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(For discussions on politics concerning firearms and gun safety, see Gun Politics or Talk:Gun Politics. This page only deals with non-political aspects of gun safety).

Gun saftey is a collection of rules and recommendations that can be applied when handling firearms. The purpose of gun safety is to eliminate or minimize the amount of unintentional damage, injury and/or death caused by inproper handling of firearms.

Gun safety rules and mindset.

When gun safety is being taught it is often recommended that a certain mindset about firearms is maintained. This mindset is that firearms are inherently dangerous. This follows naturally from the purpose and destructive capabilities of firearms. The purpose of propagating such a mindset is to encourage those that handle firearms to treat them with respect for their destrutive capabilities. The mindset also discourages handlers from playing or toying with firearms, something which may cause accidents.

The rules of gun safety are an extension of this mindset. While there are many variations, the following rules are those most commonly taught during gun safety training:

• Always treat firearms as if they are loaded, not safetied and ready to fire.
• Always point the muzzle away from anything and everything you do not intend to fire upon.
• Always keep your fingers away from the trigger until your are ready to fire.
• Always be sure of your target and its surroudnings.

Treat firearms as if they are loaded.

This rule is intended to minimize the effect of misunderstandings about whether or not a firearm is ready to be discharged. A large portion of firearm accidents stems from scenarios where the handler erronously believes a firearm is emptied, safetied, or otherwise not ready to fire when it fact it is ready to be discharged. If a handler instead always treats firearms as capable of being fired at any time the handler is more likely to take precautions to ensure an unintentional discharge does not cause severe damage.

The rule can be expressed as: "The gun is always loaded". This wording is commonly used during gun safety training. The purpose is to eliminate reasoning such as "But I know my gun is emptied so it's ok". Such reasoning is often found among unexperienced gun handlers and facilitates accident scenarios as described above. A gun safety instructor can respond to such reasoning by restating the rule: "No, your gun is always loaded".

Point the muzzle away from non-targets.

This rule is intended to minimize the damage caused if a firearm is unintentionally discharged. When practicing gun safety, a handler is not only recommended to be aware that the firearm is capable of firing at any time, but also to expect that it might actually do so. As such the handler should always take precautions to minimize the damage caused by an unintended discharge. By pointing the muzzle away from non-targets, the effect of such a discharge will hopefully be less than disastrous.

Two natural safe directions to point the muzzle is either upwards (at the sky) or downwards (at the ground). Both have their advantages and disadvantages. Firing at the ground may result in a ricochet or cause hazardous fragments to be flung at people or material. While this risk is eliminated by pointing the muzzle upwards, an accidental discharge may result in the bullet causing damage when it comes down to the ground again. Indeed several accidents have been caused by discharging firearms into the air. Another risk by pointing a firearm upwards is that this results in an elevated risk that the muzzle will inadverantly be pointed at a non-target, for instance someone's head.

Keep fingers off the trigger.

This rule is intended to prevent a handler from becoming the cause of an undesired discharge. The intended way to discharge a firearm is by pressing its trigger. Indeed modern firearms are commonly designed and constructed in such a way that firing should be impossible by other than pressing the trigger. (Note the key-word "should". Gun safety rules dictates that the handler must not count on that. See rules above). Since humans may perform involontary motions, caused by being startled, by not keeping full attention to body movements or by physiological reasons beyond conscious control such as spasms, a handler should always strive to minimize the harmful effects of such a motion. Keeping fingers away from the trigger lessens the risk of the handler involontarilly discharging a firearm.

It might be noted that in popular culture, such as movies and TV shows, this rule is often violated. These violations occur even when portraying people that ought to be trained in gun safety, such as military personnel or law enforcement officers.

Be sure of your target.

This rule is intended to eliminate or minimize damage to non-targets when purposely discharging a firearm. Unintentional damage may occur if a non-target is misidentified as a target or if the bullet hits something/someone other than the intended target.

To lessen the risk of firing at misidentified non-targets, a handler must positively identify the target as valid. If the situation allows it, all of the above gun safety rules should be observed until the target is validated.

To lessen the risk of damaging non-targets when firing at a valid target, the handler must be aware of the consequences of firing. A bullet may miss the intended target and hit something else, or it may pass through the target while retaining enough energy to cause more damage. As such the handler must observe what is near and behind the target. If non-targets are at risk of being hit by the bullet, the handler may have to refrain from firing.

This rule may create situations that present dilemmas for a handler. Such situations may include for instance a police officer in a riot, or a soldier in a situation where civilians are near the enemy. Indecision or midjudgement of the handler's abilities in such a situation may cause undesired outcomes. Such may be for instance the handler being injured or killed, or the handler violating rules of engagement and causing unintended damage. To prevent such outcomes the handler must be properly trained. This makes it easier for the handler to make appropriate decisions, even if given little time and/or put under severe stress.

Gun safety for firearms not in use.

Guns safety for situations where firearms are not in use are intendend to prevent access to and a subsequent discharge of a firearm. Preventing access to firearms serves a double purpose as it protects the firearm from theft.

A viable method for preventing access to a functioning firearm is to store it disassembled and to keep the parts separated. If a certain part of a firearm is required for it to be able to fire the handler may remove that from the main portion of the firearm and keep it in a separate location. Ammunition may also be stored away from the firearm. (Footnote: Swedish legislation requires owners of firearms to store the firearms with the main body, the "vital piece" and the ammunition in separate locations).

A lock that prevents motion of the trigger, blocks the chamber or in any other way prevents the firearm from being discharged may be used for additional safety. This also makes the firearm less useful to thieves as the firearm cannot be used unless the lock is removed. Such locks are commonly designed so that they cannot be forcibly removed without damaging the firearm in such a way that it is permanently disabled.

If a firearm is intended to be used for self defence at home, special-purpose locking devices exist that allows the owner to store the firearm in a safe manner while still being able to gain quick access to it.

Gun safety for children.

As childern commonly are too young to be allowed to handle guns at all, there is a different set of rules that can be taught to them.

• Stop
• Don't touch.
• Leave.
• Tell an adult.

The purpose of these rules is to prevent children from inadvertantly handling firearms. If a gun is discovered by a child an adult should remove access to the firearm as soon as possible by for instance turning it over to an appropriate agency, such as the police.

History and teachers of gun safety.

While gun safety in different forms has existed since the creation of firearms, modern gun safety is often credited to Jeff Cooper. Being influential in the modern handling of firearms he formalised the above mentioned rules of guns safety.

Other teachers of gun safety include Masaad Ayoob, Clint Smith, Chuck Taylor, and Ignatius Piazza.