I try, I really try not to be judgemental of shooters. The tacticool types often get me down because they show up looking like the gun rag editors dressed them, a regular Peter J. Kokalis sideshow they are. So they spent their money and it made them happy. All too often though you will get cornered and they will tell you everything they know. The thought they know nothing never occurs to them. My most common interaction is to correct safety problems, little stuff like loading up behind the firing line, a sure fire way to improve my humor. Can't tell them anything about gun handling, they are all knowing!
Here is a great tacticool interaction story, courtesy of some actual tactical types. A nearby USPSA match often used to draw a few Delta guys from southern NC. They brought their Ranger buddies with them at one point, some of whom were rusty with the pistol. I was RO'ing shooters in my squad and that rustiness led me to politely ask one to refrain from pointing his pistol at his stomach the next time he cleared a malfunction. That wasn't tacticool though, but the next stage was, 40 some round field course and they are going forward of the shooter and scoring/taping targets while the shooter is still finishing up 10 yards away. I asked them to refrain from that, which they did, with the comment that they were just back from afghanistan and were used to 360 deg fire in close confines to each other. I had to comment that we frowned on 360 deg fire in our current setting. Good group of guys, last saw them at a match in early 2003, sporting a satellite phone and full beards, answered the phone and left mid-match, hope they are still okay and doing their thing.
Now an example of tacticool that makes me puke
I live in an area with 80,000 military and a pretty large spec-ops community. I have shot with SEALs, talked with them, bought and sold guns with them. (Be very afraid when one comments that the #1.5 single stage trigger on the Rem 700 you are selling him is "a little heavy
) I know people that work for Blackhawk, got a tour of the place. I try to shoot a lot and be knowledgeable.
Through a fair amount of casual interaction of this sort I still show no desire to act like or pass myself off as a SEAL. Unfortunately, many others do. One fellow is a nice guy, works in a Tactical gear store, goes to gun schools and such. He came to a three gun match at one point with his shorty AR, 18 rails of fury, 3-point sling, tac vest and C-mag. We smoked him.
So, I see him late last year and he is rolling with tricked up Glocks(no harm no foul, I work on my Glocks too) Maximum rooney AR (EOTech, AN/PEQ designator, Surefire Foregrip, etc....) That didn't bother me, after all I have an A2 configuration AR with an ACOG and dressed up in Bowflage warpaint. What got me was the peltor electronic muffs with boom mike and ICS cord, the drop thigh holster, the drop thigh AR mag pouch, the latest load bearing gear with the belt line covered up with mag pouches, dump bags, gi-normous Strider knife sticking out of all of it, it went on and on. I gave him the benefit of the doubt, later asked someone who would know if he had gotten hired on with Blackwater and was getting sent out. Nope, just this guy being this guy, nice guy, okay shooter, but a huge gear queer wannabe.
Now this bothers me why? Few persons that go to that level of dress-up have the integrity to say they just like buying gear when questioned about their affiliations. Their existence is an affront to people who really do wear that gear when doing their job. Furthermore, being in an area with so many real deal people the dress-ups must know that others at least assume they are super secret dreaded deadly demons of darkness. In a word, I find it dishonest.
Now me, am I too tacticool? I like my Blackwater hat. I like it because someone I respect gave it to me for helping run shooting matches. People ask if I work there (nope) or train there(not yet), I am quick to point out I just shoot pistol matches there and it was my home club while I had time to compete. Hopefully again soon. Now chances are if I am wearing a Dillon shirt and Blackwater hat I am not carrying or at a shooting event because I know this says gun to some people. See me in a race car t-shirt and greasy race car hat? Hmmmm. I wear a riggers belt. Why? 4 years old, holds up lots of gun, pants too, very tough. I have exactly too people ask me what I did for a living based on it. Quickly, "just an airplane mechanic". Never bothered to tell the last one I was carrying two guns as he led me on a little guided tour of some land a mile into the woods, he was a probation officer sporting a Glock, I figured I might as well have mine too. My wife sometimes questions why I carry, I asked her how she would have felt going into the woods far from home with this fella had she not known what was inside my leather coat. (Coronado Leather, now there is tactical, not Tacticool, nobody ever sees that as a gun carrier flag). Other than that it is jeans and a T-shirt. My "tactical" pants came from Bass Pro because the zip-off legs rock! I am sure some would consider me a little too tactical, probably the same old revolver guy that thinks an 8 shot revolver is an assault weapon. But, what I do is quite low key and it is me. So, to me tacticool is:
Trying to be someone you are not.
