Machineguntony
New member
So I was at the gun store a few days ago, shopping for a threaded barrel for my silencers, and the gun store guys are all so burly.
I prefer the term 'silencer' over 'suppressor', and ten years ago, I was very much into the shooting sports, and now I'm getting back into it. My girlfriend, however, is not into shooting, and I am trying to ease her in.
I call it a silencer, and the guys go nuts, 'it's a suppressor, if you don't know what you're talking about you shouldn't be using those things...blah blah blah. It doesn't make the gun silent. It only suppresses, have you ever heard one blah blah blah'.
My girlfriend is already intimidated and now she is even more so.
So I argue that the term, 'supressor' is incorrect for different reasons.
Here are my reasons:
1. The inventor of the silencer, Hiram Percy Maxim, called it a silencer. If he's the inventor, he gets to name it. His invention, the first credited silencer, was called the Maxim Silencer.
2. It's legally known as a 'Silencer' under 26 USC 5845. The legal term is 'silencer', according to law and according to the ATF.
2. English is about communication, and communication is about being understood. If you told the average person about a 'suppressor', they would think you were talking about a dictator. Everyone knows and UNDERSTANDS the word Silencer.
3. The same right wing NRA guys who eschew left wing political correctness, over super accurate descriptive terms like African American or People of Color, get their panties in a bunch and then argue that 'the term silencer is totally incorrect and conveys a bad Hollywood produced image of the assassin'.
4. Not all terms or words must be completely descriptive, so long as they communicate the idea correctly. For example, it's a 'television', not a 'teleaudiovision'; and we don't say that 'computer' is inaccurate because it does more than compute.
5. Finally, 'silencer' is so much damn cooler than 'sound suppressor'.
The gun guys didnt know how to respond, but they swore that it was always a
a suppressor until Hollywood came along with their, peww peww peww (wrong, see number 1 above).
Anyways, my girlfriend likes the term 'silencer', and she's hot, so she gets the final vote.
I prefer the term 'silencer' over 'suppressor', and ten years ago, I was very much into the shooting sports, and now I'm getting back into it. My girlfriend, however, is not into shooting, and I am trying to ease her in.
I call it a silencer, and the guys go nuts, 'it's a suppressor, if you don't know what you're talking about you shouldn't be using those things...blah blah blah. It doesn't make the gun silent. It only suppresses, have you ever heard one blah blah blah'.
My girlfriend is already intimidated and now she is even more so.
So I argue that the term, 'supressor' is incorrect for different reasons.
Here are my reasons:
1. The inventor of the silencer, Hiram Percy Maxim, called it a silencer. If he's the inventor, he gets to name it. His invention, the first credited silencer, was called the Maxim Silencer.
2. It's legally known as a 'Silencer' under 26 USC 5845. The legal term is 'silencer', according to law and according to the ATF.
2. English is about communication, and communication is about being understood. If you told the average person about a 'suppressor', they would think you were talking about a dictator. Everyone knows and UNDERSTANDS the word Silencer.
3. The same right wing NRA guys who eschew left wing political correctness, over super accurate descriptive terms like African American or People of Color, get their panties in a bunch and then argue that 'the term silencer is totally incorrect and conveys a bad Hollywood produced image of the assassin'.
4. Not all terms or words must be completely descriptive, so long as they communicate the idea correctly. For example, it's a 'television', not a 'teleaudiovision'; and we don't say that 'computer' is inaccurate because it does more than compute.
5. Finally, 'silencer' is so much damn cooler than 'sound suppressor'.
The gun guys didnt know how to respond, but they swore that it was always a
a suppressor until Hollywood came along with their, peww peww peww (wrong, see number 1 above).
Anyways, my girlfriend likes the term 'silencer', and she's hot, so she gets the final vote.
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