Mom's place in Northern Wisconsin for a few days, helping her.

I was at the hardware store with her, small town near her place.

At the end of an aisle in the hardware store were several assault rifles for sale.

I picked up, and handled an AR-15. Yes. Same one used in Connecticut.

It's one thing to see those guns on the news, or in Internet message boards like here.

But here I was holding the same type of gun that killed all those kids.

Sure felt strange.

[BainsBane]

1. Just laying out there?

Like it was an umbrella or something? Not even behind the counter or in a case?

[Archae]

2. Just sitting out, in a display at the end of an aisle, close to the cashier.

They wanted $999 for it.

[BainsBane]

4. He really out to lower the price to $666

Good grief.

[ZombieHorde]

3. That's interesting to me.

How did it make you feel and/or what did it make you think? I'll completely understand if the experience was too difficult to put into words.

[galileoreloaded]

5. is it hard to pick up a phone book? a skateboard?

why an object contains such emotion is for me the definition of woo.

its fascinating.

[uppityperson]

17. I do not know of a mass murder commited by phone book.

[galileoreloaded]

22. only for a lack of imagination. nt

[ZombieHorde]

20. I think in our minds objects can also be symbols.

I think it is the symbol that evokes emotion more than the collection of atoms themselves.

[galileoreloaded]

21. but its only in your mind, and not real. thats solipsism. nt

[ZombieHorde]

24. I don't think my position on this is solipsism because

solipsism is more broad than our emotions the meanings we place on symbols. I think the belief that our emotions and the meanings we apply to symbols as only being in our minds is common to most philosophies.

[Fumesucker]

23. I guess you could get used to working around nuclear weapons too

But I know I'd feel a bit odd touching one for the first time.

[Archae]

6. Just felt strange to me.

I was holding that same kind of gun.

And if I had about $1000, (plus more for ammo) I could have walked out of the store with that gun.

[Cirque du So-What]

7. This I find odd

You're in Wisconsin, yet the hardware store isn't Menards. After a few days of listening to TV while visiting my daughter in La Crosse, I thought that 'save big money at Menards' was the state song.

[BainsBane]

9. I like Menards

but it isn't a hardware store. It's huge, a locally owned Home Depot.

[Cirque du So-What]

12. I like Menards too

I go to the one in my town quite often. My comment was about Menards media saturation in Wisconsin proper. I believe their corporate HQ is in Eau Claire.

[BainsBane]

13. Yeah, I got that

We have them in the Twin Cities too. I much prefer Menards to Home Depot.

[Cirque du So-What]

16. If I never set foot in a Home Depot again

it'll be too soon. Aside from things I've heard about the shitty way they treat their employees, they always seemed to be out of the most basic things. The straw that broke the camel's back for me was finding them sold out of Romex flexible electrical cable.

[BainsBane]

18. I more often go to the local hardware store

the Ace Hardware. They have plenty of staff to help me find stuff and figure out what I need. If I need a lot of stuff, I'll head over to Menards.

[Tierra_y_Libertad]

8. I was holding an M-14 when I started my journey to being a pacifist.

It was in early 1965, just a few months before I was to say good-bye to the Marine Crotch. We had to qualify every 6 months on the rifle range. So, there I was sitting there drinking hot coffee out of a canteen cup while waiting for the next group of targets to be "pulled" and start banging at them when the realization really hit me that they wanted me to kill people. People I didn't know, probably would like if I met them, so LBJ could prove he was "tough on Communism".

When, later, they asked me to extend my enlistment, which would have meant going to Vietnam, I told them to shove it and added a few pithy words about LBJ.

Got me 30 days on mess duty...but that beat killing people.

[Flashmann]

10. Wow!!! That means

Any nut that can his his mitts on a clip and a handful of rounds,can stroll in there,pick the gun up as you did,but then snap a loaded clip in it,then use it to hold the place up on his way out...Seems awfully convenient.

[onehandle]

11. Yeah. Holding an object built for the singular purpose of hunting and killing humans...

...is a bizarre thing.

It's a military weapon. Period.

[Tx4obama]

14. I hope you wiped your finger prints off of it, no telling where the gun will end up.

[LeftofObama]

15. Good point!

I hadn't even thought of that!

[LuvNewcastle]

19. My dad has a rifle that his dad took from

a dead Japanese soldier during WWII. He used to hang it on the wall. It was perfectly safe; we didn't even have bullets for it. I used to wonder if that rifle ever killed any U.S. soldiers. I always feel a sense of awe when I think about how everything is connected and everything has a destiny.