“Assault weapon.” Sixteen-round “clip.” A box of “bullets.” When it comes to firearms, there’s no shortage of misused terminology. Sometimes the error is committed innocently, a simple mistake owing to the shooter’s ignorance. As your source for holsters, speed loaders, and everything in between, Speed Beez is going to tackle some of the most misused gun terms today.
- Clip vs. Magazine: You know that boxy rectangular thingy that holds cartridges and slides into the bottom of your semi-auto pistol? It’s not a clip — no matter how often the term is misused. It’s a magazine. So, what is a clip? A cartridge “clip” has no spring and does not feed shells directly into the chamber like a magazine does but rather holds cartridges in the correct sequence for “charging” a specific firearm’s magazine.
- Assault Rifles vs. Assault Weapons vs. Semi-Automatic Rifles: The term “assault rifle” is perhaps the most commonly misused gun term, and certainly it’s one of the most damaging to the public’s perception of firearms. The U.S. Department of Defense defines assault rifles as “selective-fire weapons that fire a cartridge intermediate in power between sub-machine gun and rifle cartridges.” The AR-15 and other civilian carbines errantly called assault rifles do no such thing. They are semi-automatic, non-battlefield firearms. While the term “assault rifle” is frequently misused, the term “assault weapon” doesn’t even really exist.
- Precision vs. Accuracy: These seemingly synonymous terms are often used interchangeably, but they describe two distinct aspects of shots on target. Accuracy is a measurement of the shooter’s ability to consistently hit a given target; precision is essentially the tightness of his groups.
