I had the opportunity on Friday to introduce another new person to the world of shooting.  A friend of mine at work had a programmer working on his project who is here from Brazil.  She had never been shooting before and wanted to see what it was like. 

We met at Bass Pro on Friday evening and after getting setup in the range, I gave her the basic lecture on the three rules and then showed her the basic operation of the S&W 22s.  I set the target pretty close for the initial shots, and she took to it pretty quickly and was soon putting most of her shots in the 10-ring.  After she’d gotten comfortable with the .22 she wanted to try something a little bigger, so I let her try the Taurus 92 (she picked this one because it was made in Brazil ).  While she put the shot in the bottom of the 10-ring, she decided that it had too much recoil for her (I also think she was uncomforable with it because it’s a double-stack and she had very small hands).  But overall, she really enjoyed the experience.

Afterwards we all went to dinner at Big Buck’s.  We got to talking a bit about guns and guns laws in general, since she mentioned that Brazil’s laws were so restrictive.  It turns out that they just made them worse.

Now, under a new law hailed by supporters as the most sweeping gun-control measure in South America, only Brazilians with valid reasons — police and security guards, for example — are allowed to carry firearms in public.

Ordinary citizens who own guns either must register their weapons, turn them in or face jail time.

…

The new law requires background checks for prospective buyers, raises the legal age for gun ownership from 21 to 25, demands that all guns be registered and imposes prison sentences of up to four years for violators.

One of the things that she told us is that almost everyone there has a gun, but they don’t know how to use them, since the restrictions keep them from actually getting out and practicing.  In general, the problems in Brazil seem to be more related to drug gangs and other criminals than to people owning guns.  They have trouble with crime in general there, with criminals kidnapping people to drain their ATM accounts and with carjackings.  She mentioned on seeing my Avalanche that a vehicle like that in Brazil would make me a target for criminals, where it’s a pretty common vehicle here. 

Of course, the fact that gangs will have guns regardless of the law seems to be lost on the gun-grabbers.  Perhaps if a few of the targets were armed (and knew how to use their guns) and killed a few gang members these problems would start to take care of themselves.  Maybe what Brazil really needs is a Louisana carjacker law.