I’ve never liked the “the gun is always loaded” thing. Until you check it you assume it is loaded. THEN YOU CHECK IT!! Then you always TREAT it as if it was loaded.
A friend of a friend was showing off his fancy H&K bullpup years ago. I asked him to show me that it was unloaded. He argued that it WAS unloaded. I left - the guy had more money than brains.
Even with toy guns it took me awhile to get used to my boy when he was young playing with them and “shooting” people with it. We visited an old hunting buddy of mine and he told my son not to point the toy gun at him or anyone or he would take it away. I agreed with my friend and told my son. Yes - it did end up getting taken away for the day!
“A friend of a friend was showing off his fancy H&K bullpup years ago. I asked him to show me that it was unloaded. He argued that it WAS unloaded. I left - the guy had more money than brains.”
Being obsessive about following gun handling rules saved my butt from a nasty accident. A friend and I came back from deer hunting with our revolvers. We both had the same gun but I had just had an action job done on mine and we were comparing trigger pulls in his parent’s basement. Both guns were empty of course with my friend’s 6 rounds sitting on the table near the ammo box. I went to take a whiz and his mother called us to dinner. When I came out his gun was just where he left it with the 6 rounds sitting on the table. I picked it up, cocked it and took aim at the water heater to try the trigger pull again. I had about 4# of pressure on the 5 # trigger but was bothered by not checking to see if it was loaded. This felt silly since the gun was in the exact same place as when I left, as was 6 rounds, and it was less than a minute since it was last checked. Never the less I uncocked it, opened the cylinder and was astonished to find 6 LIVE ROUNDS. In the minute I was gone my friend had reloaded his gun with ammo from the box and left the original 6 on the table. I was never again tempted to handle a gun without making sure it was unloaded every time it left my hand.