Never point a gun at anything you don’t want dead or destroyed.
How many times have you heard a story on the news where someone was accidentally shot after firing a gun they “knew” was empty? On Thanksgiving Day, 2008, a man fatally shot himself in the head after putting a pistol to his temple, assuring everybody that it was empty, and pulling the trigger. These kinds of accidents could easily be avoided if everybody followed the golden rule of guns – “The gun is always loaded. Period.” If you find yourself holding a firearm, before you do anything, ask yourself if you’d act like that if the gun was loaded. Pointing a gun at a buddy? That’s a criminal act. Pointing a gun at yourself? That’s grounds to get you thrown into therapy. A gun is only safe when it’s in pieces or locked up in a safe.
