I remember as far back as before and during the 90s, 00s, and even just about 12 or so years ago it seemed shotguns were a widely accepted choice for HD use. Lately, I see a lot of “hate” on shotguns, usually people who say “AR15” or PCC are the better choices will be the ones to talk the most trash. I’m not here to start an argument, nor am I claiming the AR15 to be bad or anything like that. I’m just curious why all the sudden there’s been sort of a shift in opinion? I’m all for personal preference, and could care less if someone tells me what I use for HD isn’t adequate for them, but I find it ridiculous to take it to the extremes many take it on the internet. In my opinion, it seems many of these people have complaints that generally sound like they have no real experience with shotguns. What do you think?
A lot has changed since shotguns ruled the world of HD. As I mentioned in another thread I was born in the late 60's and to the extent that I grew up at all, it was in the 70's and 80's. As a kid I would pour lustfully over
The Shooter's Bible and drool over the ARs. AR's were rare and exotic, and when was young pretty much only Colt (and maybe Armalite) sold them. An AR was rare and quite expensive- when I bought my Min-14 a Cold AR cost around $1500! For reference, as a high school kid I made something like $3.35/hour!
Also, the King of CQB back then was the MP5. All the high-speed, low-drag teams used them. The doctrine of the day was that battle rifles ruled the battlefield, subguns ruled the CQB space, cops carried wheelguns and you had an 870 behind the door of the bedroom.
Of course nowadays ARs are at commodity pricing the way flatscreen TVs are. Mini-14s and AKs are expensive.
And the AR platform has been tweaked and refined over the 60 years it's been around! Subguns have mostly fallen out of favor and been replaced by SBRs. Suppressors are more common. I never saw a cop with a rifle or carbine in a squad car back in the day but now they're common.
So yeah, I don't think shotguns are "hated" but the rise of the AR has cut deeply into the domain of the shotgun. The AR is much easier to shoot well, has lower recoil, high rates of fire, deep magazines and tons of options. They're more reliable for a relative nOOb than a pump shotgun IMO (I'm a fairly experienced shooter and I still occasionally short-stroke a pump shottie).
The rise of the choose-your-own-reality media is another issue. If you just look at the crime stats we live in perhaps the safest era in human history. Across the board violent crimes are much lower than in the 70's and 80's. Pockets of higher crime of course exist. But the media left and right has learned to sensational crime to sell ads. If you only watched Fox News you could be forgiven for thinking there are 500 home invasions every day. While the mythical "home invasion CREW" has penetrated the middle class psyche the opinion has arisen that the mostly likely threat will be five armed invaders busting down your door at night. The reality based on actual facts indicate that if you own an AR but don't own a fire extinguisher, you're an idiot. But this siege mentality and fear of the "other" has grown very strong in modern society.
So in a nutshell, the shotgun has lost ground due to competition from newer technology that offers certain advantages over it. An atmosphere of FUD has arisen where elites control the population through fear of the other. And the general decline of places to shoot and of hunting and shooting sports means that less people grew up hunting and running a pump shotgun.
JMOHO.