Jay Peterson
  • Home
  • Acting
    • Headshots
    • Resume
    • Press
    • History
    • Reels
  • The Gruntverse
    • Three briefings before a crisis
    • The Preliminary Report of Marshal Bennett
    • So your kid turned out to be a mage
  • Jay at Play
    • Nonfiction
    • Other videos >
      • Just Blanks
      • Tommy That
      • Machine Gun Shakespeare
      • Igor
  • Blog

Call a weapon a weapon

6/24/2015

0 Comments

 
There is a trend throughout my profession that few know about. If I've mentioned it, it's only been in passing. And I don't think I've ever written how much it's disturbed me.

There's a trend, surprising as it may be, is a refusal to refer to weapons as weapons. Typically, this is a reaction to post-columbine academia, which shits its tweed trousers at the thought of weaponry on campus. Insisting on terms like "theatrical props" or "sports equipment," is a levee against the storm of bullshit for drama departments, fencing teams, and the like to take what refuge they can in.

(The fact that establishing schools as weapon-free zones has been a miserable, blood-soaked failure is another matter. Campus carry becomes a fact of life in more states every year, and progress in that arena continues. But it is only tangential to the matter at hand.)

I can understand the need to placate the huge bureaucracies that control your fate. I know that a humanities discipline can ill-afford to rock the already-shaky ivory tower. And no fencing team wants to share the sad off-campus fate of NSDU's team.

But in the long run (15 years since Columbine, as I write this), this irritating fiction does more harm than I think anyone realizes.

For one thing, it kills credibility. It is impossible to hold up a sword, with a straight face say, "it's a prop, not a weapon," and not look like a godsdamn tool to anyone who's been remotely near a scrum. Worse if it comes from the lips of an instructor. Because now not only have they been stupid enough to say it, they're someone in authority with enough stupidity to say so. Even if an operator is willing to give benefit of doubt (and most will throw said individual right into the mental "fuck this idiot" pile), they'll be distracted for the rest of the session. Their attention will be split between following the lesson and watching the instructor like a hawk, ready for the next asinine thing to come out of their mouth.

For another, it shows a lack of respect for the weapon. Refusing to call a spade a spade encourages one to treat it like something else. In a world where a news commentator throws an axe, misses his target and hits a drummer, we need MORE respect for a weapon, not less.

Yes, weapons inspire fear in those unfamiliar. Familiarity should transform that fear into respect, not unthinking complacency. Such thinking is exactly what leads to "justs." It was "just" a bread knife that went 4 inches into an actor's torso in Tuscon, AZ. It was "just" a throwing axe that fortunately didn't seriously injure a West Point drummer.

On yet another level, it's just dishonest. When I began selling knives, I've been asked why I didn't use this payment service or that retail service, and my answer would take them aback. "They don't allow weapons dealers to use them," I'd say. To which they would be dumbfounded, saying, "But you just make training/prop/theatrical knives."

As if that makes them any less knives. This fundamental dishonesty rankles me.

(I'd like to point out now to all my gentle readers, the ridiculously easy segue into American weapon politics this could lead to. I'm not gonna go there, 'cause it's a whole 'nother kettle of fish. But I easily could go there.

Be grateful for that, motherfuckers.)

Lastly, it lets us hide from the nature of our stories. Drawing a "theatrical prop" with a dramatic flair and all thoughts on spectacle ignores the fact that thousands died on the point of that "prop." In doing so we do no justice to our stories, nor those whose lives they were based on.

Am I saying that every story told with these weapons should be as grim as a drill instructor at a funeral? No. Not at all. And the fact that we're somehow conditioned to expect that is part of the problem. Taking up arms does not confine or relieve someone of the human condition. On the contrary, it brings that condition into a new level of vivid detail. One lost if those extensions of their bodies and will, their weapons, become just another prop to put on the table and have ready.   
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture

    Jay Peterson

    Musings on violence, storytelling, and humanity in general.

    Archives

    December 2022
    October 2022
    September 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    July 2015
    June 2015
    May 2015
    March 2015
    February 2015
    January 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014
    October 2014
    September 2014
    August 2014
    July 2014
    June 2014
    May 2014
    April 2014
    March 2014
    January 2014
    December 2013
    November 2013
    October 2013
    September 2013
    June 2013
    April 2013
    December 2012
    November 2012
    October 2012
    September 2012
    April 2012
    February 2012
    February 2011
    December 2010
    November 2010
    August 2010
    June 2010
    August 2008

    Categories

    All
    2nd Amendment
    Archer
    Armor
    Barbarism
    Blades
    Blanks
    Boobplate
    Book Review
    Chainmail Bikini
    Fight Scene
    Film
    Firearms
    History
    Killology
    Military
    Reality
    Safety
    Set Life
    Shakespeare
    Teacupping
    Theater
    Tucker Thayer
    USMC
    Viking
    War Stories
    Weapon Of The Week
    Workshops
    Wounds

    RSS Feed

Certa Bonum Certamen

Picture